Leo Tolstoy

He felt now that he was not simply close to her, but that he did not know where he ended and she began.

They’ve got no idea what happiness is, they don’t know that without this love there is no happiness or unhappiness for us–there is no life.

In the best, the friendliest and simplest relations flattery or praise is necessary, just as grease is necessary to keep wheels turning.

He stepped down, avoiding any long look at her as one avoids long looks at the sun, but seeing her as one sees the sun, without looking.

Music is the shorthand of emotion

Pure and complete sorrow is as impossible as pure and complete joy.

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

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

Be happy; without reason.

What’s the use of happiness? It can’t buy you money.

Anybody who thinks money will make you happy, hasn’t got money.

Relinquishing the delusional hope that we can or must be flawless allows us to seek happiness in the place it can be found: Our real, messy, imperfect experience

While I am opposed to all orthodox creeds, I have a creed myself; and my creed is this. Happiness is the only good. The time to be happy is now. The place to be happy is here. The way to be happy is to make others so. This creed is somewhat short, but it is long enough for this life, strong enough for this world. If there is another world, when we get there we can make another creed.

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.

There is only one way to happiness and that is to cease worrying about things which are beyond the power of our will.

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

If you let go a little you will have a little happiness. If you let go completely you will be free.

There is only one happiness in this life, to love and be loved.

We are long before we are convinced that happiness is never to be found, and each believes it possessed by others, to keep alive the hope of obtaining it for himself.

If happiness is what you’re after, you’re gonna be let down frequently and you’re gonna be unhappy much of your time. Joy though, joy is the feeling that we have doing what we are fashioned to do, no matter the outcome.

Pursue whatever it is that you want to do with your life. It is the only secret to happiness that I know except for maybe true love, that and maybe having the amazing health insurance plan that our congressmen have.