Epitectus

The best way to cheer yourself up is to try to cheer somebody else up.

One swallow does not make a summer, neither does one fine day; similarly one day or brief time of happiness does not make a person entirely happy.

The greatest happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved – loved for ourselves, or rather, loved in spite of ourselves.

Whether happiness may come or not, one should try and prepare one’s self to do without it.

The search for happiness is one of the chief sources of unhappiness.

You have no more right to consume happiness without producing it, than you do to consume wealth without producing it.

A lifetime of happiness? No man alive could bear it; it would be hell on earth.

I’ve found happiness in my work, but not in my private life. I had to take from my private life to make my public life successful. I had to make a lot of sacrifices. I was happy in Cardiff. I had a great time. Every Thursday there was a factory club; darts, dancing. I was happy until success entered my life, and then it was all downhill. Success spoilt me. It took away my happiness. My success became a barrier with my family. They couldn’t relate to me, and I couldn’t relate to them.

We have no more right to consume happiness without producing it than to consume wealth without producing it.

The secret of happiness, you see, is not found in seeking more, but in developing the capacity to enjoy less.

You don’t stop laughing because you grow old. You grow old because you stop laughing.

I’m always smiling and happy.

The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one.

A happy person is not a person in a certain set of circumstances, but rather a person with a certain set of attitudes.

Happiness and unhappiness are in the heart and spirit of each one of us: If you feel unhappy, then place yourself above that and act so that your happiness does not get to be dependent on anything.