What is the secret to happiness?  That old question has been around since the beginning of time.

Some people in this life just seem internally happy.  Others have the disposition of a…. well… a toad on a sloggy bog.

I think the difference is simple to see in those you meet along the way.

This next part may seem a bit off track… but it isn’t.  Seriously.  You see, I’m a bit of a sports fan.  I just learned something about Chappy WcWinty.  Chappy was a football coach in Division II for a WHOLE lot of years.  This guy could really lead a team.  He was one of the winningest football coaches in history… at that level.

So….this is what he did.  The week following the game, Chappy would show his players films  of the previous game.  But he didn’t show them the mistakes.  He showed them what they did RIGHT.  He focused on the things they were doing well.

And what if we did this for ourselves?  What would happen if we played the good movies of ourselves in our heads?  Not of us playing football.  No.  But of us doing the things WE do.

I think whatever it is we pay attention to… what ever we put our  focus on …. is the thing that grows within us.  If we look in the direction we want to go…. well…  away we go.

Don’t get me wrong.  I am betting we can learn from our mistakes too.  That is a certainty in my book.  But we don’t have to linger there.  We just take that information… that “thing” we learned from the “mistake”…. and we try not to do THAT again.  But perhaps we shouldn’t dwell on it…. like a sloggy toad.

You can’t slap yourself into happy either.  I think we can become happy… …. yes…. …. we can “find” our happiness by doing the things that MAKE US happy.  Focus on what we enjoy.  Succeed at that.  And happiness is likely to follow, I say.

But if we dwell on the negative, and hang out with the rotten and stinky….once again…. there we go.

Look toward the direction you want to go.  And just go. Go like the wind.  Or…. Like Chappy.  Just like Chappy.

“Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful.” – H. Cain