Your Happiness Suit

I just read a passage from the book "Word Power" by Vernon Howard. Vernon is one of my all-time favorite authors. It's as if each sentence of every book I've read of his is like Divine Wisdom pouring onto the page. He cuts to the Truth in such a thought-provoking and powerful way. I want to share an excerpt from this 1958 classic.

WEAR HAPPINESS AS A HABIT

   A lecturer in Dallas had just concluded a talk entitled, "Wear Happiness as a Habit" when a man from the audience approached him on stage.

   “I don’t know about that lecture of yours,” the man said as he doubtfully shook his head. “It seems that you’re asking the impossible. How can I wear happiness as a habit when it doesn’t seem to fit my nature?”

   The lecturer touched the man’s suit. “This suit you’re wearing… did you know it fitted you before you tried it on?”

   “No, of course not.”

   “Does it fit you now?”

   “Yes. Perfectly.”

   “How do you know?”

   The man vaguely gestured. “Why… because I wear it.”

   “So you now feel it to be a satisfactory, well-fitting suit?”

   “Right.”

   “And it always fits you, doesn’t it?… no matter what the weather?”

   “Yes,” the man agreed, “it’s a fine suit for both sunny and stormy days.”

 

HAPPINESS DOES SUIT YOU

 

   "All right," the lecturer pressed his point, "how about your suitability for happiness? Do you think you can have happiness as an everday experience before you try it on?"

   "I don't know," the inquirer confessed, "I'm emotionally mixed up."

   "The only reason a peaceful life doesn't suit you is because you keep taking it off every time a stormy sky appears. I suggest you try wearing happiness as a habit in all kinds of weather, just as you wear that suit of yours."

   "Show me how," the man challenged.

   The lecturer nodded. "Stop telling yourself that you are at the mercy of the changing weather, for every time you do so you actually expose yourself. Do you know what happens every time you declare yourself a helpless victim of the weather of life?"

   "What?"

   "You unbutton your well-fitting suit of happiness. You expose yourself to every imaginable storm. You get drenched by the very feelings you want to keep out. You futher convince yourself that happiness just doesn't suit you. Which is all wrong."

   A new understanding broke over the man's face. "How could I have missed such a fundamental fact as that?"

   The lecturer continued. "Let me show you how to bring your desired emotions in line. From now on I want you to think of every spoken word as a button."

   The man smiled in amusement. "A button? I think I get it."

 

Are you as impressed by this excerpt as I am?! The idea of making happiness a habit? And with every "button" or piece of clothing, we get to proclaim our happiness. We get to wear it as our natural state of being throughout the day. And notice when we take the happiness suit off.

It's a choice. But we must be willing to try it on.

Hmmm...

I'd love to hear how it works out for you!

With lots of LOVE,
Teresa

#plantingseeds #dreamsdocometrue #yourgreatnessiscalling #moveonpurpose