Being Happy In The Present Quotes & Sayings

Epicurus grasped how incredibly bad we are at being happy, and how talented we are at making up reasons to be miserable. We might put off our happiness, telling ourselves as we squeeze onto the Tube to go to our spirit-crushing job that at some point in the future we'll be happy, when we're promoted, when we're rich, when we're retired. Meanwhile the present moment flows by, unnoticed and unenjoyed. — Anonymous

Being this side of 40 feels like what I should have felt being this side of 25: in my body, in my heart, happy with my life, and OK with whatever bumps in the road present themselves. — Jennifer Aniston

Those were her best days, although there was always something feckless about her, something so slack and almost fearful in her too frequent smile, so that when you saw Mignon being happy, you always thought: "It can't last." She had the febrile gaiety of a being without a past, without a present, yet she existed thus, without memory or history, only because her past was too bleak to think of and her future too terrible to contemplate; she was the broken blossom of the present tense. — Angela Carter

Time is your most precious resource; make every minute count. — Brian Tracy

Happiness at work is not about eliminating all the bad stuff from your job. It's about being happy at work even though some of these bad things are present. It's about building your skills and your energy to fix the problems, and to create more and more positive experiences at work. — Alexander Kjerulf

The world is so full of a number of things, I'm sure we should all be as happy as kings. — Robert Louis Stevenson

If there is a state where the soul can find a resting-place secure enough to establish itself and concentrate its entire being there, with no need to remember the past or reach into the future, where time is nothing to it, where the present runs on indefinitely but this duration goes unnoticed, with no sign of the passing of time, and no other feeling of deprivation or enjoyment, pleasure or pain, desire or fear than the simple feeling of existence, a feeling that fills our soul entirely, as long as this state lasts, we can call ourselves happy, not with a poor, incomplete and relative happiness such as we find in the pleasures of life, but with a sufficient, complete and perfect happiness which leaves no emptiness to be filled in the soul. — Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Dances an endless illusion, A woman of desire endures in my heart, I wait, O! Almighty cut the net of passion, You are the ultimate Source of light. Gitamohanam,(spiritual Hymns), — Manmohan Acharya

If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, we have at least to consider the possibility that we have a small aquatic bird of the family anatidae on our hands. — Douglas Adams

The egoic mind imagines a problem, and then it imagines a solution. When we get caught up in these thoughts, we feel like we have a problem that has to be solved before we can be happy. But the problem is just imagined! When we drop out of involvement with these thoughts and into the simple experience of the present moment, we discover that everything is fine just the way it is. Life never had to be any different than it is, nor do we. We can be the "imperfect" human we are. In fact, we weren't designed to be anything other than the human being that we are. — Gina Lake

Mum looks hesitant. As mums get when they are accustomed to being able to predict their daughters' questions, and then suddenly find they were wrong about that. Elsa shrugs. — Fredrik Backman

Some people are very competitive in their birding. Maybe they'll die happy, having seen a thousand species before they die, but I'll die happy knowing I've spent all that quiet time being present. — Lynn Thomson

Try to be happy in this present moment, and put not off being so to a time to come
as though that time should be of another make from this which has already come and is ours. — Thomas Fuller

How thrilling to discover one had depths, how consoling to find them less polluted than the shallows, how encouraging to identify the enemy not as a fissure in the will but as a dead fetus in the specimen jar of the unconscious. My attention was being paternally led away from the excruciating present to the happy, healthy future that would be enabled by an analysis of the sick past, as though the priest had nothing to do but study old books and make bright forecasts, the present not worthy of notice. — Edmund White

We have negative mental habits that come up over and over again. One of the most significant negative habits we should be aware of is that of constantly allowing our mind to run off into the future. Perhaps we got this from our parents. Carried away by our worries, we're unable to live fully and happily in the present. Deep down, we believe we can't really be happy just yet - that we still have a few more boxes to be checked off before we can really enjoy life. We speculate, dream, strategize, and plan for these "conditions of happiness" we want to have in the future; and we continually chase after that future, even while we sleep. We may have fears about the future because we don't know how it's going to turn out, and these worries and anxieties keep us from enjoying being here now. — Thich Nhat Hanh

The more successful enterprises are the more they try to replicate, duplicate, codify what makes us great. And suddenly they're inward thinking. They're thinking how can we continue to do what we've done in the past without understanding that what made them successful is to take risks, to change and to adapt and to be responsive. And so in a sense success breeds its own failure. And I think it's true of a lot of successful businesses. — Lou Gerstner

Don't be a storehouse of memories. Leave past, future and even present thoughts behind. Be a witness to life unfolding by itself. Be free of all attachments, fears and concerns by keeping your mind inside your own heart. Rest in being. Like this, your life is always fresh and imbued with pure joy and timeless presence. Be happy, wise and free. — Mooji

When I got into high school, I got really into basketball. I had this itch that I wanted to just move. I didn't know what I wanted to do, but I knew that if basketball became a scholarship or something, it would be a means to that. It turned out I couldn't jump that high. — Boyd Holbrook

Venusians have different values. They value love, communication, beauty, and relationships. They spend a lot of time supporting, helping, and nurturing one another. Their sense of self is defined through their feelings and the quality of their relationships. They experience fulfillment through sharing and relating. — John Gray

The present is never a happy state to any human being. — Samuel Johnson

The Bring the Noise buzz was so strong, so we put it out on a release called 'Attack of the Killer B's' which was a record made up of B-sides and things like that - so it wasn't out on our new album, you know what I mean? But we always felt strongly about it. — Charlie Benante

On the off-chance you won't live forever, maybe you should try being happy now. — Janice Kaplan

99.9% of being a good parent is just being present with your child. On the flipside of that, 100% of being happy is just being present. — Mark Webber

When things are tough, and when I don't think I can last another minute, if I just hold on, hold on tight and with everything I got, the shit gets better. — James Frey

If you dread tomorrow it's because you don't know how to build the present, and when you don't know how to build the present, you tell yourself you can deal with it tomorrow, and it's a lost cause anyway because tomorrow always ends up being today don't you see ... We have to live with the certainty that we'll get old and that it won't look nice or be good or feel happy. And tell ourselves that it's now that matters: to build something now at any price using all our strength. Always remember that there's a retirement home waiting somewhere and so we have to surpass ourselves every day, make every day undying. Climb our own personal Everest and do it in such a way that every step is a little bit of eternity. That's what the future is for: to build the present with real plans made by living people. — Muriel Barbery

Author Neale Donald Walsch says, So long as you're still worried about what others think of you, you are owned by them. Only when you require no approval from outside yourself can you own yourself. — Oprah Winfrey

One splendid summer afternoon Kaspar realized he had never been happier in his life or both of his lives, past and present. Not fireworks-orgasms-and-champagne happy, but on waking in the morning he was glad almost every single day to be exactly where he was. He had never before experienced the feeling of genuine, constant well-being and it was a true revelation. The longer the satisfaction continued, the less he thought about his previous life as a mechanic and the extraordinary things he'd once seen and been able to do. Misery may love company but happiness is content to be alone. The funny irony of his existence now was, as long as he was this happy and content with his lot, Kaspar didn't need to make much of an effort to "walk away" from his mechanic's life because now he was sated with this one both in mind and heart. — Jonathan Carroll

Nik stands and walks over to us. He kisses my cheek before taking Ash in a full-blown man hug. A long one. They both seem to be a little emotional. Nik whispers something to Ash and Ash nods before he slaps Nik's back a few times and they part. Nik moves to stand between us and says, "It's my honor to present the new Mr. and Mrs. Asher Collins."
Everyone stands up, whooping and cheering. And that's about the time I burst into tears.
I'm suddenly being group hugged and Tina wails, "I'm so happy for you, you crazy lady!"
I wail right back, "I'm so happy I could shit rainbows!"
Lola cheers. "I'm so f**king happy right now!"
Mimi kisses my head and rocks me slightly. She says in a sing-song voice, "I knew all along! — Belle Aurora

Only by being present can you be happy. Too much attention to the past and the future takes the now away. And once it's gone, you never get it back. — Katherine Howe

Travel plucks us out of the worn routines of our lives and plops us down into a new culture, language, or city, and lets us figure life out. It strips the excess away and melts us down to our core. It teaches us that stuff doesn't make us happy - only experiences and being present do that. — Fred Perrotta

All learned people learn Latin. It's bound to come in useful. Fairy tales, on the other hand, are about real life. — Monica Furlong

May the Gods all preserve for me (until my present form ceases) this clear and sunlit view of external reality, the instinctive awareness of my unimportance, the cosiness of being small, and the solace of being able to imagine myself happy. — Fernando Pessoa

There's a void inside most people.
It's been created by not being contented with who we are, not being happy with what we have, not being present and looking for something more, better, more exciting out there.
And we've always been trying to fill this void with something external. — Lidiya K.

Finally, it is my most fervent prayer to that Almighty Being before whom I now stand, and who has kept us in His hands from the infancy of our Republic to the present day, that He will so overrule all my intentions and actions and inspire the hearts of my fellow-citizens that we may be preserved from dangers of all kinds and continue forever a united and happy people. — Andrew Jackson

If he was a ghost in the life he remembered, Jeff thought, he was also a ghost in his present life, just the same way. Except, in all the fourteen years, just a couple of times. With Melody that first summer he had felt alive. On the beach on the island. And when he played the guitar. Most of the time, he thought, he practiced not being anybody. If you weren't anybody then nobody could - what? Hurt you or leave you behind? Make you unhappy? But then they couldn't make you happy either, could they? If you played it safe, then you kept safe. Jeff figured he was pretty good at keeping safe - he didn't even look in mirrors because he didn't want to see Melody's eyes. But one result of that was that Jeff didn't know anything about himself. And he thought, sitting in the little boat, alone on the creek, alone with the creek and the sky and the marshes, that he might want to know more. — Cynthia Voigt