The way we think about our quest for happiness can affect what we do and the outcomes we achieve. We think these quotes are helpful provocations, potentially helping us reframe how we think about happiness. Summary by The World of Work Project
Happiness Quotes
These are some quotes that we enjoy as provocations with people exploring their path towards happiness.
“Happiness depends upon ourselves.”
often attributed to Aristotle
“Happiness is not a goal...it's a by-product of a life well-lived.”
Eleanor Roosevelt
“The secret of happiness, you see, is not found in seeking more, but in developing the capacity to enjoy less.”
often attributed to Socrates
“The best way to cheer yourself up is to try to cheer somebody else up.”
Mark Twain
"You see, the secret is I don't really care what happens"
Jiddu Krishnamurti
“If you look for the good in people and give them the benefit of the doubt, you will be much happier.”
often attributed to Confucius
“Comparison is the thief of joy”
often attributed to Teddy Roosevelt
“Everywhere I go, there I am”
often attributed to Confucius
Learning More
Miswanting and hedonic adaptation are good starting places to learn a bit more. Laurie Santos’ free, on-line course, “The science of wellbeing” (Link to Coursera) is also worth checking out as it’s excellent.
You might also want to learn a bit more about wellbeing, the PERMA model, positive thinking and the GREAT DREAM model.
We also think that acceptance is a key part of this. We can’t be and do everything. We think Oliver Burkeman’s book, “4000 weeks“, is helpful in relation to acceptance.
Our podcast on happiness might be of interst too, though it looks at things in a slightly different way:
The World of Work Project View
Happiness can be a very elusive thing, be it in work or in the wider world. To be honest, we’re not sure it’s a goal that should even be followed. Potentially the quest for it increases our sense of not having it. We’re more in favour of focusing on contentment and satisfaction, or perhaps even living without discomfort or suffering.
That said, we also know that there are many pressures on individaul’s mental health in the world at the moment, ranging from the climate crisis to global conflicts, increasing isolation and lonliness, social media related anxiety and financial pressures. It’s a tough time, which makes many of use feel that even contentment and satisfaction are far away.
It also doesn’t help that the world is constantly vying for our attention and engagement, often in ways that activate us emotionally. Given all of this, we think it helpful to ask if we’re looking for happiness in the right places and in the right ways.
These quotes are really nothing more than little provocations to help us reflect on that and which hopefully lead us some partly towards helpful realisations.
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Sources and Feedback
There are no specific quotes for these, they are just things we’ve picked up that we think are helpful.
We’re a small organization who know we make mistakes and want to improve them. Please contact us with any feedback you have on this post. We’ll usually reply within 72 hours.
