“My happiness grows in direct proportion to my acceptance, and in inverse proportion to my expectations.”
Happiness is the thing everyone wants and nobody can quite pin down. These quotes explore joy, contentment, pleasure, and the surprising research that suggests happiness has less to do with circumstances than with how you respond to them.
“The women I know who have children and have careers, they seem to be very happy. They love their children and they love their jobs. But happiness comes out of being willing to do your work in your twenties to find out who you are, what you love.”
“My happiness grows in direct proportion to my acceptance, and in inverse proportion to my expectations.”
“Happiness is not a matter of intensity but of balance, order, rhythm and harmony.”
“The white man's happiness cannot be purchased by the black man's misery.”
“So, my happiness doesn't come from money or fame. My happiness comes from seeing life without struggle.”
“It is neither wealth nor splendor but tranquility and occupation which give you happiness.”
“Seek happiness for its own sake, and you will not find it seek for duty, and happiness will follow as the shadow comes with the sunshine.”
“Wealth, like happiness, is never attained when sought after directly. It comes as a by-product of providing a useful service.”
“There is no private house in which people can enjoy themselves so well as at a capital tavern... No, Sir there is nothing which has yet been contrived by man by which so much happiness is produced as by a good tavern or inn.”
“Part of the happiness of life consists not in fighting battles, but in avoiding them. A masterly retreat is in itself a victory.”
“Happiness is the reward we get for living to the highest right we know.”
“There is no excellence without labor. One cannot dream oneself into either usefulness or happiness.”
“Independence is happiness.”
“Love is when the other person's happiness is more important than your own.”
“Happiness is no respecter of persons.”
“The British do not expect happiness. I had the impression, all the time that I lived there, that they do not want to be happy they want to be right.”