“Happiness is the ability to move forward, knowing the future will be better than the past. Today I choose to be happy!”

I think our ability to feel happy is substantially stronger when one has the ability to evaluate oneself in an honest way so as to recognize one’s own strengths and weaknesses, doing so in a way where we aren’t beating ourselves up for those imperfections, but rather doing it in a way that allows us to be aware of our weaknesses in order to work on them and make a plan of how we can improve and change for the better.

Self-evaluation can be painful because it requires us to set aside all justifications, rationalizations, excuses, and blame and truly look at only ourselves, asking ourselves the question “what do I need to do better” and “how could I have handled this differently” and “how can I be better?” Our natural tendency is to avoid self-evaluation because no one likes feeling wrong or weak. Yet that fear that admitting our weaknesses makes us bad or wrong is completely backwards – being willing to recognize and acknowledge your weaknesses in order to improve upon them is the greatest show of strength there is.

There is nothing weak about choosing to be better. It takes courage to say “I was wrong” or “I am sorry”. It takes humility to say “I messed up” or “I made a mistake”. And it takes conviction to say “I choose to be better” and to really do what it takes to improve.

In fact, one of the very definitions of the word strength is “the influence or power possessed by a person” and there is little in life more powerful, or with greater influence, than a person who exhibits the characteristics of courage, humility and conviction.  And it is those people who inspire the rest of us to want to choose to be better as well.

Today let’s choose to be better, because better = HAPPY!

Have a great day!

~Amy Rees Anderson