Finding Your Happy Place
Where is your happy place? Television commercials are abuzz with glitzy advertisings of their “exceptional” products which will lead to your happy place.
I smiled when I read a sign in a restaurant located near the Gulf of Mexico: “The beach is my happy place.”
Dictionaries describe a “happy place” as something we associate with the past–where we enjoyed contentment, felt calm, free of stress, and experienced a happy state of mind.
But doesn’t a “happy place” also mean our present state? Where we find enjoyment? Yet it can change as we transition through various seasons of life. A happy place can be physical, emotional, or spiritual.
Ask yourself this question: “What makes me happy?” Maybe one of these:
- Praying, studying the Bible, or attending church
- A phone call from a friend
- A box of chocolates or a delicious meal
- Enjoying a hobby: golf, knitting, playing an instrument, painting, cooking, flying a plane or flying a kite, reading, decorating, swimming, hiking, a movie, or television show
- A day spent with children or grandchildren, laughing at play
- A hug or greeting from a spouse, a child, a pet
- A compliment from a boss, a spouse, a child
- Helping a friend, neighbor, or stranger in need
- Name your own truly happy place
Most days I try to find a happy moment.. But my truly happy contentment comes at night when all my family members are home from work and safely tucked in their beds ready for a good night’s sleep. I say my good-night thanks and praises to the Lord, turn over and expect some restful sleep. When I do, I wake up happy!
While most of us desire to find our spiritual happy place, the Bible gives us a place to start:
Scriptures: O taste and see that the Lord [our God] is good! Blessed (happy, fortunate, to be envied) is the man who trusts and takes refuge in Him. (Psalm 34:8 AMPC)
Happy (blessed, fortunate, enviable) is the man who finds skillful and godly Wisdom, and the man who gets understanding [drawing it forth from God’s Word and life’s experiences], (Proverbs 3:13 AMPC)
Blessed (happy, fortunate, prosperous, and enviable) is the man who walks and lives not in the counsel of the ungodly [following their advice, their plans and purposes], nor stands [submissive and inactive] in the path where sinners walk, nor sits down [to relax and rest] where the scornful [and the mockers] gather. (Psalm 1:1 AMPC)
Blessed and happy and to be envied is the person of whose sin the Lord will take no account nor reckon it against him. (Romans 4:8 AMPC)
Prayer: Lord, thank You that when I look around me, I find many reasons to be happy because of Your many blessings. I also experience happiness whenever I think of the great sacrifice Jesus did in dying for my sins. Thank You. May the Holy Spirit guide me when I hit rough places and get discouraged. I ask in the name of Jesus, Amen.
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