To ask how you achieve total happiness?

[PiperChapstick]

At the risk of sounding like a bad Facebook meme, I'm trying to achieve total happiness in my life and have found that doing things like being happy with what I have (materialistic wise) and avoiding people who only bring me down or make me cross has really helped. Though the latter is bloody hard sometimes. I have some right wankers in my life. The former is surprisingly easy - I recently changed jobs from one where I was miserable to a lower paid one where I'm very happy. I have less disposable income but it doesn't bother me half as much as I thought it would as I'm not going to bed dreading the next day and wanting to spend 8 hours in tears.

So can I ask you lovely mumsnetters what your life hacks are for being happy and content!

Appreciating that without sadness, grief, disappointment etc in my life the happiness would not be happy. It would be the norm, which by it's very definition is unexceptional, neutral. The flaw in the concept of heaven is that without negative emotion positive emotion stops being positive- it's only the comparison which proves the happiness.

I don't have neighbours! The two years I did I was completely miserable.

I have no friends in my life that I consider to be "hard work".

I don't think you can achieve total happiness, nor is it a useful goal as it's perfection.

Content, which you mention, is more attainable.

Your job move sounds a good idea.

Lowering your standards of happiness is helpful, too, according to happiness research.

www.becomingminimalist.com/happier/

I am not a fan of positive psychology as I think it can encourage an attitude that ignores objective reality, all a case of how you see it, not what it is, but some these recommendations seem sensible.

Divorced husband.
After years of EA, being afraid to voice an opinion, scared of making a decision in case it was the wrong one.....I feel liberated.
Yes its hard financially and he is not involving himself with the children. Told me I'm a single parent and have to do it all.
But I can.
I take pleasure from waking up and knowing I made the right decision.

avoiding people who only bring me down or make me cross has really helped. Though the latter is bloody hard sometimes. I have some right wankers in my life

I work closely with someone who is utterly toxic and makes me feel exhausted and miserable at times. She is a 'friend' of mine and I feel I have no choice but to not rock the boat IYSWIM. How on earth do you do it?

Eat chocolate everyday and don't be sorry about it

Stop caring what anyone else thinks.

Other people's thoughts are none of your business

I chose to leave a job that was bringing me down. Where people had tried to bully me after breast cancer etc etc I left to go to nothing!!! I could talk about so much more. I now realise that all that is important is my DH and 2 DSs We are all sitting together now watching a post match commentary. It's pure happiness!!!!

Keeping your expectations realistic helps in achieving happiness. Aim for the possible, rather than the wildly improbable, and look outwards rather than inwards.

this is trivial but we decided not to buy a tv! we dont have one at all in our house and as a result we are out of touch with the latest commercials, the news and dont sit looking for something to watch, we watch only what we want to on our computers, its made us much happier!

Hard work always made me so happy, I would be aching from from a day up some scaffolding in a freezing dance hall painting a wall mural, or flagging after a 12 hour painting shift for a book and feel so content and great at the end of it. I get cranky when I feel I havent worked hard enough, if that makes sense

I find pleasure in small things. I will concentrate on how nice a cup of tea is or stop and properly look at a picture on of the dc's have drawn. Simple stuff is important.

I try and laugh about stuff. We lost some money a while back and rather than worry about it - we laughed it off as we still had our health and learnt a valuable lesson in the process.

Dont rush through life doing too much.

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs.

I think happiness comes down basically to two things: work that is meaningful to you and gives you satisfaction, and high quality relationships where you hear and are heard. These are the fulfilling things that lead to happiness. They both need to be worked at but, if you put the effort in, you stand a good chance of being happy.

Buy a horse. Simples.

Totally agree with avoiding 'drains' and hanging around with 'furnaces' instead.

Sadly I work with a huge drain and she does have a massively negative impact on me. I need to brace myself for each day!! I go for a walk most lunchtimes just to get away from the doom and gloom fest.

A really good laugh with a real friend really boosts your happiness.

Be grateful for what you have.
Accept change with grace ("let it be")
Don't seek happiness in things.

Try not to care what others think of you.

That's it really.

For me what brings me the most happiness and satisfaction in my life is putting my very best effort into the things I choose to do so I have no regrets that I could have tried harder and making an effort to keep my thoughts appreciative and positive instead of permanently indulging the normal human tendency to focus on what's lacking or going wrong (which I do as well of course).

The human condition has a negative default but it is fairly easy to learn new habits to focus on what's good and great rather than what's wrong if I apply a bit of effort to adjusting my thoughts.

Makes the world a bit brighter for me!

Wine

My grandma used to swear by 'what you can't alter you have to accept' - that will do for most situations!

I think everyone on MN takes wine for granted, FannyPlant!

Missing my toxic 'friend' is close to family so I too couldn't avoid her at family gatherings etc (there's a lot of those in my life). Sadly I found the more of an arse she was and the more she distanced herself the more I'd chase her and try to attain the wonderful relationship we used to have before she changed into an unlikeable person. I accepted that my good friend no longer existed and slowly eased off contact. It was also silly little things like unfollowing her on Facebook so I wasn't bombarded with statuses etc that peed me off. Learning to say 'no' as well and also to let what they say fall on deaf ears. I also invested time in other friendships which was nice to see not all people are toxic and I could have a healthy relationship with people who are nice to me! It's taken me about 2 years to hone the art of not letting what she says bother me - and concentrating on the good friends I have.

Acceptance

I had never really felt happy in my life, apart from brief periods when I was younger as I am naturally a depressive person. After a hard road to have children and a difficult 6 months with each of them I gave up work to be with them full time and I can honestly say that every day for me now is pure happiness. I just want life to stand still at this time forever as everything is perfect.

Bettercall

I don't think total happiness is possible (for me, at least) because there will always be annoying things and serious things that make me irritated or sad. I find it far easier to take pleasure in small moments - a cuddle in the morning, a perfect bacon sandwich, feeling the sun on my face, watching happy dogs playing in the park, a great new haircut and so on.