What Does Happiness Mean to You Right Now?

This has been a year of challenges, frustration, heartache, and not knowing what to do next. We are left to our own devices to create some kind of normalcy in our homes. In about two weeks, we celebrate Thanksgiving and for sure, it will probably be quite different for many families. Let us just stop for a minute here and offer our condolences to any of our readers who have suffered unbearable losses. Our hearts are with you.

Many of these emotions are new to us and can feel awkward because we have lived a certain way and changes are occurring rapidly—some of them becoming permanent. The important thing to remember is even though this is a whole different way of looking at the world (masks, social distancing, grocery limitations, etc.) that doesn’t necessarily mean our lives are taking a turn for the worse if we keep our health intact.

Our outlook can eventually become one of encouragement and an incentive to change things for the better. For instance, we know of a person who is now permanently working full-time from home since her company has suspended “live” operations on-site for all employees and permanently closed its physical doors. This has been a blessing for her not to have to commute to work every day and, additionally, for her second grader who is now enjoying homeschooling and having mom nearby.

Open the Door and Get Some Fresh Air

“Happiness sneaks in through a door you didn’t know you left open.” (John Barrymore, American actor)

It’s true, some of us are feeling a bit isolated right now not being able to see our friends and family in person much. We are beginning to realize life may never really be the same as before this pandemic. So, the best effort we can make would be to “reinvent” our lives for the better.

We can start by figuring out what happiness currently means to us. Like right now. Today. This week. This month. It probably will be quite different than last year so really think about it. What is our number one need and how can we find a way to make that happen?

Would connecting with a friend be our current wish? That might mean picking up the phone to hear their voice instead of emailing or texting. Or maybe meeting for lunch in a park if we stay six feet apart. We not only will cause our own happiness but cause our friend some happiness too. Bingo!

Are we really missing out on some great food? True, we may not be able to go to our favorite restaurant if they don’t have dine-in service, but we certainly can go to the grocery store, pick up some items, go home, and surprise ourselves by trying out a new recipe. There will probably be leftovers for tomorrow too.

It’s possible we are going “stir crazy” staying at home so much. And even though we thought all our closets and drawers would get cleaned out and organized once and for all, it just hasn’t happened. So maybe gathering a few family members, packing up the car, and going camping for a few days will change our outlook drastically.

Where Is Our Happiness?

Okay, we get the idea. We can certainly go through that door and make our own happiness. Try out old things in a new way. Develop new daily routines. Let’s face it--we are the only ones holding ourselves back. Everyone is in the same boat right now so no sense making things worse by complaining, whining, and giving up. That’s not us. Life is a big challenge, especially now, but we are strong, determined women ready for anything. Let’s make it happen!

The last suggestion to move closer to happiness is to either continue praying or start praying for friends, family, neighbors, our cities, states, country, and the world that we will see an end to Covid-19 in the near future. Those are seven important categories, so maybe choose one each day and really pray for needs to be met whatever they are.  

God knows. 

God cares.

God helps.

He’s waiting to hear from us.

"Make me walk along the path of your commands, for that is where my happiness is found" (Psalm 119:35 NLT).

 

How to Listen to That Voice Inside

“One early morning around three o’clock as my husband and I was sleeping soundly, our four-year-old son somehow managed to unlock our front door and leave the house on an adventure! He walked all the way down our neighborhood block by himself in the dark.

“Eventually, he turned around and started back but got confused about which house was ours. Thankfully, he ended up in the yard of our next-door neighbors and tried to ride one of the bicycles left outside by their children that day making plenty of noise in the process. Several minutes later we were awakened by a loud knocking on our door.

“Being cautious, we didn’t want to open the door to a stranger in the middle of the night. So, we yelled through the door, ‘Who is it!?’ Our neighbor said to open the door because she had our son with her! ‘No way. That’s not possible,' I said. 'He’s asleep in his bed.’ Her voice (which I then recognized) came back with a panicked shout, ‘OPEN THE DOOR NOW!’

“Finally, we were convinced and opened the door. There stood our son in his pajamas, happy as could be. When questioned, he said he just wanted to find his new bicycle. We discovered that night what sleep-walking can do even to a child. And we were grateful for the wisdom of a good neighbor who listened to her own intuition in the middle of the night.” [B.C. 1973]

Possibilities and Imagination

Has that ever happened to anyone else? No, maybe not that same situation, but something that caused us to stop and listen to what’s going on in our minds. A moment when we are not sure what to do, but suddenly something tells us to turn around and go a different way or to stop and speak to that person we hardly know but who ends up helping us in a sticky situation.

Sometimes our thoughts, or intuition, will lead us into believing something is possible or likely. In fact, our gut feeling may have prompted us exactly like that when we finally made the decision to start a new single-again life. We saw it as a possibility. It may not have been our decision to begin with but slowly we listened to our own thoughts and started planning our future with some imagination.

No matter which stages we are in right now—shock, denial, fear, possibility, or I-can-do-this attitude—the fact remains, life goes on with or without us. So, let’s not get left behind and buried in the chaos of the past. Creating a life of peace and joy may be difficult, yes, but oh, so very worth it!

Welcome the Voice Inside

We all have voices inside from the time we are born. They direct us to choose right from wrong, truth from lies, friends from enemies, and harmony from pandemonium. The main question is then, how can we learn to recognize and separate the voices playing tug-of-war in our heads?

Maybe, just maybe, training our ears to accept the most decent and honorable paths will bring us our best life. To begin, we need to develop practices and patterns to help us stay on track, and then they will just become second nature to us. Try these one at a time and keep adding to them.

Comfort… life can be scary much of the time depending on which direction the world is going and, more importantly, how we respond to it. But there is one sure way we can practice this life-giving habit. Every morning open this amazing book called the Holy Bible and spend just a bit of time reading and listening to the heavenly voice of God. He will direct our best path.      

Trust… humanly speaking, it is difficult to trust just anyone. We know this from our previous relationship(s). But we can build better, more trustworthy friendships if we try.

“Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another, ‘What! you too? I thought I was the only one.’” [C.S. Lewis]

In the end, we need to remember, God is the only One whom we can put our faith in 100 percent of the time.

Prayer… Nothing we try will be more important than developing a habit of prayer. Many people don’t realize it’s not necessary to be inside a church building to pray or memorize a long, drawn-out prayer by rote.

In fact, the best thing about prayer is it’s simply a conversation with God. Since He is everywhere all the time, He can hear us speaking to Him and we don’t need any special words. Even just a one-line request, “Help me, God, to do well in this interview” is enough for Him to answer.      

“Your own ears will hear him. Right behind you a voice will say, ‘This is the way you should go,’ whether to the right or the left” (Isaiah 30:21 NLT).

How Whispered Prayers Will Stop Stress

Probably most of us have, at one time or another, felt a sensation of sweating, tension, increased pulse and headache in answer to the various, everyday forms of stress. It can come from anger, fear, aggravation, frustration or illness in ourselves or others to name just a few reasons. No one can escape it for an entire lifetime. It's not pretty, but pretty common.   

Stress-less Solutions
Apparently, there are as many ways to handle feelings of stress as there are people alive! Some are quite simple like having a pet around to soothe our nerves. Close friends who have a gift of listening. Lighting candles and putting on quiet music. Going to dinner with an encouraging friend. Shopping for an antique clock. Huh? O.K. that's just something that happened to me today. And the yummiest: enjoying a warm beverage, probably with chocolate!        

Classic Clues
On a more practical level, if we want a solution that has been around for centuries that is guaranteed to turn our situation around, it's Whispered Prayer. On the surface, it doesn't seem that it's very sensible or useful in the midst of a stress attack. After all, we can't reach out and touch prayer as if it is an object, like a pet or a candle. We can't enjoy the taste like chocolate. But we can ask, what is prayer good for?  

• relieving distress (Psalm 102)
• deliverance from fear (Psalm 34:4) 
• confidence the Lord will hear us (1 John 5:14)
• we will receive an answer (Psalm 17:6)
• daily requests are welcome (Philippians 4:6)
• calms anger (1 Timothy 2:8)
• provides peaceful and quiet lives (1 Timothy 2:1)
• increases faith (Jeremiah 33:3)
• receiving the love of God (Psalm 42:8)
• healing and forgiveness granted (James 5:15-16)

These are only a few. We also know prayer is a direct conversation between us and the Lord, and that, dear friends, is pure joy.  

Where Do We Begin?
When we have no idea how to pray, nor what to pray for, it's not the time to give up! 
Jesus already knows what we want to pray for and He has a solution. His Holy Spirit will help us. We just have to be honest and ask. He will even fill in what we have left out. It's true! 

The greatest part of prayer is there's no special place we have to go in order to pray.
No special physical posture to assume. We can pray as we grocery shop, wash our hair, while we wait to pick our child up at school, or driving in the car. God always hears our prayers no matter where we are. Then, we can count on the fact God always answers our prayers. Yes, always. He delights in it! The answer is either "Yes," "No," or "Not yet." He knows what is best for us at the time. 

Thankfulness is a great place to begin! 

Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. Philippians 4:6