All human beings share a common desire: To be happy. What differs is how we imagine that happiness.

A wise monk explained the connection between happiness and gratitude asking: Have you ever wondered if people are grateful because they are happy, or if they are happy because they are grateful?

You probably know people who have everything you could imagine necessary to be happy: material wealth, friendships, academic degrees, and yet they are not happy because they want to have something different or more than what they already have... and there is not this feeling of “enoughness”.

On the other hand, you may have met people who have experienced many misfortunes and losses, or live in poverty, facing adversity; and yet, they are deeply happy. Why? The answer lies in their ability to feel gratitude.

The key lies in understanding that it is not happiness that makes us grateful, but being grateful that makes us happy.

What is gratitude and how does it work?

Gratitude arises naturally in our hearts when we experience something valuable that has been given to us, something that we have not bought or earned, but rather we have been gifted. And happiness springs spontaneously.

The great news is that gratitude is not something that only happens occasionally, but we can live and feel it at all times.

This is your opportunity.

The key to living grateful and happy lies in being aware that every moment is a gift: We have not earned it, we have not bought it, we have not obtained it in any way, and we cannot guarantee that the next moment will be given to us. And the important thing is the gift within the gift: which is the opportunity. It is not having the thing or the gift itself, but the opportunity to enjoy it.

This moment we are in right now is a gift in itself, full of opportunities. Without this moment, we would not have the opportunity to experience anything or do anything. This moment is a gift and within it lies the opportunity to enjoy it, which is what makes us happy.

We are not talking about feeling gratitude for everything: for the evil or pain that exists in the world, such as war or loss, but rather feeling gratitude for the opportunity that is presented. Maybe that painful loss or problem is the opportunity to understand more clearly what we do want in life, or to develop skills and talents that we didn't even know we had, such as strength, togetherness, compassion, resilience, creative ideas...wisdom.

Most everyday moments contain the opportunity to enjoy and appreciate life, but we are often so rushed, distracted, or absorbed in thoughts that we miss that opportunity. Instead of enjoying ourselves, our minds fill us with worry and stress, making us feel trapped at times. However, that is not our consciousness, but our thought patterns, emotions and reactions that occur automatically and that is like a filter or lens between us and life.

The key to your happiness:

A simple study asked the following three questions via mobile phones:

1. Right now, what are you doing?

2. Right now, where is your mind?

3. Right now, do you feel happy?

The results showed that people whose minds were present in what they were doing felt happy, while those whose minds were elsewhere felt unhappy. Which tells us once again that happiness occurs when we live the moment with true presence, with the awareness of the gift it is and the opportunity that living it represents.

The Method to be Happy:
David Steindl-Rast, Austrian Benedictine monk, shares a method for living with gratitude and happiness that is as simple as remembering what we were taught as children about crossing the street:

"Stop. Look. Go."

…As simple as that.

However, with our hectic lives, we often forget to stop. We need to take pauses and moments of silence. When you stop and look you open your eyes, ears and heart, you can appreciate the opportunity to enjoy and help others. Opportunity invites you to do something, to take advantage of the gift that life offers you at that moment. Usually, that opportunity is to enjoy or create, since we are creative beings by nature.

Gratitude completely transforms your life. If you are grateful, you are not fearful, and if you are not afraid, you do not act violently. You act from a sense of sufficiency and share rather than feeling scarcity. When you feel gratitude, you enjoy the differences between people and respect the world. Grateful people are happy people.

The invitation I am sharing with you today is simple: Stop. Look. Go ahead. Take every moment as your opportunity to create a happy life and a happy world. Receive, treasure, and live every moment that life presents to you.

Gratitude, Happiness, and Peace

A group of psychologists in search of new answers asked Dalai Lama how to change the current tendencies in humanity of fear and despair. And he answered that it was possible to witness a peaceful humanity. However, peace is not something that falls from the sky; It is something that every human being can generate. If each of the 8 billion human beings that inhabit this beautiful planet spends time generating frequencies of peace through meditation, conscious breathing, silence, connection with nature, etc.; we will be able to witness a peaceful humanity... Even yourself, just by reading these words, you are already contributing to it.

Take a moment to close your eyes and breathe deeply. Observe and accept from the heart this precious moment in your life and feel that spontaneous gratitude emerging from deep within. Receive it, feel it, smile, create, imagine, visualize, hug, dance, taste, smell... This moment is your gift. How do you choose to live it?

Gratitude, Happiness, and Inner Peace are your possibility every moment. Don't let it pass.

Happiness in your life begins today.

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