What does it mean to be happy? If you are “content”, are you happy? Do you have to be joyful or exuberant to be happy? How do you understand the word “happy”?

And what brings you to that feeling?

I was having this conversation with an old friend the other day and we debated the meaning of the word “content”. Is being content the same thing as being happy? I’ve always been a fairly contented person but until I stopped to think about it I believed that somehow “content” ranked lower on the happiness scale than “happy” did.

You know I’ve written a book called The Happy Place but that doesn’t make me an expert on this – far from it. And since my son died, I’ve had to re-think this topic – a lot. It’s very hard to feel happy in the year following a sudden loss like this.

It’s hot easy for me to get back to happy right now but “content” I can sometimes manage. I feel content…

• When I have a good book on the go – fiction
• When I have a craft, like knitting, that I’m in the middle of – preferably when I’m starting a new one
• When I have fun plans to anticipate, maybe later in the week, or on the weekend
• When I have a cup of iced coffee, made from the left-over brew of Saturday morning, the sun is shining and, as I have said, there is that book I’m reading
• When I am preparing for our yearly sojourn to the water – and any moment when I’m there
• When I’m counting down the days until my daughter’s visit – and any moment when she’s home
• When orders pour in from our website store
• When I am able to solve a difficult problem
• When I am getting things organized – each thing in its place
• When there is a lot of good conversation on the LFI porch

How do you see happiness/contentment? Can you get to happy when you don’t know what makes you happy? What does it mean to you to be happy?

Photo credit: David Amsler