Make Joy a Habit

Let's face it, who doesn't want to be happy? The good news is, joy is ours when we choose to make it a priority. Dedication to embracing it is the key. Here are some simple techniques to help you start today to make joy a habit. Try them all or just some of them, and choose the ones that work best for you. Then, practice them for 21 days (which is typically how long it takes to form a habit) or as often as you can. The more you practice them, the more joyful you will feel each day.

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How to Avoid Hurt Feelings

Has anyone ever said this to you: “Don’t be so sensitive. I was only kidding.” If so, did it change the way you felt? Chances are it didn’t because you had already taken the matter to heart and it had already hurt your feelings.

Needless to say, not every hurt feeling can be avoided, but some can, especially the unnecessary ones.

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10 Ways to Celebrate Your Small Victories

Big victories are easy to recognize as a cause to celebrate. It’s the small stuff that’s often overlooked because you may be thinking, “Ah shucks, it was nothing.” But even a small victory is still a victory. It’s a breakthrough for you that should also be celebrated. Nothing complicated. Here are 10 ways you can keep it simple.

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Let Love Make You Smile

Go ahead. I dare you to think about how good love feels and not smile. Couldn’t do it could you? Neither can I, nor would I want to.  When love makes us smile, it eases our heart, adds a gleam to our eyes, and sparks joy in our soul.

Remembering love not only makes me smile more, but has led me to recently launch an online gift shop to help others remember love and smile more, too. It’s entitled LoveMakesMeSmile.com, with the tagline, “Gifts for a Happy Life.”

I never intended to launch an online gift shop, but, briefly, here’s how it happened.

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Happy Is the Way to Be

Want to be truly happy? The Beatitudes point the way. This is a lesson I learned some months ago after hearing my pastor preach a series of sermons about the Beatitudes found at the beginning of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount in the Book of Matthew of the New Testament. It was such an eye-and-heart-opening series of sermons that the messages are still fresh in my mind. One thing I noticed in particular was the way in which he used the words "blessed" and "happy" interchangeably as he so beautifully dissected each Beatitude.

This prompted me to look up the word "blessed" to see if, in fact, it means happy. To my delight, I found this definition in Webster's online dictionary for blessed: "of or enjoying happiness." And in some versions of the Bible, such as The Good News Translation, the word "happy" is substituted for the word "blessed" in each of the Beatitudes.

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What a Wonderful World!

Despite all the ugliness that appears to be in the world, it is truly a beautiful and wonderful world when we stop and look with our eyes, mind and heart with joy and gratitude. No one reminds us of that better than Louis Armstrong. Thanks, Satchmo!

Our Joy