At KOK, we're constantly curious about how we can bring more joy to everyday life and create happier lives in general. Nothing less. And although what we offer is essentially joy and excitement, we're always looking to learn more about happiness, joy and positive vibes.
Written by: Kristin Lorange
Here are some tips we've been reading up on lately. It's been of great value to us, and now we hope it can be of value to you too.
"Do not ask your children to strive for extraordinary lives. Such striving may seem admirable, but it is the way of foolishness. Help them instead to find the wonder and the marvel of an ordinary life. Show them the joy of tasting tomatoes, apples and pears. Show them how to cry when pets and people die. Show them the infinite pleasure in the touch of a hand.
And make the ordinary come alive for them. The extraordinary will take care of itself."
- The Parent's Tao Te Ching: Ancient Advice for Modern Parents
Whether you have children or not, you were once a child, and if you're lucky, you still are a little bit. Many of us aspire to extraordinary lives, or are constantly searching for happiness up ahead. Whatever your level of ambition, you have everything to gain by seeking joy in the small, intimate things. Yes, it may seem trite, and for many of us in the irony generation, it takes a little extra effort to get over the need to grin a little with mindfulness. The beauty of the ancient life hack of finding happiness in ordinary life is that it's like a muscle you can train. And this little exercise will bring you wealth and happiness.
Some small things worth enjoying are, for example, water, air, food and friendship, a cloud, a flower, a smile.
"Perfect your existence by slowly going through the routine of your life until you have mastered it. Do the ordinary things that make up your life. Learn to perform these like a master. You will get great satisfaction from them."
- John-Roger
Good habits and routines are a perennial topic for many people. Do you also feel that there's a long list of habits you should definitely adopt, and you know how much good it would do you, but then time just slips away and life gets in the way? Luckily, you're not alone, and there's plenty of help to be found in good books. Here are our personal recommendations.
Perhaps the most important piece of advice is to start small, don't try to do everything at once. Then you're setting yourself up for failure. We speak from experience. And that said, we've seen that it's often better to just read a book three times and then understand and implement its principles than to read five different ones and end up drowning in advice. But one last important tip follows below.
So simple, and so effective. People who think more positively tend to cope better with stress, have better immune systems and are happier. Allowing your inner critic too much leeway steals energy and self-esteem, and this can happen without you even knowing it. But if you follow tip 1, you'll train your attention, which will make it easier to observe when you're talking negatively to yourself. Then it will be easier to turn those negative thoughts into more supportive ones. If you don't quite know what to say instead, one trick is to talk to yourself as if you were a child, a good friend, or a sweet old lady doing the best she can. For example:
Thanks for reading this far, you're cool and we hope you get a lot of benefit from our little tricks for great joy!
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