11 ways you can decide to be happy!

11 ways you can decide to be happy!

Here at The Happiness Institute we've been saying more many years that happiness is something you CHOOSE. 

CHOOSE is both a philosophy of taking responsibility but also an acronym for 6 key happiness principles (see HERE). 

This thought provoking article from Inc.com also believes happiness is something you choose and provides 11 great questions you should ask yourself; because the answers you come up with and the decisions you ultimately make in response will be telling…

by Minda Zetlin

When was the last time you stopped to do a big-picture assessment of your life and career? If it's been more than a year-or worse, you've never done one at all-now is the time.

Why is this so important? Because in the crush of daily life, daily obligations, and daily deadlines, it's impossible to stay focused on what's most important for you in the long term. So we all have to step back from time to time and assess how our daily schedule and activities aligns with our long-term goals. We also have to re-assess those goals themselves because they're likely to change over time.

Deirdre Maloney, speaker, trainer, and author of Bogus Balance: Your Journey to Real Work/Life Bliss, is an expert at this sort of self-assessment. She herself goes through this exercise once or twice every year, she says, and offers online worksheets to help others do it as well. It's an important process, she explains, because most of us have more choices than we realize in life and could be a lot happier-if we have the courage to make the necessary changes.

"Work-life balance, the way we've defined it, seems to insinuate that if get the right planning tools and set boundaries we can have it all," Maloney says. "We can't have it all, so instead of trying, we need to define what is our all."

Doing that requires figuring out what makes you the most happy and fulfilled, "and then doing those things wholeheartedly," she explains. The key, she says, is to make conscious choices about what you do and don't do.

Start by asking yourself the following questions:

1. What do you value most in life?

"Ask what values really rise to the top for you," Maloney says. "Income, family, success, achievement, giving back to the community." Listen to your own voice-not what you think you should value-and make your own ranking of what tops your list, what comes second, and so on.

Then think about how those priorities play out in your daily life. This doesn't mean, for instance, that if your family takes the top spot that you'll always choose family over work. But if you've skipped dinner at home several nights in a row to go to work-related events, taking a look at these priorities may tell you when it's time to turn one down.

2. What failed to fulfill you this past year?

Think back over all your activities, work-related and otherwise, and pick out the ones that were least satisfying. "Maybe sacrifice some things," Maloney suggests. "We all have things we have to do that we don't love. But you'll be happier and more fulfilled if you're intentionally choosing the things that feed you the most."

3. What would your ideal career look like?

"What does my all look like, if I chose to have it?" Maloney says. Assess where you are right now, and what the steps are between there are where you want to be. What will you do to bridge the gap in the next 24 hours? In the next week? Next month? Then, week by week, evaluate your ideal and your intentions against what you actually did. This will help you make small changes that can set you on the road to a more fulfilling career. (Here's more on how to increase your focus and achieve your goals.)

…keep reading the full & original article HERE