42 Quotes on Happiness
What are the secrets of happiness?
It’s a question we’d all like the answer to. Unfortunately, it’s not that simple.
Many things we think will make us happy don’t, and we fail to acknowledge the little things that do.
The good news is that we can learn to be happier; we just need a better understanding of the real drivers.
Here are 42 great quotes from various thinkers, writers, artists, monks, and others to help you gain a different perspective.
1. "The way I see it, if you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain!"
- Dolly Parton, Musician
2. “Happiness is a warm puppy."
- Charles M. Schulz, Cartoonist
3. "Sanity and happiness are an impossible combination."
- Mark Twain, Writer
4. “To find happiness, look halfway between too little and too much.”
- Ruskin Bond, Indian writer
5. “Children are happy because they don’t have a file in their minds called ‘All the Things That Could Go Wrong.”
- Marianne Williamson, Author, speaker, and political activist
6. "Unhappiness is not knowing what we want and killing ourselves to get it."
- Don Herrold, Cartoonist
7. "Maybe happiness is this: not feeling that you should be elsewhere, doing something else, being someone else."
- Eric Weiner, American author
8. “Our economy is based upon people wanting more; their happiness on wanting less.”
- Frank A. Clark, American lawyer and politician
9. “Happiness cannot be pursued; it must ensue. One must have a reason to ‘be happy.’ Once the reason is found . . . one becomes happy automatically.”
- Viktor Emil Frankl, Austrian psychologist and Holocaust survivor
10. “The trick is to find happiness in the brief gaps between disasters.”
- Christopher Paolini, American writer
11. "Others may know pleasure, but pleasure is not happiness. It has no more importance than a shadow following a man."
- Muhammad Ali, Boxer
12. “Rules for happiness: something to do, someone to love, something to hope for.”
- Immanuel Kant, Philosophy
13. “Happiness is not a goal; it is a by-product.”
- Eleanor Roosevelt, American political figure, diplomat, and activist
14. “The happiest of all lives is a busy solitude.”
- Voltaire, French writer
15. “You can never get enough of what you don't need to make you happy.”
- Eric Hoffer, American philosopher
16. “Not having the best situation, but seeing the best in your situation is the key to happiness.”
- Marie Forleo, American entrepreneur
17. “Of all the means which are procured by wisdom to ensure happiness throughout the whole life, by far the most important is the acquisition of friends.”
- Epicurus, Greek philosopher
18. "When one door of happiness closes, another opens, but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one that has been opened for us."
- Helen Keller, American author
19. “Don’t let your happiness depend on something you may lose.”
- C.S. Lewis, British writer and literary scholar
20. “Most unhappiness is caused by people listening to themselves… instead of talking to themselves.”
- William James, Psychologist
21. “Man only likes to count his troubles; he doesn't calculate his happiness.”
- Fyodor Dostoevsky, Russian writer
22. “We are more interested in making others believe we are happy than in trying to be happy ourselves.”
- Francois de la Rochefoucauld, French writer
23. "Happiness is not about making it to the peak of the mountain nor is it about climbing aimlessly around the mountain; happiness is the experience of climbing toward the peak."
- Tal Ben-Shahar, American teacher and writer
24. “There is a wonderful mythical law of nature that the three things we crave most in life—happiness, freedom, and peace of mind—are always attained by giving them to someone else.”
- Peyton C. March, Army officer
25. “Shop for security over happiness and we buy it at that price.”
- Richard Bach, American writer
26. “The Constitution only guarantees the American people the right to pursue happiness. You have to catch it yourself.”
- Benjamin Franklin, Founding Father of the United States
27. “The secret of happiness is freedom, the secret of freedom is courage.”
- Carrie Jones, Football
28. “Happiness is a choice that requires effort at times.”
- Aeschylus, Greek tragedian
29. "If you want to be happy, do not dwell in the past, do not worry about the future, focus on living fully in the present."
- Roy T. Bennett, Author
30. "A calm and modest life brings more happiness than the pursuit of success combined with constant restlessness."
- Albert Einstein, Physicist
31. "For every minute you are angry you lose sixty seconds of happiness."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson, Writer
32. “Happiness consists more in small conveniences or pleasures that occur every day, than in great pieces of good fortune that happen but seldom to a man in the course of his life."
- Benjamin Franklin, Founding Father of the United States
33. "Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony."
- Mahatma Gandhi, Indian lawyer
34. “Happiness is a gift and the trick is not to expect it, but to delight in it when it comes.”
- Charles Dickens, English novelist and journalist
35. “Whoever is happy will make others happy too.”
- Anne Frank, German diarist
36. “Happiness is like one of those palaces on an enchanted island, its gates guarded by dragons. One must fight to gain it.”
- Alexander Dumas, French novelist and playwright
37. “Everybody in the world is seeking happiness—and there is one sure way to find it. That is by controlling your thoughts. Happiness doesn’t depend on outward conditions. It depends on inner conditions.”
- Dale Carnegie, American writer and lecturer
38. “It’s up to brave hearts, sir, to be patient when things are going badly, as well as being happy when they’re going well.”
- Miguel de Cervantes, Spanish writer
39. “Our happiness or unhappiness depends to an important degree upon the habit of mind we cultivate.”
- Norman Vincent Peale, American clergyman and author
40. “Success is getting what you want..Happiness is wanting what you get.”
- Dale Carnegie, American writer and lecturer
41. “No medicine cures what happiness cannot.”
- Gabriel García Márquez, Colombian novelist
42. “A mindfulness practitioner is able to generate joy and happiness. It’s not so hard. There’s a little difference between joy and happiness. Joy still has some of the element of excitement or anticipation in it. In happiness, there is ease and freedom.”
- Thich Nhat Hanh, Vietnamese monk and peace activist
Need more happiness in your life? Try our hugely popular and highly-rated courses made in collaboration and certified by The Happiness Research Institute. The Happy Course and The Even Happier Course are sure to put a smile on your face.
