What Happiness Means to Me

¶ … Happiness Means to Me

My strategy for creating and ensuring thorough happiness for myself and others is simple: I will treat myself and others well, with kindness and compassion. As a nurse, I have already dedicated my life to helping others heal and experience overall well-being. My profession will continue to bolster my happiness as well as the happiness of others. However, happiness for me is not limited to my job; in my personal life too, I will maintain high standards of ethics, health, inner peace, and prosperity. Happiness to me means not the fleeting moments of bliss that can accompany daily life; this is but an obsolete definition of happiness that will lead not to true joy but to the mindless pursuit of sensual pleasure. I will, however, lie in a literal and figurative bed of roses in order to experience those moments of happiness that come from pure inner peace but that are not dependent on material things. I will continue to pursue holistic prosperity through my livelihood, which I know serves as a boon to both myself and to others. Not only will nursing pay my bills for years to come, it will also have ancillary payoffs, such as bringing health to other people. Continuing to practice my rewarding profession will bring deep happiness to my life as I witness those around me smile and appreciate their being alive. Throughout my life, I will direct and focus my attention and energies to a true, long-lasting sense of happiness that pervades my life and the lives of others. Therefore, my happiness entails a combination of personal and interpersonal blessings that through my actions I create.

One of the personal blessings that I will create in my life will be like lying on a bed of roses. Aromatic, sensual, and awash with color, roses symbolize love and spirituality. Lying amid the soft petals, I will contemplate true joy, knowing that as I follow my bliss I will be contributing to the bliss of others. The surer of myself I become, the more happiness I will create in my life. When I am peaceful and serene, I will act with complete kindness and compassion to all who I meet. When people around me bother me or make me angry, I will react with an appropriate measure of assertiveness but will never resort to harming others. I will therefore always seek to be cordial and sweet to those I meet either in my personal or professional life. Lying on a bed of roses will be my way of bringing my inner peace to the outer world.

Related to this concept of happiness is my ability to prosper and be healthy, which I will do with grace, ease, and aplomb. Because my profession is nursing, it will only make sense for me to pursue perfect health and well-being for myself. I will treat my body well by eating good foods and refraining from unhealthy behaviors. My good health will serve as a conspicuous example to others who might learn from my example as well as from their own mistakes. In addition to the optimal physical and mental health conditions I will create in my life, I will also continue to prosper and be wealthy. While I don't feel that my happiness depends on how much money I have in the bank, I do know that wealth can contribute to my happiness. Material prosperity will be a reward for my hard work, and a way for me to help others to prosper too.

I will never tire of caring for others because I am and always will be dedicated to nursing. Whether old and infirm or young and helpless, I will do all I can in my power to assist others. My knowledge of medical science will enable me to bring the latest in technology and scientific advancements to the people I care for. However, nursing is not only about science, which can be as cold and hard as an icicle. Rather, nursing involves a great degree of caring and compassion that transcend medicine or science. Similarly, my ability to remain peaceful in times of stress will help others heal. Nursing will always be a fairly stressful job, as I will encounter a number of emergency situations that will try my spirit, my patience, and my endurance. Happiness, therefore, will definitely include continued dedication and perseverance in spite of the many obstacles that will come my way.

Nursing involves a seamless interface between education and understanding, knowledge and compassion. As I possess all of these things, I will remain thoroughly dedicated to my profession and will continue to help and take care of others throughout most of my life. My job will bring me happiness on a number of different levels: it will contribute to my personal prosperity and well-being as it also contributes to the health and well-being of others. For example, when I go to work, I report partly out of duty to my own life but partly because other people are counting on me, people whose lives depend on my services. I will encounter life or death situations in which my actions will have an immediate and direct impact on someone's physical health. These are the things that will continue to make me happy and will continue to stimulate my passion for life.