Happiness - a thought away:
     changing your life through meditation

“Happiness is that innate part of life that eludes many of us most of the time. Life is challenging, devastating, rewarding, contemplative, nurturing, and sometimes happy. As a Yoga teacher and therapist, it never ceases to amaze me how much people desire something as simple as happiness in their life. Everyone wants to feel good, valued and real. Happiness is looked at as this coveted award for the select few - the ones that make front page news, the ones with lots of money, the ones with good, well adjusted children, the ones who write books, make movies, run for office or somehow get noticed by the masses. Not true!
I’m here to tell you that happiness is just a thought away. Not only that, I will share with you the simplicity of happiness and how you can be happy every day. The hardest part of the process is believing that’s it’s possible to be happy just because you choose to be. I have shared this with classes I teach as well as private sessions, all with the same result. Everyone leaves happy. It’s staying that way that is the challenge.
For just a moment, think of something that makes you feel happy. Imprint that image or thought into your head and sit on it for a couple of minutes. Roll it around, savour it, do whatever it takes to feel the happiness that thought brings. Don’t cheat - give yourself two minutes. Now, do you feel ‘happy’? Has your attitude shifted just a little bit? Yes? Where did that change come from? Why did just thinking about a happy thought make you feel happy? Take this a step further and for just a moment, think about the feeling, ’happy’, not associating it with any memory or situation. Again, give yourself two minutes. If you’re really working with me, you may have felt happy without relating it to any place or event that elicited the feeling of happiness. Now we’re getting somewhere. If you didn’t feel happy, stay here and keep working it...”

Written by Georgianna Anderson RYT SMC, this article continues to describe how meditation can help you to experience greater happiness in your life. Georgianna Anderson lives in Phoenix, Arizona where she teaches group and one-to-one Yoga sessions. She also runs retreats and workshops on Yoga and meditation and has written a number of articles for magazines.