Ajahn Chah

You are your own teacher. Investigate yourself to find the truth – inside, not outside. Knowing yourself is most important.

Happiness is not a goal…it’s a by-product of a life well lived.

Cheerfulness and contentment are great beautifiers, and are famous preservers of good looks.

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

Whether happiness may come or not, one should try and prepare one’s self to do without it.

Be happy with what you have and are, be generous with both, and you won’t have to haunt for happiness

Laughter is the shortest distance between two people.

If only we’d stop trying to be happy we could have a pretty good time.

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

Seize the moments of happiness, love and be loved! That is the only reality in the world, all else is folly. It is the one thing we are interested in here.

The best way to cheer yourself up is to try to cheer somebody else up.

You traverse the world in search of happiness, which is within the reach of every man. A contented mind confers it on all.

How often, for example, have you said or heard someone else say, “All I really want in this life is to be happy”? It sounds like a commonsense answer, but as a life goal, it is destined for failure. My dog, Barkley, wants to be happy. Does that mean that the two of you want the same things? I don’t think so. I’ll bet everything I own that you and Barkley define happiness very differently. So unless you’re willing to settle for someone scratching your belly and letting you sleep under the coffee table, you might want to be a little more precise about what you as a unique individual really want.

Man is the artificer of his own happiness.

Be happy; without reason.

It’s not selfish to love yourself, take care of yourself, and to make your happiness a priority. It’s necessary.