Many people who have difficulties in life often like to scorn happiness and love to claim that true happiness is not possible at all. The truth is that there are different levels of happiness that you can experience in your life. This is not a straight line. There are ups and downs that you will experience throughout your life, but whether or not you are happy depends on your feelings.
You have it in you
Just because you are a human being and can experience feelings, including happiness, you know that true happiness exists. You can probably write down many days and things that have brought joy into your life in the years from your birth until today.
Look around you
It is incredible, but while it is easy to say that people cannot be happy if their basic needs are not met, you will find that all around you that not only are there are people whose needs are not met, but they are also very happy. That proves to be true when you study rich people and realize that they are no happier than poor people in general.
It is not about the things
If you look at a list of the happiest countries in the world, you will find that happiness has nothing to do with the things you have. The most satisfied people happen to live in Denmark at the moment. Most of the people who live there pay high taxes, live in small houses, and are generally not as consumerist as people in the USA, for example. But the USA is 17 on the list. This shows that happiness is not about the substance.
It is not even about goals
Maybe you think that happiness is also about achieving your goals. But it's not. If you say things like “I'll be happy if…” a lot, you're not likely to be happy. You can be happy today before you reach your goals while you are on your way to achieve those goals. It's honestly more about everyday life and not about moments.
It's not about your living conditions
Now, of course, some things in life can get you down. But for happy people, even the worst events will not make them unhappy, at least not in the long run. A happy person usually can control things through his life circumstances. Dr. Gillian Mandich, a happiness expert, notes that our life circumstances account for only 10 percent of our happiness.
True happiness is accepting that you can experience it and understanding what it means. A happy person will not be happy at the same level around the clock, 365 days a year. When you observe that people who have cancer are happy, that children who don't get enough to eat are happy, and that people who live in huts in Africa are happy, then you realize that you can be happy also.