Motivational Quotes

Happiness

Happiness resides not in possessions, and not in gold, happiness dwells in the soul.

- Democritus

Best Quotes about Happiness

The secret to happiness is not in doing what one likes to do, but in liking what one has to do.

No man should desire to be happy who is not at the same time holy. He should spend his efforts in seeking to know and do the will of God, leaving to Christ the matter of how happy he should be.

Tozer, A. W.

We wish to be happier than other people; and this is difficult, for we believe others to be happier than they are.

Montesquieu, Charles De

If frugality were established in the state, and if our expenses were laid out to meet needs rather than superfluities of life, there might be fewer wants, and even fewer pleasures, but infinitely more happiness.

Goldsmith, Oliver

Happiness is like a cat, If you try to coax it or call it, it will avoid you; it will never come. But if you pay not attention to it and go about your business, you'll find it rubbing against your legs and jumping into your lap.

Bennett, William John

Happiness is a ball after which we run wherever it rolls, and we push it with our feet when it stops.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

Remember that happiness is a way of travel, not a destination.

Goodman, Roy

The only true happiness comes from squandering ourselves for a purpose.

William Cowper

It is not God's will merely that we should be happy, but that we should make ourselves happy

Kant, Immanuel

10.

If you want happiness for an hour -- take a nap. If you want happiness for a day -- go fishing. If you want happiness for a month -- get married. If you want happiness for a year -- inherit a fortune. If you want happiness for a lifetime -- help someone else.

Proverb, Chinese

11.

Call no man unhappy until he is married.

Socrates

12.

Unhappiness is not knowing what we want, and killing ourselves to get it.

Herold, Don

13.

Sir, that all who are happy, are equally happy, is not true. A peasant and a philosopher may be equally satisfied, but not equally happy. Happiness consists in the multiplicity of agreeable consciousness.

Johnson, Samuel

14.

Seek not happiness too greedily, and be not fearful of happiness.

Lao-tzu

15.

Happiness is that state of consciousness which proceeds from the achievement of one's values.

Ayn Rand

16.

I've grown to realize the joy that comes from little victories is preferable to the fun that comes from ease and the pursuit of pleasure.

Lawana Blackwell

17.

Happiness is a sunbeam which may pass through a thousand bosoms without losing a particle of its original ray; nay, when it strikes on a kindred heart, like the converged light on a mirror, it reflects itself with redoubled brightness. It is not perfected till it is shared.

Porter, Jane

18.

Be it jewel or toy, not the prize gives the joy, but the striving to win the prize.

Meredith, Owen

19.

Happiness does not lie in happiness, but in the achievement of it.

Dostoevsky, Fyodor

20.

And isn't that, at it's core, what the princess fantasy is about for all of us? "Princess" is how we tell little girls that they are special, precious. "Princess" is the wish that we could protect them from pain, that they would never know sorrow, that they will live happily ever after ensconces in lace and innocence.

Peggy Orenstein

21.

If you optimize everything, you will always be unhappy.

Knuth, Don

22.

Happiness is the absence of the striving for happiness.

Chuang Tzu

23.

False happiness renders men stern and proud, and that happiness is never communicated. True happiness renders them kind and sensible, and that happiness is always shared.

Montesquieu, Charles De

24.

A person will be just about as happy as they make up their minds to be.

Lincoln, Abraham

25.

Remember that it is nothing to do your duty, that is demanded of you and is no more meritorious than to wash your hands when they are dirty; the only thing that counts is the love of duty; when love and duty are one, then grace is in you and you will enjoy a happiness which passes all understanding.

W. Somerset Maugham

26.

Happiness is not having what you want, but wanting what you have.

Schachtel, Rabbi H.

27.

Man is the artificer of his own happiness.

Henry David Thoreau

28.

Happiness does not come from doing easy work but from the afterglow of satisfaction that comes after the achievement of a difficult task that demanded our best.

Rubin, Theodore I.

29.

Happiness comes from... some curious adjustment to life.

Walpole, Sir Hugh

30.

The good life, as I conceive it, is a happy life. I do not mean that if you are good you will be happy; I mean that if you are happy you will be good.

Russell, Bertrand

31.

Happiness makes up in height for what it lacks in length.

Robert Frost

32.

While we pursue happiness, we flee from contentment.

Proverb, Hasidic

33.

We tend to forget that happiness doesn't come as a result of getting something we don't have, but rather of recognizing and appreciating what we do have.

Koenig, Frederick

34.

Men can only be happy when they do not assume that the object of life is happiness

Orwell, George

35.

Happiness... she loves, to see men at work. She loves sweat, weariness, self sacrifice. She will be found not in places but lurking in cornfields and factories; and hovering over littered desks; she crowns the unconscious head of the busy child.

Grayson, David

36.

Happiness lies in being privileged to work hard for long hours in doing whatever you think is worth doing. One man may find happiness in supporting a wife and children. Another may find it in robbing banks. Still another may labor mightily for years in pursuing pure research with no discernible result. Note the individual and subjective nature of each case. No two are alike and there is no reason to expect them to be. Each man or woman must find for himself or herself that occupation in which hard work and long hours make him or her happy. Contrariwise, if you are looking for shorter hours and longer vacations and early retirement, you are in the wrong job. Perhaps you need to take up bank robbing. Or geeking in a sideshow. Or even politics.

Heinlein, Robert

37.

We are never so happy nor so unhappy as we imagine.

La Rochefoucauld, Francois De

38.

The happiness of a man in this life does not consist in the absence but in the mastery of his passions.

Alfred Lord Tennyson

39.

The secret of happiness is to make others believe they are the cause of it.

Al Batt

40.

Sometimes it's hard to avoid the happiness of others.

David Assael

41.

All you need for happiness is a good gun, a good horse, and a good wife.

Boone, Daniel

42.

Happiness was not made to be boasted, but enjoyed. Therefore tho others count me miserable, I will not believe them if I know and feel myself to be happy; nor fear them.

Traherne, Thomas

43.

Happiness is a conscious choice, not an automatic response.

Barthel, Mildred

44.

Happiness is a positive cash flow.

Adler, Fred

45.

Nothing is miserable unless you think it so; and on the other hand, nothing brings happiness unless you are content with it.

Jonathan Haidt

46.

It's not a question of happiness, it's a requirement. Consider the alternative.

Horton, Doug

47.

Three grand essentials to happiness in this life are something to do, something to love, and something to hope for.

Addison, Joseph

48.

The really happy man never laughs -- seldom -- though he may smile. He does not need to laugh, for laughter, like weeping is a relief of mental tension -- and the happy are not over strung.

Aveling, Prof. F. A. P.

49.

Happiness must be cultivated. It is like character. It is not a thing to be safely let alone for a moment, or it will run to weeds.

Phelps, Elizabeth Stuart

50.

There is something ridiculous and even quite indecent in an individual claiming to be happy. Still more a people or a nation making such a claim. The pursuit of happiness... is without any question the most fatuous which could possibly be undertaken. This lamentable phrase the pursuit of happiness is responsible for a good part of the ills and miseries of the modern world.

Muggeridge, Malcolm