WHAT DOES BEING CONTENT LOOK LIKE?

WhaT does happy look like to you? For me, if i were to imagine myself at my happiest, i would be in a beautiful park. My wife would be there, our dog running happily just ahead of us and we would be on our way to meet good friends.

The sun would be shining, and i’d feel its warmth on my skin. The glorious smell of freshly cut grass would tickle my nose. i would feel fit and well in my body; nothing aching, my mind would be free from troubles.

For you, happy might look rather different to this. But pinning down what makes you happy, and imagining yourself in that blissful state — seeing, feeling, hearing and smelling all that’s around you — is a really helpful exercise.

That’s because it brings to mind your true values: those things in life that matter the most to you.

My values are good health, loving and feeling loved by my wife; they are being in nature and the company of friends; they are family and my beloved pet dog.

as long as i have them in my life, able to spend time nurturing those elements of it, then i am living my values and, fundamentally, i am happy.

There are moments, of course, when i feel down or something bad happens that makes me feel sad.

Life can’t be one long utopian dream. But taking a little time each day in order to think about what you value most is a brilliant habit to get into.

and that’s because being happy is much more habit over circumstance than you might actually think.

happy people aren’t that way through some stroke of luck. They chose, albeit sometimes subconsciously, to be happy — it is something they practise, that they work at, which is why they’ve become so good at it.

Too many of us confuse happiness with pleasure. Trust me, the two are not the same.

Pleasure is a bar of fine chocolate or a glass of good champagne.

happiness is the backdrop against which you experience life — it’s when you’re living in conjunction with your values.