What Are the Sources of Happiness? Can it Change From Person to Person?

First of all, what is happiness? Happiness is a emotion that includes a range of positive feelings, from satisfaction to intense joy. So basically a sense of well-being, joy, or contentment.

If we talk about the sources of happiness, I can tell you a whole bunch of things. Like meaningful relationships, a sense of purpose, presence, self acceptance and inner peace, contribution and kindness, health... It goes on and on like this. If you asked me whether all of these affect my happiness equally, I would definitely say no. For me, probably meaningful relationships mean the most and affects my happiness more than the other ones. When you ask yourself the exact same question do you give the same answer as me or no? You may, or may not. That is our main topic on this blog, does everyone have the same ideas when it comes to the sources of happiness or not? And if you ask me, definitely not.

Think of happiness as a tree, the tree obviously has branches. So lets take a look at some of those branches. While we do that, I want you to ask yourself the same questions everytime we talk about a different branch of the tree, how much does this affect my happiness? Does it affect it at all or not?

First of all, meaningful relationships. For me, a meaningful relationship must include trust, respect, affection and sympathy. It could be between you and your mom, dad, siblings, friends, lover... I think that in a meaningful relationship you should have fun, you should be able to be yourself, you should be able to express your feelings without being worried that the the other person of the relationship telling your feelings to another person or making fun of your feelings or neglecting them. You should be able to have conversations, both serious and fun ones. But does everyone like to have a meaningful relationship? Do you? Is everyone capable of having it? Are you? Ask youself these questions. And if you ask me, for the first question, I would say yes. But the important word is "meaningful." The second question, absolutely, yes. But as I said, it has to be meaningful cause that is how I want my relationship to be with my friends, family and lover. I want to surround myself with real people, people like myself. For the third question, absolutely no. I think that we can clearly see that not everyone is capable of having a real relationship, but at their current state. I believe that everyone can be better, everyone can learn, the important thing is to never give up on being better. And for the last, I would say I'm pretty capable, but of course I am open to learning in order to get better.

Next lets talk about a sense of purpose. Having a purpose can help you see your path, sometimes when people do or strart something without a purpose or don't do anything at all they can feel out of control. basically when people lack a purpose, they may feel that they cannot control their lives, or they may feel like they can't accomplish anything significant because they lack purpose, which can lead to a fear of failure. Not on all circumstances though don't get me wrong, sometimes you can just start doing something without a purpose just for fun, thats a whole different thing. The things I wrote about are related to more serious situations. Having a sense of purpose can make a person feel in control of their lives, make them feel more steady. When you know where you want your path to go, maybe you will always have hope of being succesfull and happy since you know what you're working for and what you'll end up with. As you see, I wrote maybe. Go take a look at our title, it says can it change from person to person right there. And my answer to that is "yes" obviously.

Next is presence, I think this is the simplest one. As the name suggests, by being more present with another person or a group of people, you will probably feel more included. But I think that its not important if they aren't the right kind of people. So I suggest you make sure you're present with the right person or group. And for me, surrounding myself with my people and being present with them makes me so happy. Does it go the same way for you?

Next one is an important one, self acceptance and inner peace. Why is it important? So, when you accept yourself, you experience a profound sense of peace. This helps you in many ways. First of all, you no longer feel the need to compare yourself to others or seek approval from other beings. You are your lifes main character,  self acceptance and inner peace helps you understand this fact. You are the main happiness source in your life, its in your hands, being in peace with yourself means having a much more peaceful life. Accept yourself, don't seek approval from others, seek approval from yourself. But, make sure it affects you positively, make sure it makes you be a better person. In that case, I don't see how this will affect a persons happiness negatively, but who knows? So ask yourself, does it affect your happiness positively or negatively?

Next, contribution and kindness. Lets go piece by piece, kindness can increase your sense of connectivity with others, decrease loneliness and improve relationships. It also can be contagious, encouraging others to join in with their own generous deeds. Think about it, you'd have a circle of people where everyone helps eachother, cares about eachother. For me, that is awesome, it would be really peaceful and I'd be very happy. Would you? Next, contribution For me, when I contribute to something I feel important, I feel like i make a difference and that is actually a fact so I feel happier. Do you?

Last but not least, health. Which is extremely important. Being healthy gives you energy. If you have energy, you can do a whole bunch of things. First of all sports. Doing the right sport for yourself will be fun, for that you need energy of course, for that you need to be healthy. Really think about it for a moment, from the least bad health problem to the worst. It does take some of your abilities right? Being healthy is important because it helps you live your life to the most. In most situations you gotta be at least decently healthy to do what makes you happy, to find the energy in yourself. I don’t think anyone would disagree and say “Being unhealthy makes me so happy.” But who knows? There may be situations we can’t imagine. So, do you agree or disagree?

So these are the branches of our tree, does every branch make you feel happy the same? Are there any that don’t even affect your happiness? Try and put them in order from the one that affects your happiness the most to the least. Go chat with people you know, your friends, family… Tell them to make their order from their point of view. Lastly, compare with all the people you had a chat with. Are all the lists same? The answer is probably no. Because as I said, the source of happiness can change from one person to another.