Tuesday, March 20, 2012

Maui Lessons: Choosing to be happy


Maui Lesson: Choose to be happy and see the positive in every situation you are in.

This lesson is cliche yes, but oh so important to get a reminder in every now and then.
The reality of being surrounded by the same people ALL day and ALL night, living AND working together, actually depending on eachother helped drive home this message for me. It helped me really have a chance to practice it and begin making it a habit of mine instead of just an ideal.

The first month or so while in Maui, I found myself getting sucked in to other peoples bad moods and creating a few myself. I gave in to the strange pleasure of complaining with those around me while trying to hide my shame in doing it. I would feel wrong and but also feel complelled to do it. Somewhere along the line (with a little reminder from Dan, and an awesome perpetually happy couple who stayed on the farm with us) I decided this wasn't making me happy. I felt like these actions were ruining my amazing Maui experience. So I made the decision to actively change. My feelings of discontent still arise but now I make a point to stop my negative line of thought when I realize it I remind myself about all the positives as well. All those little things we think are so awesome when we first realize them but then take for granted as being things we are owed after we have gotten used to them.

I'm not perfectly happy & smiling all the time (if that is even possible) but at least I feel like I have actually gotten on the path to positivity instead of just turning my head to look at it every now and then.

3 comments:

  1. All I can say is smile, smile, smile :).

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  2. Nobody's perfect - just remember that "catching yourself" and making a correction means you are on the right path.

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  3. I totally get your point - nobody can be happy and smiling all the time, but sometimes we can choose ;-)

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