“We are happy when we grow”
We’re told so often that success means being happy all the time. But happiness isn’t like that, it’s not 24/7 — it ebbs and flows. Growth has its hard times. Growth can be painful. Yet it’s in that pain, and in that difficulty, that we can eventually look back with pride. You see where you are. You see where you came from. You see the journey of growth and look back in wondering awe. I did that. I made it through. As Jim Rohn once said, there is not a single tree that has grown half as tall as it could have. They grow to their utmost ability. They don’t stop until they physically cannot continue. Unhappiness, in the end, may in part be the result of that nagging, clawing sense of wrongness that comes when you stop moving, when you stop learning, when you let go of your dreams and passions. When you let life become a monotonous cycle of mere existence. Nothing sits still. We can either grow or deteriorate — in mind, body, and spirit. Nothing stays the same. We can choose whether we move upward or downward.