At first, I both agreed and disagreed with this quote. I disagreed with it because "happiness is the object and design of our existence" (emphasis added), but I agree with it because it sounds true. And as my mother pointed out when she shared this photo on Facebook, "If you strive to do and be these things, you will be happy."
God created us so that we could be happy, but the path to happiness isn't what many people think it is. Often, in the pursuit of happiness, people make choices that give them temporary happiness, followed by lasting unhappiness. God has shown us the path to true happiness, but because it's not easy or fun, many people have trouble following it. It's ironic that our desire for happiness pulls us away from the source of true happiness, and that if we forget about our own happiness and just try to make other people happy, we'll end up happier, too.
There's a lot of irony in the world, and most of it can be attributed to either Satan trying to trick us into thinking that evil is good, or God knowing that the path to happiness passes through the valley of sorrow. It's ironic that in order to get what we ultimately want, we have to put our own wants on hold for a while. In order to find true happiness, we need to stop looking for things to make us happy. Crazy, huh?
I want to be happy. Of course, we all do. But strangely, in order to gain happiness, I need to stop putting so much focus on things that I think will make me happy. Temporary happiness isn't important. Eternal happiness is.
1 comment:
:) Perspective
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