Today's Quotation:

The art of living does not consist in preserving and clinging
to a particular mood of happiness, but in allowing happiness
to change its form. . . happiness, like a child,
must be allowed to grow up.

Charles L. Morgan

Today's Meditation:

Boy do we get frustrated when we try to keep things the same.  We may feel good today and hope to keep that feeling for a while, but you know, days change, situations change, people change, and moods change.  What made us happy years ago does no longer, and what will make us happy tomorrow can't be the same things that make us happy today.

I used to love watching Winnie the Pooh cartoons.  Now, they're enjoyable, but not nearly as much as they used to be.  I used to love hot chocolate, but now I prefer a nice hot cup of tea.  There was a day long ago when playing baseball was one of my favorite things in the world; I haven't played in years now, and to be honest, I don't really miss it at all.

I've grown, and I've changed.  My tastes are different, as are my desires.  My happiness now is dependent on what I give to the world, not what I take from it.  I'm most happy when I see other people feeling happy, not when I buy things or receive gifts or even accomplish a difficult task.  The accomplishments are fine, for I love taking on challenges and rising to the occasion, but that still doesn't compare to the feeling I get when I see someone else happy, especially when I had something to do with them being happy.  Perhaps it was something I said or did, something very slight and seemingly unimportant, but it sure did something for someone else.

Too many people not only try to hold on to happiness, but they try to recapture happiness from times before.  "You can't go home again" is a very true saying, for truly going home would be an attempt to recapture the past.  The past is gone, and today is here.  We're older and wiser and more capable of taking all we can from the present moment, so here the present moment is--what are you waiting for?

Questions to ponder:

1.  What makes you happy now?

2.  What used to make you happy, but doesn't really any longer?

3.  What used to make you happy, but can't be recaptured because
it's from a different time and place, when you were a different person?

Happiness is the greatest paradox in nature.  It can grow in any soil,
live under any conditions.  It defies environment.  The reason for this
is that it does not come from without but from within.  Whenever
you see people seeking happiness outside themselves, you can be sure
they have never yet found it.

Forman Lincicome