Line upon Line

“Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be,” said Abraham Lincoln.

On a one-to-ten happiness scale, I’m a seven or eight. After all, I don’t want to be greedy. Besides, if I choose ten as my happiness quotient, I’ll be miserable trying to live up to it. No one is that happy, are they?

 Scooter was.

Ten-scale happy, Scooter was a double-amputee who ran the newsstand in my hometown Pasadena. Despite his “handicap,” this affable man dished out smiles like candy to eager children. He threw newspapers and joy with aplomb, pirouetting atop his homemade skateboard to the whistles of an adoring public.

While crippling injuries or birth defects lead some to the sour waters of self-pity, Scooter chose to lift others from the tide pools of their troubles. He was a standard-bearer for the life-gives-you-lemons cliche.

Where Do We Find Happiness?

Paychecks and prizes may bring smiles, but the sunshine in our soul cannot be purchased with money or recognition. This begs the question: Where do we find happiness?

We don’t “find” happiness in the lost-and-found sense. It finds us in the search-and-rescue sense when we seek to lift others.

Like any good choice, happiness requires effort and attitude. We can’t pine for happiness while mourning our misery steeped in sin or self-destructive behavior.

The Book of Mormon teaches that happiness stems from following Jesus in right living. “If there be no righteousness, there be no happiness” (2 Ne. 2:13). The opposite is also true, as in “wickedness never was happiness” (Alma 41:10).

Because sin separates man from God, we need rescue from sin. Jesus ransomed each of us from the effects of sin through His infinite atonement. “Adam fell that men might be; and men are, that they might have joy” (2 Ne. 2:25). This ransom brings eternal joy for all who repent and come unto Christ. When we serve as Christ served, joy finds us.           

Choose Joy

Both joy and misery are choices. Perhaps we can’t choose our present circumstance, but we can choose our present joy. We can also choose our present attitude, including gratitude.

Some are content with sour grapes. Ironically, they seek diversion from the only thing that brings true joy. Steeped in joyless self-service, their capacity to offer joy to others is diminished.

Like a smoker with emphysema who sucks drags between breaths on a respirator, our ability to choose health and happiness is reduced when addicted to the world’s poisons. Such fixes enslave the unwary, but need not capture those with eyes fixed on Jesus.

By rejecting the attention-cry of self-promotion, or the allure of character-piercing addiction, we set aside carnal joy for the lasting happiness of a selfless life.

The Path of Happiness