How to be happy is as easy as 1-2-3.
1.  Know what you want to accomplish in life.
2.  Have a plan on how to reach your goals and a timeline.
3.  Smile.  You have no choice in what happens to you in life, but you have every choice in how you react to the things that do. 

Many things in life we think will "bring us happiness": If only I had a boyfriend/girlfriend.  If only I had a new job.  If only I had more money.  If only I had a better (car, phone, tv, etc.).  No THING can make us happier, only our perception of the world around us can be altered to interpret our lives as something good or bad, happy or sad.  Everyone has trials and both good times and bad, it's life.  Love doesn't last without mutual respect, dedication and work.  Money doesn't cure disease or old age.  Newer and bigger things might come at the expense of time spent with your family due to more hours worked or a longer commute.  Things just take you away from what matters most - people; friends and family.

My husband and I took a long belated honeymoon and anniversary trip to Maui, Hawaii this year in celebration of our 20 years  together.  The weather and beaches were beautiful.  The people were friendly and a larger pot of multiculturalism than I had known... Native Hawaiians, Polynesians, Asians, Filipino, Portuguese, and more!  This is where our Nation dreams of as PARADISE.  Do you know what I saw?  I saw large areas of high end tourism with luxury resorts along the western coast.  Then I saw a lot of housing in central Maui that consisted of most of the working population that was either owned by multiple families due to the cost of property there or renters.  This used to be a huge sugar cane plantation with thousands of workers.. now there are only about 700 workers with one sugar mill left.  Rising labor costs have driven businesses overseas where the labor wages are less.  Then we took our tour along the Road to Hana.  On this drive, we saw multigenerational native land holders with no electricity, no water and living in shacks or house kits (the home building materials are delivered in like a small POD and the home is built, then the POD is used as a garage or storage shed). These houses are smaller than most people's garages.  Evidently they only come in Aqua because that seems to be all we saw along the way.  Don't get me wrong... it is a beautiful place, but it is far from IDEAL in every sense of that word. 

Sunday was Earth Day.  We need to stop thinking that More = Better, that quantity should be valued over quality.  It would take a big shift in thinking, but in mass this type of thinking of a better tomorrow over our wants and desires for today could change the world.  We only have one planet to call our home and we are all one People, no matter our color or country or religion.  I read "Genome the autobiography of a Species in 23 chapters" by Matt Ridley this weekend and there was one paragraph that specifically spoke to me where he wrote on page 76;
     "Even if a gene causes a disease by being 'broken', most genes are not 'broken' in any of us, they just come in different flavours. The blue-eyed gene is not a broken version of the brown-eyed gene, or the red-haired gene a broken version of the brown-haired gene.  They are, in the jargon, different alleles - alternate versions of the same genetic 'paragraph', all equally fit, valid and legitimate.  They are all normal; there is no single definition of  normality."

So in essence, if all expressions of genes are normal, then so are all people.  Whether you are tall or short, big or small, dark or light, blind, deaf, or have Downs syndrome - each one is normal and perfectly made.  Judea-Christian religions believe that God made each in his own image and now even science has bore out this theory as truth, each of us perfectly made.

Now if only there is a way to spread this message to the world.  A way to get everyone to understand that there is no difference between us.  The earthquake victim in S. America or the flood victim in Louisiana or the drought victim in Africa or the orphans in Eastern Europe are all our friends, neighbors and family.  None is more important than any other, whether they are right next door or half way around the world.  Often we have myoptic vision and life is centered directly around our daily lives and location.  We need to open our hearts and minds to the interconnectedness of our world and that it is all our neighborhood.