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      7. Self-Criticism Is Not Self-Improvement

      8. We Are Never Victims When We Value Ourselves

      24. People Can Love Us, but They Cannot Complete Us

      25. We Don’t Find Fulfilment in Other People; We Find Fulfilment by Looking Inward

      61. When We’re Not Driven by Our Egos, We Can Lose the Battle to Win the War

      65. What Is It from Our Past That Weighs Us Down Today?

      69. When You Have Been Hurt: Keep the Doors to Your Heart Open to Let In Amazing New Things

      70. When Your Heart Is Broken: Take Your Happiness Back into Your Own Hands

      Understanding

      6. We Cannot Find Happiness, Because It Has Never Been Lost

      10. Understand the Relationship You Have with Yourself

      13. Our Expectations Are Our Standards Imposed Upon Someone Else

      16. To Talk Instead of Argue, Be Curious Instead of Accusatory

      18. There Are No Unspoken Rules in the Human Realm

      19. Even If What Is Important to You Isn’t Important to Your Partner, It Does Not Mean That You Are Unimportant

      20. It’s Not Personal, Even When It Feels Personal

      22. Our Ability to Love Is Only as Good as Our Skills

      27. When We Give (without Expectations), We Receive

      34. It’s Not about Negative People, It’s about Not Being Negatively Affected

      38. The Person Is Not Difficult, They Are Just Very Different from You

      41. When You Care Whose Fault It Is, You Cannot Be Happy

      42. Don’t Let the Concept of Fairness Make You Lose Sight of Your Objectives

      44. To Be Understood, We Have to First Understand

      45. We Don’t Need to Agree to Understand

      46. Difficult Conversations Need to Be Non-Confrontational

      48. Do You Recognize the Voices of Your Ego and Your Self-Esteem?

      49. Put Out the Fire; Don’t Add More Fuel to It

      50. Offense Can Certainly Be Given, but It Doesn’t Have to Be Taken

      52. When People Take Advantage of Us, We Don’t Need Blame or Anger to Stand Up for Ourselves

      53. People Don’t “Do” Things to Us, They Do Things to Themselves

      56. Satisfaction Only Disguises Itself as Happiness

      58. Righteous Anger Is Not Self-Preservation, It’s Self-Sabotage

      59. Do We Seek to Empower Ourselves or to Control Others?

      67. To Let Go of the Big Things, Practice Letting Go of the Small, Everyday Things

      68. When You Want to Grow: Practice the Three Stages of Happiness—the Rehearsal, the Performance, and the Review

      71. When You’re Having a Bad Day: Choose Happiness, Because Choosing Misery Is a Lot Harder

      When I first started writing this book, my intention was to write about happiness. However, the more time I spent on developing the chapters and titles, the more I realized that perhaps the book is about unhappiness, for it is when we know how to navigate through the unhappy moments in life that we can truly be happy. This is why all five chapters in this book delve deep into heartache, pain, hurt, depression, communication problems, and relationship difficulties. These are all challenges that every single one of us is likely to experience at one time or another, and it’s hard to not feel frustrated and upset when life isn’t going the way we hope it will.

      The objective of this book is to help you build the skills and strength to work through the challenging, difficult, and uncomfortable times in life, because it is only then that you can find peace.

      Even when we have a great career and a wonderful relationship, we might feel like something is missing or that our life isn’t fulfilled. Sometimes, we can start off incredibly happy with our lives, and then after some time goes by, the problems that creep in make our life feel incredibly exhausting. We all understand that perfection doesn’t exist, yet often we can’t help but despair when life is far from perfect. This is why it’s so important for us to understand how to take responsibility for our happiness even in the toughest of times, because we don’t want our happiness to always be at the mercy of “what happens to us.” This is why many cannot find fulfilment—we will only learn how to be fulfilled through the ups and downs of life.

      Throughout the different chapters of this book, you’ll find that I define happiness as much more than just a feeling. You’ll read stories of how it is possible to still be happy even when life throws us a curveball because there are practices that we can embrace to build an incredibly solid foundation to help us weather the storms. It is when we understand how to not suffer and how to be at peace that we can cultivate the loving relationships we want, as well as genuinely enjoying going to work and interacting with people without negativity, stress, or anxiety.

      I’ve written this book so that it can be experienced in four different ways, and I highly recommend that you read its sections in this order for the most rewarding experience:

      1.For your first read, experience the book in sequence from beginning to end, so that it provides a holistic understanding of how to overcome challenges in life to be happy.

      2.Each section is also a self-contained lesson, so after your first read, you can flip to the individual piece that you feel compelled to read again.

      3.Every title also serves as a quote. Once you’ve read the entire book, you can flip to the quotes that serve as a quick reminder of the philosophies you’d like to embrace in life.

      4.There are two tables of content in this book, the first arranged by chapter and title, and the second by subject. This is so that if you’d like to actively practice happiness after you’ve finished the book, you can pick up the book again and refer to “Contents by Subject” for techniques relating to acceptance, understanding, awareness, perspective, and self-love.

      So many of the lessons I’ve shared in this book come from my mother, who grew up poor yet happy. She is divorced yet lives each day with joy, and she experiences anxiety and depression yet does not suffer. My mother is my best teacher, and her guidance comes neither from books nor education but from the way she lives her own life. Not only does she show that it is entirely possible to be happy, always, her approach to happiness has always been practical and extremely applicable. It is with this same approach that I’ve written this book, and I hope that you enjoy reading in a way that uplifts you and empowers you to live each day with joy and no regrets, no matter what comes your way. Be happy, always!

      Lots of love,

      Xandria

      Life Is Either a Celebration or a Lesson

      <Perspective>

      My husband, Yuri, likes to say that life is either a celebration or a lesson. I think that this is one of the best philosophies, because then we can truly see life as the gift that it is.

      Yuri and I have been married since 2010, and we used to argue so much in those first few years. At the time, we didn’t know that it was possible to disagree without arguing. We knew that it was common for couples to argue, so we honestly thought that having arguments in a relationship

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