Quotes about happiness

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“And therein lies the whole of man's plight. Human time does not turn in a circle; it runs ahead in a straight line. That is why man cannot be happy: happiness is the longing for repetition.”

Milan Kundera book The Unbearable Lightness of Being

“While money can't buy happiness, it certainly lets you choose your own form of misery.”

Groucho Marx (1890–1977) American comedian

“When a man likes you, he will be interested in finding out what you like. If he makes you happy, he feels more secure. Everything men do is intended to impress women.”

Sherry Argov (1977) American writer

“They weren't happy, and neither of them had touched the chicken or the ale---and yet they weren't unhappy either. There was an unmistakable air of natural intimacy about the picture and anybody would have said that they were conspiring together.”

F. Scott Fitzgerald The Great Gatsby

“The key to happiness - as any good fairy godmother will tell you - is not to avoid problems, but to overcome them.”

Janette Rallison (1966) American writer

“Myrna could spend happy hours browsing bookcases. She felt if she could just get a good look at a person’s bookcase and their grocery cart, she’d pretty much know who they were.”

Louise Penny book Still Life

“Happy children do not seem to grow up to be writers.”

Piers Anthony (1934) English-American writer in the science fiction and fantasy genres

“I don't care about truth. I want some happiness.”

F. Scott Fitzgerald book The Beautiful and Damned

“You can be a depressive and be happy, just as you can be a sober alcoholic.”

Matt Haig book Reasons to Stay Alive

“Satisfaction of one's curiosity is one of the greatest sources of happiness in life.

Linus Pauling”

Linus Pauling (1901–1994) American scientist

“She shrugged. "You can be happy for someone else's good fortune, but that doesn't mean you forget your own bad luck.”

Jodi Picoult Plain Truth

“If everyone started off the day singing, just think how happy they'd be.”

Lauren Myracle book Shine

“The things that make us happy make us wise.”

John Crowley book Little, Big

“Seek happiness in tranquility and avoid ambition even if it be only the apparently innocent one of distinguishing yourself in science and discoveries.”

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (1797–1851) English novelist, short story writer, dramatist, essayist, biographer, and travel writer

“We care about moral issues, nobility, decency, happiness, goodness—the issues that matter in the real world, but which can only be addressed, in their purity, in fiction.”

Orson Scott Card (1951) American science fiction novelist

“Lesson no. 17: Happiness is caring about the happiness of those you love.”

François Lelord book Hector and the Search for Happiness

“My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute.”

Ayn Rand (1905–1982) Russian-American novelist and philosopher

“Happiness, like unhappiness, is a proactive choice.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

“The present moment is filled with joy and happiness. If you are attentive, you will see it. (21)”

Thich Nhat Hanh (1926) Religious leader and peace activist

“You have to open up to the world and learn optimism… Contentment with the past, happiness with the present, and hope for the future. Learned optimisim.”

Jennifer Crusie (1949) American writer

“It is by being fully involved with every detail of our lives, whether good or bad, that we find happiness, not by trying to look for it directly.”

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1934) Hungarian American psychologist

“To be truthful i am not entirely sure what people mean when they talk of happiness. There are moments of joy and laughter, the comfort of friendship, but enduring happiness? If it exists i have not found it”

David Gemmell (1948–2006) British author of heroic fantasy

“I was stupid, the official descriptive phrase for happy.”

Daniel Handler book Why We Broke Up

“If it is true that there is no greater sorrow than to remember a
happy time in a state of misery, it is just as true that calling up a
moment of anguish in a tranquil mood, seated quietly at one's desk, is
a source of profound satisfaction.”

Primo Levi book The Periodic Table

“If your happiness depends on what somebody else does, I guess you do have a problem.”

Richard Bach (1936) American spiritual writer

“How selfish soever man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it except the pleasure of seeing it.”

Adam Smith book The Theory of Moral Sentiments

“Happy Birthday Seaweed Brain”

Rick Riordan book The Last Olympian

“Maybe one day it will be just you and me, my little blueberry," Magnus said conversationally. "But not for a long, long time. We'll take care of him, you and I. Won't we?"
Max Lightwood made a happy burbling sound that Magnus took as agreement.”

Cassandra Clare (1973) American author

“The thing everyone should realize is that the key to happiness is being happy for yourself and yourself.”

Ellen DeGeneres (1958) American stand-up comedian, television host, and actress

“If you've ever had that feeling of loneliness, of being an outsider, it never quite leaves you. You can be happy or successful or whatever, but that thing still stays within you.”

Tim Burton (1958) American filmmaker

“In one respect at least the Martians are a happy people, they have no lawyers.”

Edgar Rice Burroughs book A Princess of Mars

“There’s nothing that makes you more insane than family. Or more happy. Or more exasperated. Or more… secure.”

Jim Butcher book Vignette

“A sure way to lose happiness, I found, is to want it at the expense of everything else.”

Bette Davis (1908–1989) film and television actress from the United States

“There are a few moments in your life when you are truly and completely happy, and you remember to give thanks. Even as it happens you are nostalgic for the moment, you are tucking it away in your scrapbook.”

David Benioff (1970) writer

“One could be happy not only without love, but despite it.”

Gabriel García Márquez book Love in the Time of Cholera

“You are your own worst enemy. If you can learn to stop expecting impossible perfection, in yourself and others, you may find the happiness that has always eluded you.”

Lisa Kleypas (1964) American writer

“Ah! Vanitas vanitatum! Which of us is happy in this world? Which of us has his desire? or, having it, is satisfied? — Come, children, let us shut up the box and the puppets, for our play is played out.”

William Makepeace Thackeray Vanity Fair

“Before and after… I heard a thousand times that a boy, or a man, can't make you happy, that you have to be happy on your own before you can be happy with another person. All I can say is, I wish it were true.”

Curtis Sittenfeld book Prep

“That time we separated was my idea. I thought, well, I'm fifty years old and there might be someone else out there. People waste their happiness - that's what makes me sad. Everyone's so scared to be happy.”

Wally Lamb book She's Come Undone

“The more ups and downs, the more joy I feel. The greater the fear, the greater the happiness I feel.”

Jack Kerouac book Big Sur

“Success is getting what you want.
Happiness is wanting what you get.”

Andrew Carnegie (1835–1919) American businessman and philanthropist

“Everybody has something, that one thing they must do to feel happy. I think this is yours, and I want you to be happy. You don’t have to do it, but it’s here if you choose to come back to it.”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

“She knew that even pain can be confessed, but to confess happiness is to stand naked, delivered to the witness…”

Ayn Rand book The Fountainhead

“You wanted happiness, I can’t blame you for that, and maybe a mouth sounds idiotic when it blathers on about joy but tell me you love this, tell me you’re not miserable.”

Richard Siken (1967) American poet

“Before that she hadn’t realized how fragile happiness was, how if you were careless, you could knock it over and shatter it.”

Celeste Ng book Everything I Never Told You: A Novel

“Throughout his life the memory of that happy day stayed locked secretly in (his) heart.”

Brian Jacques book Martin the Warrior

“If you want to be happy, be!”

Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862) 1817-1862 American poet, essayist, naturalist, and abolitionist

“Happiness is feeling useful to others.”

François Lelord book Hector and the Search for Happiness

“Um i'm happy to sit close to you and everything, but i had no idea you would like it so much,' Paris muttered.”

Gena Showalter (1975) American writer

“To forgive is the highest, most beautiful form of love. In return, you will receive untold peace and happiness”

Robert Muller (1923–2010) Civil servant with the United Nations

“Love is not about what you want. It's about finding happiness for the one you love.”

Terry Goodkind book Wizard's First Rule

“The happy people are failures because they are on such good terms with themselves they don't give a damn.”

Agatha Christie (1890–1976) English mystery and detective writer

“The talent for being happy is appreciating and liking what you have, instead of what you don't have.”

Woody Allen (1935) American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician

“This nice and subtle happiness of reading, this joy not chilled by age, this polite and unpunished vice, this selfish, serene life-long intoxication.”

Logan Pearsall Smith (1865–1946) British American-born writer

“Dear me! how happy and good we'd be, if we had no worries!”

Louisa May Alcott book Little Women

“Happy are the beloved and the lovers and those who can live without love.”

Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986) Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator, and a key figure in Spanish language literature

“Il me semble que je serais toujours bien la ou je ne suis pas.

It seems to me that I will always be happy in the place where I am not.”

Charles Baudelaire (1821–1867) French poet

“Love is not an equation, it is not a contract, and it is not a happy ending. Love is the slate under the chalk, the ground that buildings rise, and the oxygen in the air. It is the place you come back to, no matter where your headed”

Jodi Picoult (1966) Author

“Everyone deserves a happy ending.”

Jodi Picoult (1966) Author

“we are human beings, we are born full of guilt; we feel terrified when happiness becomes a real possibility.”

Paulo Coelho book Eleven Minutes

“A happy life consists not in the absence, but in the mastery of hardships.”

Helen Keller (1880–1968) American author and political activist

“Slowly but surly I want to strip her of every kind of happiness as to make a saint of her.”

Jean Genet book Our Lady of the Flowers

“There is joy in self-forgetfulness. So I try to make the light in others' eyes my sun, the music in others' ears my symphony, the smile on others' lips my happiness.”

Helen Keller (1880–1968) American author and political activist

“The imagination needs moodling,--long, inefficient happy idling, dawdling and puttering.”

Brenda Ueland (1891–1985) Journalist and writer

“It's good to suffer. Dont complain. Bear, bow, accept - and be grateful that God has made you suffer. For this makes you better than the people who are laughing and happy.”

Ayn Rand (1905–1982) Russian-American novelist and philosopher

“We are always in a hurry to be happy…; for when we have suffered a long time, we have great difficulty in believing in good fortune.”

Alexandre Dumas book The Count of Monte Cristo

“So you're trying to make her happy despite the fact that the reason she's unhappy in the first place is you," said Simon, not very kindly. "That seems contradictory, doesn't it?"
"Love is a contradiction," said Jace.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Fallen Angels

“I really believe there are some people who hate to contemplate the happiness of others.”

Eleanor Hibbert (1906–1993) English novelist

“… because all happiness is contagious, and disarms the spirit of hatred.”

Irène Némirovsky (1903–1942) French novelist who died at the age of 39 in Auschwitz

“There is only one person who could ever make you happy, and that person is you.”

David D. Burns (1942) American psychiatrist

“Doctor I've wrestled with reality for 40 years and I'm happy to say that I've finally won out over it.”

Mary Chase Harvey

“May we all be doomed to a happy life.”

Alethea Kontis (1976) American writer

“It may be that you are settled in another place it may be that you are happy but the one who took your heart wields final power.”

Jeanette Winterson book The Passion

“I'm happy to tell you there is very little in this world that I believe in.”

George Carlin book Brain Droppings

“Maybe this is a characteristic of happy people. An ability to be entertained by the world.”

Clare Morrall (1952) British writer

“Happiness is not having what you want, it is wanting what you have.”

Sheryl Crow (1962) American musician and actress

“Do you really want to be happy? You can begin by being appreciative of who you are and what you've got. Do you want to be really miserable? You can begin by being discontented.”

Benjamin Hoff book The Tao of Pooh

“Life is too hard, too much to handle. Nobody told me there’d be days like these. How could nobody tell me there’d be days like these? How could they let me grow up like that—happy and pink and stupid?”

Karen Marie Moning (1964) author

“Happy Birthday."
Adrian came to a sudden halt. The words were soft and small, spoken tentatively, but easily discerned by vampire ears. Slowly, he turned around and found Jill Mastrano standing shyly before him.”

Richelle Mead (1976) American writer

“what made you happy once might not make you happy now.”

Jodi Picoult book Nineteen Minutes

“Whatever you focus upon, increases…… When you focus on the things you need, you'll find those needs increasing…… A grateful perspective brings happiness and abundance into a person's life.”

Andy Andrews (1959) author and corporate speaker

“What we call Life is a condition of the soul. And the soul must improve in happiness and wisdom, except by its own fault. These tears in our eyes, these faintings of the flesh, will not hinder such improvement.”

Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806–1861) English poet, author

“All I ask is the chance to prove that money can't make me happy.”

Spike Milligan (1918–2002) British-Irish comedian, writer, musician, poet, playwright, soldier and actor

“The happiness you feel is in direct proportion to the love you give.”

Oprah Winfrey (1954) American businesswoman, talk show host, actress, producer, and philanthropist

“She wanted to be herself again, to recover all that she had been obliged to give up in half a century of servitude that had doubtless made her happy but which, once her husband was dead, did not leave her even the vestiges of her identity.”

Gabriel García Márquez book Love in the Time of Cholera

“I learned that you should feel when writing, not like Lord Byron on a mountain top, but like a child stringing beads in kindergarten - happy, absorbed and quietly putting one bead on after another.”

Brenda Ueland (1891–1985) Journalist and writer

“He saw in happiness the seeds of independence, and in independence the seeds of revolt.”

Mervyn Peake book Titus Groan

“The good writing of any age has always been the product of someone's neurosis, and we'd have a mighty dull literature if all the writers that came along were a bunch of happy chuckleheads.”

William Styron (1925–2006) American novelist and essayist

“Most times we're so focused on what we think we want that we can't appreciate how happy we already are. It's only when we forget about our problems and help others forget theirs that we realize how good we really have it.”

Glenn Beck (1964) U.S. talk radio and television host

“Clary and Simon continued to stare judgmentally. It made Simon very happy. Judging people together was an essential part of best friendship.”

Cassandra Clare (1973) American author

“His statement to himself should have been 'I possess this now, therefore I am happy', instead of what it so Victorianly was: 'I cannot possess this forever, therefore I am sad.”

John Fowles book The French Lieutenant's Woman

“When she is happy, she can't stop talking, when she is sad she doesn't say a word.”

Ann Brashares book Girls in Pants: The Third Summer of the Sisterhood

“Joy, happiness, are hopes and our dreams…. A place of peace and harmony… that's the kind of land I invision.”

Masashi Kishimoto (1974) Japanese manga artist

“I am not proud, but I am happy; and happiness blinds, I think, more than pride.”

Alexandre Dumas book The Count of Monte Cristo

“Often, moreover, it is… that aspect of our being that society finds eccentric, ridiculous, or disagreeable, that holds our sweet waters, our secret well of happiness, the key to our equanimity in malevolent climes.”

Tom Robbins book Still Life with Woodpecker

“When falsehood can look so like the truth, who can assure themselves of certain happiness?”

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus

“You may only call me "Mrs. Darcy"… when you are completely, and perfectly, and incandescently happy.”

Jane Austen book Pride and Prejudice

“That secret was a hole in the middle of me that every happy thing fell into.”

Jonathan Safran Foer book Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

“Trust your happiness and the richness of your life at this moment. It is as true and as much yours as anything else that ever happened to you.”

Katherine Anne Porter (1890–1980) American journalist, essayist, short story writer, novelist, and political activist