The pursuit of happiness

Continuing on from last week and leaving the old bad habits behind and welcoming the new you together with the dawning of a New Year and decade, I want to pursue happiness- joy and peace. Inner joy and peace as simple as it sounds is not easy to come by, but the impact it has on our lives is immeasurable and priceless. In consideration of such insurmountable significances, here are a few tips to help you get the best out of this year, your year.
"The simplification of life is one of the steps to inner peace. A persistent simplification will create an inner and outer well-being that places harmony in one’s life."
Set limits. Set limits for daily checking of inboxes Set time limits for small decisions and make them within seconds after you have thought about them to avoid procrastination and over thinking. Set time limits for tasks such as 15 minutes each day for answering emails or for using Twitter. Set a limit for commitments. And learn to say no, it will make you feel less stress and produce better results.
"Acceptance of others, their looks, their behaviors, their beliefs, brings you an inner peace and tranquility - instead of anger and resentment."
When you accept what is, you stop feeding energy into resisting what is. You don’t make a problem more powerful and sticky in your mind. Instead, somewhat counter intuitively, when you accept what is, it loses much of its power. It just does. And you feel stillness inside. Now, accepting what is doesn’t mean to give up. It just means that you put yourself in a better position, take action if necessary. Because now you can see more clearly, you can focus your energy towards what you want, and take the appropriate action to change your situation.
"Inner peace can be reached only when we practice forgiveness. Forgiveness is letting go of the past, and is therefore the means for correcting our misperceptions."
By accepting what is, it is much easier to let go of things and to forgive what has happened. Forgiveness is important because as long as you don’t forgive someone, you are linked to that person. Your thoughts will return to the person who wronged you and what s/he did over and over again. The emotional link between the two of you is so strong and inflicts much suffering in you and as a result of your inner turmoil - most often in other people around you too. The fury controls you. When you forgive you do not only release the other person. You set yourself free too from all of that agony.
One thing to keep in mind is to not just forgive others but also yourself. By forgiving yourself - instead of resenting yourself for something you did a week or 10 years ago - you make the habit of forgiveness more and more of a natural part of you. And so forgiving others becomes easier too.
Also, what you think is a question of forgiving others you may sometimes - after some time and inner struggle - discover is just as much, if not more, about releasing yourself rather than the other person.
"Never continue in a job you don’t enjoy. If you’re happy doing what you're doing, you'll like yourself, you'll have inner peace. And if you have that, along with physical health, you’ll have more success than you could possibly have imagined."
A quote from the esteemed Roger Carcas "When you do what you enjoy there is a natural peace that arises within. You are in alignment with your outer world." This also leads to a lot more success than if you have a lot of inner turmoil and really don't care that much for your work.
One of my favorite tips for finding things you enjoy or love doing is simply to explore (explore- to discover what it is like or what is there, a feeling of exhilaration upon discovering something new or exciting to be savored) life. To be curious and try things out and see what you think of them. This can bring many insights both about yourself and about how things really are when you do them, rather than when they are just theories floating around in your head. Life is full of surprises and challenges but taking is one thrilling experience. It is better to have found happiness and lost it than to not have known the feeling at all. What do you think?