6 Ways to Choose Happiness in Your Life

How to Find Positivity and Happiness from Within

There is nobody to blame for your unhappiness but yourself. After the age of eighteen, every choice you make is yours. We all grow up in different environments, living through different circumstances, and facing challenging traumas that vary in intensity. We all lived under the rule of thumb of our parents. Most of us as children had no control over where we lived, the food we ate, how we dressed, the religion we practiced, and where we went to school. Most of us were guided on a journey by what our parents and families wanted us to do with our lives. They had good intentions, but for many, it led to resentment, unhappiness, depression, and anxiety in their careers and relationships.

But now, here's how we find independent happiness in the lives we choose.

Where you live can determine your level of happiness.

I grew up in a small town in Ohio. We didn’t go on many vacations or travel much, so my world was very small. Growing up I thought you had to stay in the same region with your family forever, even if I only saw them on birthdays and holidays. The seasonal affective disorder is a real issue in those cold, gloomy northern states, and I suffered from it terribly. I had dreams of living by the ocean in warmth and enjoying sunshine most days of the year. I knew that life would make me happy. After watching my cousins move out of state and my dad moves to Florida, I realized I can do the same.

In July 2018, I made the biggest move of my life to Florida. The health of my dad encouraged me to go. He was suffering from cancer and was in remission. I must thank the universe for its timing and planning. I sold my house at the full asking price the day I put it on the market. By the time I got down to Florida, my dad’s health went downhill. I had six weeks with my dad before he passed away. I am blessed to have that time with him. He brought me to the sunshine state where I always told everyone I would end up. I manifested that move many years prior to making it happen, and it played out the way it needed to. I honestly couldn’t be happier.

How you perceive yourself can impact your happiness.

I was overweight most of my childhood and into my mid-twenties. Growing up in my household there was always candy, cookie jars, pop, Little Debbie’s, chips, Cheetos, Doritos, Stouffer’s meals, lunchmeat, hotdogs, mac-n-cheese, and SpaghettiOs. I didn’t know that processed food was horrible for me. Vegetables in my diet were frozen or canned, and the only salad I ate was iceberg lettuce drenched in ranch dressing. My fruit choices were canned fruit, bananas, apples, or oranges. It wasn’t until I started to suffer from an eating disorder at the age of eighteen that I realized the impact food had on my weight. By nineteen, my weight skyrocketed to 199.5 lbs. I was not going to allow myself to hit 200 lbs.

It took me years to realize my eating disorder was activated by the traumas I faced when I was younger and never confronted. As I learned about food and exercise from male mentors at the gym, I lost weight and became stronger in my mind and body. I was on my way to becoming healthier and happier. The hardest step I needed to take to fully recover from my eating disorder was dealing with my past. Ultimately, leading me to peace and happiness.

Being comfortable with both your masculine and feminine energy can lead to increased confidence.

I remember as a child my stepmom always wanted me to wear oversized clothes and have my hair like Dorothy Hamill—a short bowl cut. I never wore dresses and lived mostly in workout clothes and jeans. I had strong masculine energy; it was a protection. I didn’t feel good about myself. I wanted to fit in with the other girls who were doing their makeup and wearing trendy clothes. After high school, I began to go out of my comfort zone by trying heels and short skirts. But I still didn’t feel completely confident. I would walk with my head down, instead of standing tall.

Once again, I had to work through insecurities and fears to get to the point I am now. It’s not that we never feel insecure again, we simply catch ourselves and change those thoughts to positive ones. I love dressing up, wearing heels, and doing my hair, nails, and makeup. My confidence skyrocketed when I allowed my feminine side to come through. I am happy with who I am now, but the work is never finished.

I believe our spiritual beliefs play a role in our happiness.

The world we live in is amazing and mysterious. Much we will never know or understand. How was this world created? What happens to our souls when we pass on? I wasn’t raised with or forced into any religion. I remember trying to understand God as a child. I went to church with some friends, but it was too preachy for me. I was baptized Catholic at twenty-four for my first marriage. I remember driving the priest crazy with all my questions. I couldn’t wrap my head around the rules of religion.

After all my experiences, I came to my own conclusions. Call it the Universe or God or whatever you want to, the world is full of energy that manifests in many ways. Energy creates, and energy destroys. Our bodies on earth are full of energy, and our souls are an energy that carries on into the afterlife. I believe that grief after loss is where many of us get stuck. It is hard to understand what happens after death. My personal experiences with losing my grandparents, parents, and animals are what finally defined my beliefs. The signs I have received from those I love on the other side have led me to peace and happiness that I never imagined. I truly know they are all still with me and always will be, and that makes me happy.  

The relationships you are in have a huge impact on your happiness.

All my relationships and two marriages have failed up until the one I am currently in. My issue with most of my relationships, especially the one I was in for nineteen years, is that I allowed men to depend on me for their happiness. It was draining. You can’t fix people and the traumas they went through. That is their journey to face.

After my first boyfriend broke up with me, I was completely devastated. I broke up first in every relationship after that, so I would never be hurt like that again. I had to do deep internal work to understand that pattern in my relationships. I suffered from abandonment issues that stemmed from my mother not being there for me as a child. I had major trust issues. As a protection, I can easily detach from people, if they hurt me, with very little emotion. I am working through those issues. Acknowledging them is the first step.

I am now in the healthiest relationship I have ever been in. It helps to be able to talk out loud as soon as something happens, confront it, and communicate it to your partner. Relate the issues that arise to your past traumas, so they understand why you are feeling a certain way. This is letting yourself be vulnerable and grow as a couple. Now I am very happy, but the key is that we both must be happy within ourselves first, not depending on the other for our happiness.

Over a lifetime you spend about 1/3 of it working in a career of your choice. I hope you choose a career that makes you happy to wake up every morning.

There’s nothing worse than waking up every day and dreading going to work. I was raised to believe my only choices for a career were going to college, technical school, military, or working for the government. The thought of entrepreneurship was never talked about. That was only for the wealthy. I was encouraged or coerced into becoming a nurse. I tried twice to start the RN program at college, but something inside me didn’t want to do it. So, I failed. Unbeknownst to me the universe had a greater plan. Nursing wasn’t something that excited me, but my failures brought me down even more. I worked for over nineteen years for the county taking care of the developmentally disabled. But I still felt a drive for more, which led to depression.

In my early thirties, I started a bachelor’s in social work program. After one semester, I was offered a chance to start my LPN clinical. I wanted to succeed at finishing something, so I dropped out of my bachelor’s program to do one hardcore year of nursing, be done, and finally be happy. I graduated and had a job right out of school. I continued working for the county and was still unhappy. The universe had a plan for me, I just didn’t know what.

I knew deep down that I needed to have a job teaching and helping people get healthy naturally, instead of giving them medicine. I finally decided to become a personal trainer which started my path to becoming an entrepreneur. At first, my dad was angry and scared for me going off on my own when I already had longevity at a job, stable hours, retirement, and health insurance. I was scared too, but I have learned that fighting through fear can lead to happiness, like no other. You must take steps to reach goals, even if it takes years to accomplish. My Dad watched as I grew my business and was so proud of me. I am truly happy with what I do, but I know there is even more for me. One I am working towards as I write. My decisions for myself and what I wanted to do led me to happiness in my career.

Life is all about the choices we make. Those choices will lead us to our happy place. You and only you have complete control of everything you do in this life. Know, learn, and understand the power you have. The only thing that ever holds you back from true happiness is fear. Fear of failure, fear of loneliness, fear of losing everything you have, and fear of what everyone else thinks. Don’t let fear hold you back from ultimate happiness. Take the chance. The universe will sift the negative and introduce positive like-minded souls on your journey. Find the happiness within you, there’s no better feeling in this world.