Are You Happy Where You Are?

     I've written a few posts on happiness, the most recent one this past August called  How to Be (Truly) Happy. But the search for happiness comes in many forms, both at home and abroad, both inside ourselves and out in the world. 

     Anyone who's followed Laura Lee's blog knows that she recently moved into her new dream house in the Colorado foothills, Now she's making new friends, seeing new places, and enjoying her new town of La Veta. She is also enjoying some wonderful vistas, so if you want to see some fantastic scenery, take a look over at October in Southern Colorado. And if you have a little extra time, wander down to see the golden aspens, the golden clouds, and the gold up on Cripple Creek.

Colorado Rocky Mountain High

     By contrast. Meryl Baer likes the ocean, not the mountains. A few years ago she and her husband retired from Pennsylvania to the Jersey Shore. But waiting and worrying about another major storm approaching from the south has forced her to re-evaluate living on the edge of the Atlantic.

     So watching the waves crash up onto the beach, she wonders: Does she stay? Does she relocate? Where in the world would she go? Perhaps you want to blow over to her site and give her some advice at Shorely the Best.

      Meanwhile, our group's newcomer, Linda Myers, takes a different approach by going in search of happiness in strange and foreign places. Many of you know her blog Thoughts from a Bag Lady In Waiting, and probably are aware that she likes to travel. She recently returned from a trip to Eastern Europe and wrote a post called Reflections on Our Trip, thinking about what she learned from her journey, both tangible and intangible.

      Reflecting on her travels helps her clarify what's important to her -- learning the history of a place, experiencing the sublime feelings of being close to the water, and then the more practical things like if you walk five to seven miles a day you can eat gelato whenever you want and still fit into your clothes, and if you want to be happy on the road, be kind to your feet, especially if you're walking on cobblestones.

     And keeping on that more practical note, none of us would be happy if our identity was stolen. On The Survive and Thrive Boomer Guide, Rita R. Robison, consumer journalist, writes about the new credit cards with chips, which are safer because information is stored in a chip and you need to enter a PIN to complete the transaction. For the full story slide your mouse or keypad over to Do You Have a Credit Card with a Chip?

     You might also want to check out her post on how T-Mobile customer accounts have been hacked through their credit reporting agency. All the more reason to be careful, whenever you try to communicate over the cables or the airwaves.

     Finally, in 10 Signs of Sustainable Happiness Kathy Gottberg shows how we all want to be happy internally, by practicing gratitude, staying healthy, feeling competent, being loved. But she goes on to point out, “In order to have an experience of real happiness and well-being that is enduring and sustainable, it must extend out to other people and the world around you."

     In other words, it's not enough to achieve happiness for ourselves alone. Perhaps it's not even possible, for true happiness involves other people and the meaning they bring to our lives.

      In another post called Carl Jung and the Art of Aging Well, Gottberg tells us what the great psychologist discovered about happiness and the aging process. “A human being would certainly not grow to be 70 or 80 years old if this longevity had no meaning for the species to which he belongs,” wrote Jung. “The afternoon of human life must also have a significance of its own and cannot be merely a pitiful appendage to life’s morning.”

     So for Jung, as for all of us, the aging process is not merely one of inescapable decline of body, mind and relevancy. It is, instead, a time of progressive refinement of what is essential in life. And in that, we can all find true happiness.