diligent

"I keep remembering one of my Guru's teachings about happiness. She says that people universally tend to think that happiness is a stroke of luck, something that will maybe descend upon you like fine weather if you're fortunate enough. But that's not how happiness works. Happiness is the consequence of personal effort. You fight for it, strive for it, insist upon it, and sometimes even travel around the world looking for it. You have to participate relentlessly in the manifestations of your own blessings. And once you have achieved a state of happiness, you must never become lax about maintaining it, you must make a mighty effort to keep swimming upward into that happiness forever, to stay afloat on top of it. If you don't you will eat away your innate contentment. It's easy enough to pray when you're in distress but continuing to pray even when your crisis has passed is like a sealing process, helping your soul hold tight to its good attainments."

- elizabeth gilbert

ive been thinking a lot about this lately, if you haven't picked up on that theme already and by "that" I mean the whole being in charge of your own happiness deal. specifically in the past few cold, winter weeks as I tend to let myself get bummed out by the lack of sun and other winter blues.

I just finished Elizabeth Gilbert's second book (the first was eat, pray, love. you may have heard on it) called Committed. I really couldn't tell you weather I loved it or hated it, there was some of both, but it has definitely caused me to do so some self examination and her quote above REALLY inspired me to make a more diligent and thorough effort to "swim upward into my happiness"...

to seal it with more gratitude in my life.

//here's to happiness//