Question: What motto do you live by?
This question originates from the Harlequin Romantic Suspense hero interviews we post at our HRS Facebook page each month.
Answer: Happiness is a choice.
I believe everyone has the same 24 hours in a day and how we focus our time, energy, and effort makes the real difference in what we get out of each day and eventually, life as a whole.
No one can be on all the time, and no one has a perfectly smooth life. It sounds good, but wouldn’t that be boring?
Life has thrown me some pretty wild curve balls and there are days when it feels like a line drive is plowing straight through my gut. But enough with the baseball metaphors. (It’s not even my favorite sport.)
Growing up, I witnessed plenty of examples of adults who couldn’t enjoy the good moments, always waiting for some new twist or bad thing to balance it out. Those people in my life often wallowed in the negative without even realizing it.
So whether it’s a good day or bad, I make a conscious choice to find the happy. It hasn’t been easy – more like an ongoing lifetime practice. Some days the happy is the simple pleasure of a few minutes in the garden or listening to the birds. Other days, it’s the high of finaling in a contest or finishing a manuscript.
And on the bad days, I pause and reflect on those moments of joy and rest there. As I said, it’s a lifetime practice, but one that has definitely paid off for my mental health and outlook, as well as for my family and career.
Live the adventure!
1Jun2019
ps If you have a question for me, post it in the comments and I’ll answer it here or on an upcoming post.
