I was reading a quote book that I received for my birthday. One of the entries read, “Try to make at least one person happy every day, and then in ten years you may have made 3,650 persons happy, or brightened a small town by your contribution to the fund of general enjoyment.”
That’s great advice. If you want to become neurotic. So let me give you my advice. “Try to make at least one person happy every day: yourself!”
-RG
Reader interactions
50 Replies to “Making Other People Happy”
Bravo, Bravo, Bravo!
I’m not sure where it happened but, somewhere down the line, people got the idea that self-sacrifice was noble and that it was the best way to operate in all areas of life.
Heck, I was in my 20s before I realized that it was okay for me to put my own needs, wants and desires first in my life — because living for everyone else sure wasn’t working. I was broke, stressed, discouraged and working on a 2-pack-a-day cigarette habit.
Now, not only is my life working, but I’m in a position where I actually CAN be of help and assistance to others.
Great stuff, Randy. Who knew a blog post that short could be so powerful? 🙂
Tony Rush
hmmm… how about the Fact that as you help someone else, making them happy, you inturn make yourself happy.
Give someone a word of encouragement – they feel better – you feel “good” – win/win
When we serve others, we feel good. That is win/win – thanks Randy!
http://www.thesecondadam.com/freebook.html
Making others happy has never interfered with my ability to make or keep myself happy. I *do* make others happy every day. It gets easier all the time and my life is better for it (not to mention the lives of the people I encounter).
Interesting thought process Randy…
I have to say that looks like it would be much easier to remember than the “Some of the people all of the time… quote” ;0)
Cheers Fellah!
Pete
In making yourself happy, you raise your vibration. You radiate joy and good things.
The people you encounter are energized by you. Their vibration is raised, and they are happier.
It’s an upward spiral, and it’s all good.
And it all starts with you.
So I agree with Randy, and would add that the happy by-product is that the people you interface will be blessed by your presence.
It depends on what you mean by “make someone happy.”
If by that you mean making them feel good by doing/saying something that really doesn’t cost more than taking the time to focus on them for a moment of your day, then it’s a good thing.
If, however, you mean giving more tangibly, such as money, or sacrificially, at an expense to your being that leaves you depleted, then yes, it can lead to over extension and neurosis.
It’s all a learning process, and figuring out just what you can give without depleting your own resources-emotional or physical.
Char
nice. I agree.
All, what Randy is commenting on is what most people miss – you HAVE to make yourself or BE happy FIRST, before you can make or help anyone else to feel or be happy. Its the law, right Randy 🙂
Definitely an Ayn Rand viewpoint.
You can’t give what you don’t have and if you’re not happy, you’re can’t make someone else happy – unless of course that someone is a sick individual who likes to see other people unhappy.
Exactly Randy excatly… I really think that we have only total influewnce in our selfes. Begin with yow…
If you are not feeling happy but you decide to make someone else happy, that instantly changes your vibration. You don’t have to be feeling happy yourself first to be able to make someone else happy. All it takes is a split second. Then by focusing postively on someone else, you have made a positive contribution to them, energetically and vibrationally, and you have shifted your mood.
I love it!!! So true, right on, keep up the good work!
http://www.lonestargroups.com
wonderful comments
I wish I had written them, as I totally agree with your vision of giving.
take care friend !
Happiness IS contagious but it has to start with yourself in order to spread! Love ya RG!!
I agree with Randy and that trying to make someone happy each and every day could go beyond neurosis. I cannot make someone glad or sad, happy nor sappy. How someone responds
to me is their choice. I’ll use a cruise as an example. I love to cruise. I love everything about the whole experience. Denise and I just came back from our 10th cruise and there are always “the bummers” on every cruise. No matter how good the service is or how good the food is or how great the entertainment or even the weather, somebody always pops up with criticism. How they hated this or didn’t care for that. Thankfully my happiness at that moment, or any moment for that matter, isn’t dependent on their state of mind either. Life is good.
By making themselves happy, and in so doing, also ignoring the programmed society, Paul Potts and Susan Boyle sure will have made some 70+ million viewers on YouTube happy. That’s 1% of the total Earth population.
It’s interesting to understand that what people see in others is inside of themselves. That also goes for what people see in Paul Potts and Susan Boyle, both before AND after.
David Icke:
“It goes beyond the vacuous Obama ‘Yes we can’ to the much more profound ‘Yes I can’. If your base is the ‘we’ then the ‘we’ can become the ‘it’, the programmed collective identity and perception.
If you want a truly free world of uniqueness and diversity (oh, yes, please) then it must come from the ‘I’. For it is the sum total of the ‘I’s’ that make up the ‘we’ that is called society. If the ‘I’s’ are clone-like then so must be the ‘we’.
Being true to thyself does not need the confirmation of others to be valid. It just needs thyself to be true.
‘It is written’, say the texts of the ancient scribes about what is to be. Yes it is, but it doesn’t have to be. What is written is the program, but we don’t have to be its slave. We don’t have to be the laser to the DVD.”
The really tricky thing about this entire conversation is that you really can’t make someone else happy. It’s not even possible.
You can do kind and loving things with the intent of someone feeling loved, touched or joyful by your actions, but their happiness is completely dependent on them, their state of mind and open heart.
In turn it is true that our own happiness is dependent on our state of mind. We can feel touched, loved or happy by what others do for us, but it is still our own state of mind and openess to recieving that allows those emotions to surface.
Jeanne
It is impossible to make another person happy!
Happiness is an inside job just like prosperity!
Rita
Well said Randy!
The way I see it, it’s not about being a cup half empty or half full, or convincing others to see things more positively. It’s about being a cup-overflowing…. and filling up the cups of others. That means we must fill our own cups first… Love ourselves first… Make ourselves happy first… BEFORE we can do anything meaningful for others. Right?
I guess it’s another paradox of life, to truly make others happy, we must be happy in the first place. I think I’ll take this challenge and make myself happy every day for the next ten years!
Exactly what I was thinking when I was reading the quote from the book — the only person I need to make happy on a daily basis is myself (spouse too of course, but I am the top dog). And quite honestly if we are happy, and we radiate some of the happiness and positive vibes, we may in deed affect or brighten up others around us. And according to the old blue eyes song (that is Frank Sinatra for you young pups), “When you smile, the whole world smiles with you!”
Thanks for reminding us … to make ourselves happy.
Yes, your statement is well said, Randy !! I like that.
The fact of our human-ness is that if we feel good about ourselves – love ourselves, with a good self esteem, then we can’t help extend ourselves and reach out to others in love because making others happy! is a bi-product of our happiness within and the love for ourselves.
So, if we are honestly happy within, it would automatically radiate in our speech and our caring attitude even in one-to-one human communications with others, not appearing like a robot or systematic and cold and impersonal ways.
So, you can’t offer what you’re not equipped – love and caring – and if you’re not happy, you sure can’t make someone else happy, really … unless that someone is a rare neurotically sick individual who wants to see other people unhappy.
Life is good !
SAACHI
and you know what, that is so easy! Mike and I were traveling home after a big training and we were both feeling like we’d done that – made our selves happy – we so glad that we’d attended the summit. So full of positive energy. So refreshed – even after a grueling 3 days! lol – yea grueling! 😉
A SMILE FOR YOU
Smiling is infectious; you catch it like a flu,
When someone smiled at me today, I started smiling too.
I passed around the corner and someone saw my grin.
When he smiled, I realized, I’d passed it on to him.
I thought about this smile, then I realized its worth,
a single smile, just like mine, could travel round the earth.
So if you feel your smile begin. don’t leave it undetected,
let’s start an epidemic quick, and get the world infected!
author unknown
Truth and laughter!!!!
xx
Looks like the philosophy of a conceited egocentric to me !!
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Randy, I agree it is a false life. My experience is happiness sought or sold is a disease. Happiness happens at the most interesting times; when I least expect it. Often if I slow down for the wind to catch up and have a leaf pass me the humor lasts all day. People who expect to be pleased, live from the book, 1001 Rules Required to Make ME Happy ARE neurotic. Give up all your expectations and spin the dial to your point of view and if you can’t see the jokes, you are dead.
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