Happiness

What is happiness? Why is it so elusive ? Is there a secret that happy people are keeping to themselves?
For some happiness may mean winning the lottery, getting the woman/man of your dreams, watching your children grow up , listening to your favourite song, sitting on the beach watching the sun setting over the horizon. Whatever happiness means to you, one thing is certain happiness is an individual thing, as a friend of mine would say it’s all about perception. Some would suggest that all of the above are fleeting moments of happiness and that the true meaning of happiness is about finding lasting contentment and inner peace.
How do we find this contentment? Is it part of self actualisation? Does the quest to better ourselves, our circumstances, our environment, eventually lead to inner happiness? Or does one get lost in the striving and we forget to stop to smell the roses?
It's possible that part of the journey is always to strive for answers and challenge the norm. Maybe within questioning, the pushing of boundaries, challenging the status quo and finding out about one's purpose lies a form of contentment.
Although a bit of a curse, this may lead finally to the realisation that that some aren't meant to just accept life we are meant to be curious and search for answers. There is a possibility in the mere wonderment lies the evolution of one's soul.
We all have had moments of joy and appreciation for life but for some there’s still the thirst for further knowledge, to look at the bigger picture and ponder whether there's more to life than this? Is life an illusion , are we here in the matrix and we are going to wake up one day? One thing is certain that life is fleeting and we need to make the most of it , savor every moment. A lot of us put off happiness, I will be happy when I am richer, when I have such and such car, when I am a stone lighter. What we fail to realize is that this isn’t a dress rehearsal that this is it and before we know it we will be old and looking back at what we did with our lives . Did we spend most of it waiting for something to happen? There’s something to be said for living in the now.
Another common error people make is to seek happiness outside ourselves, whether it be through material accumulation , through people in our lives, putting pressure on people who are the closest to us to fulfill us. Inevitably they will fall short; subsequently we feel let down and irrecoverably damage these relationships
People shy away from getting to know themselves, they are afraid of what they might encounter, we give time to people in our lives but we tend to not honor ourselves. To take time out to get to know what makes you tick what makes you happy. To do simple things in life to reconnect with the essence of you. We are all born pure , beautiful beings and we all have a right to give and receive love. Life itself throws challenges along the way but we mustn’t let these lessons taint us and close us of what is our birthright , that is the right to be loving beings. This should foremost start with loving ourselves.
We need to take time to ponder over life’s mysteries and question our existence, maybe then we may get a glimpse of the answer on why we here? Maybe we are here to explore our inner workings, to face our demons and in doing so we find our soul's purpose and the result of which maybe the inner peace that we are striving for.
Perhaps happiness is elusive and it only comes once you honor what it is you are here to do.