WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO BE "HAPPY"?

Happy

(adjetive)

feeling or showing pleasure or contentment.

joyful, content, on top of the world, fortunate, lucky, at peace, cheery, jovial, radiant, sunny, blessed.

What is happiness? What does it mean to be happy?

I asked eight random individuals those questions above last night at 10:36. I asked a variety of people, ranging from age, gender, faith, and background. I'm going to show you all of their anonymous responses. Each individual person had their own perception of happiness. The results I got were very intriguing.

There is a certain freedom in not holding anything back. In being yourself in the purest form. This answer was quite simple, but it suggests that individuality and being yourself leads to happiness.

Others had very simple answers, right down to their faith.

I particularly enjoyed this response because I think laughter is a big part of the equation of happiness. If you can laugh yourself out of boredom, or out of bad situations, I think life will be so much easier.

I adored this response. And the wisdom in it was astounding. It's crazy because this response came from a fifteen year old boy. It just goes to show that everyone's perception of happiness is different and age isn't really a boundary.

It's interesting, because if you think about it, you may have moments of fufillment or contentment but do you ever REALLY hit the limit on how happy you can be? Is there a point in your life where you're like, "Okay, I'm completely satisfied. I've done everything right." ? I personally don't think there is. I think we keep striving to be better and better our entire lives.

Feeling like you are loved and known and special is a big contributor. My friends and family totally feed into MY personal happiness- but I have to ask myself, if I didn't have a family and I didn't have friends would I be capable of happiness?

Having no stress is something I would ideally love- But isn't stress the very factor that pushes us to do great and amazing things? We work hard when we are stressed out. If I never felt stress again, I don't know how great of a person I would be.

I couldn't quite cut her name out (sorry, Breanne!) but the last name is obviously not

in here so I thought it would be okay. In my opinion, number 8 was the best and most thoughtful response.

What does happiness mean to you?

Email me at tnskylar@gmail.com with your response.

Until next time, Skylar Presley