Venus Rising

Film & BooksIssue: Libra 08

How We Choose to Be Happy

For me September marks the anniversary of some very challenging times, and though I plan to take care of myself, no matter how hard I try, the memory of certain dates causes me to take pause, breathe deep, and appreciate all that life has given me despite the loss of too many loved ones. For reasons I have yet to pinpoint, this month my hand kept reaching for a re-read of “How We Choose to Be Happy” by Rick Foster and Greg Hicks.

How We Choose to Be Happy
by Rick Foster and Greg Hicks, Penguin Group: 1999

Foster and Hicks’ writing is mindful, intimate and tangible. Honestly, I have never been one for self-help books, but what I liked most about "How We Choose to Be Happy" is that it celebrates the wisdom of a variety of literary greats balanced by the stories of ordinary people. Choosing happiness takes time, and yes happiness is for most people a very deliberate choice, so I suggest you allow yourself plenty of time and quiet space to read this book mindfully. Even if you don’t have a traumatic event to overcome or a tragedy to work through, this book will aid your understanding of how to be content, to be healthy, and to make healthy choices. It offers straightforward questions, simple tools, and commonly-faced life scenarios to aid your reflection. 

Attitude is also a choice, and having the right attitude can have a huge return. Foster and Hicks challenge their readers to admit this. But as they challenge the reader, they also honor the fact that truly happy people have not lived charmed lives. Their research reveals that people who choose, despite their misfortunes, to view life differently attain happiness. Foster and Hicks discovered that no matter what the circumstance, their case studies all achieved happiness by making the same nine internal choices. Happiness is multi-layered, there is no single cause, and indeed achieving it is a cycle, a constant thought process. The authors claim that happy people

By following their hearts and minds, rather than allowing society to dictate how they should behave, they become special, charismatic people – the kind we want to know, the kind of people want to be.  (10)

The nine choices these people have made are: intention, accountability, identification, centrality, recasting, options, appreciation, giving, and truthfulness. It must always be understood, though, that happiness comes from within and that it accompanies honesty and self-awareness. This book also reminds us that when we forge ahead we allow ourselves to be proactive people who create our own circumstances, people who don’t allow for life’s circumstances to define or dictate to them. This is not an easy task. The writing prompts and the questions throughout the book purposely challenge the reader to join the ranks of being a truly happy person.

Remember that happiness is a way of travel - not a destination. (40)

Roy M. Goodman