Happ-E-Newsletter for October 15, 2007

Welcome My Dear Friend!

It was our pleasure to be with you and Sarah on the Virtual Happiness Club on Monday, October 8th. I learned so much from your insightful questions and the candid answers from dear Sarah. She shared the story of a man who lived life as an example for all of us, her Dad, Norman Cousins and her impressions as a child were priceless. I loved her answers, her wisdom and reliving those precious moments of healing. We especially enjoyed the trench coat story of how even after being robbed...the justice came to light from the victim, none other than dear Norman in the court of law he taught them what true forgiveness really is.

I will listen again and again to the interview on your website..as I read again and again Norman Cousins Foreword to my dear husbands book, Most of All They Taught Me Happiness. Love and Gratitude, Barbara and Robert Muller

As Sarah knows, her dad Noman Cousins was a great friend of mine and we had lunch together once a week in the UN Delegates Lounge where we shared many laughs and our numerous happiness stories. He even asked me one time to become editor of Saturday Review. I really thought long and hard about it but I could never leave my beloved United Nations.

It's no accident when two people meet on their life path. It is as if destiny is orchestrating the meeting and the purpose is bigger than one knows. Norman Cousins and I were meant to meet and be friends and the one thing I learned was that we shared the same philosophy, "Happiness will keep you healthier and a better friend than all the advice in the world..." love, Robert Muller

Norman Cousins and I met several times and were fans of each other and we both enjoyed having a sense of humor. Dctors listened to Norman because he was not a doctor and he confronted their beliefs. I loved his faking urine with apple juice and when the nurse said it was cloudy, he drank it and said he would put it through again. Peace, Bernie Siegel

Warmth and Intelligence!

I think that warmth and intelligence are an interesting combination of words. I have not heard them mentioned together very often. Together, they offer a different perspective on living life. Of course we all want to do the intelligent thing in life and at the very least, we don't want to look like we are clueless about what to do. Bertrand Russell said, "The main thing needed to make men happy is intelligence."

My definition of happiness is an inner state of well being that enables you to profit from your highest thoughts, intelligence, wisdom, awareness, common sense, emotions, health, and spiritual values. What happens when we look at intelligence with the added aspect of warmth to it? I think that being a warm person is a very important trait to have in life.

I am sure you have dealt with people that seem to be cold and non-caring. Sometimes people are referred to as cold hearted, or are described as being cold and distant. They seem cold and distant to your needs. They may appear to be indifferent to what you are saying or just not connected to you at all. How does that make you feel? It does not make you feel warm and fuzzy, right? No, it doesn't make you feel good.

Daniel Goleman the author of Emotional Intelligence, has said, "Self-awareness--recognizing a feeling as it happens--is the keystone of emotional intelligence. The ability to monitor feelings from moment to moment is crucial to psychological insight and self-understanding. An inability to notice our true feelings leaves us at their mercy. People with a greater certainty about their feelings are better pilots of their lives, having a surer sense of how they really feel about personal decisions from whom to marry to what job to take."

I think that getting along with others is part of our intelligence. It may be our emotional intelligence, but it is all about how smart we are. Why don't we learn to warm up more? Let's make it our business to become a little more warm and friendly. I think it will make you appear smarter and help you become more accepted by other people as well. Let's go practice being warm and intelligent by being warm and friendly, starting now!

BE HAPPY ZONE by Lionel Ketchian. Published in the Fairfield Citizen-News on October 10, 2007

Life is complicated, happiness is simple! LIVE RICHLY...PRACTICE HAPPINESS!
Everything we do in life is for the purpose of obtaining happiness! Happiness Empowerment to You! Reminding you to make the "Happiness Decision." Think Smart, Look Smart, Be Smart...Be Happy! Sharing Love, Peace and Happiness with you, Lionel Ketchian

Happ-E-Mail :) Sarah Shapiro, the speaker at last Thursday's Happiness Club meeting was INCREDIBLE. Her energy was so contagious and warming. Thank you for putting your heart into this club, which has such profound effect on people - myself included! Also - small world. I met with an artist yesterday who conducts workshops similar to one I run for coaching, where you use art to visualize a goal you want. Her name is Pamela Hoffstedder, and I found out at the end of our meeting that she's speaking at the Madison Happiness Club this month!!! What a fun coincidence.

I want you to know that I'm VERY interested in starting the first Yale University Happiness Club! I think I need a couple more months to settle into our new life here and get oriented. I know that starting a club will take some effort, and I want to feel centered in the endeavor. I'll see you soon at the next meeting! Warmly, Allison Aboud

Happ-E-Quote :) "Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; but remember that what you now have was once among the things you only hoped for." - Epicurus

Happ-E-Quote :) "The happy and efficient people in this world are those who accept trouble as a normal detail of human life and resolve to capitalize on it when it comes along." - H. Bertram Lewis

Happ-E-Quote :) "Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude." - Thomas Jefferson

Happ-E-Quote :) "To make mistakes is human; to stumble is commonplace; to be able to laugh at yourself is maturity." - William Arthur Ward

Happ-E-Mail :) This poem by David Lazar

Positive Self-Talk

I choose gratitude and happiness
I choose joy and bliss
I choose acceptance and forgiveness
I choose more gratitude and more acceptance
I choose harmony, peace and love.

Happ-E-Quote :) "It is the Law that any difficulties that can come to you at any time, no matter what they are, must be exactly what you need most at the moment, to enable you to take the next step forward by overcoming them. The only real misfortune, the only real tragedy, comes when we suffer without learning the lesson." - Emmet Fox

Happ-E-News :) Recent happiness articles and items of interest!

Happ-E-Quote :) "Expect trouble as an inevitable part of life, and when it comes, hold your head high. Look it squarely in the eye, and say, "I will be bigger than you. You cannot defeat me." - Ann Landers

Happ-E-Quote :) "Let a person rejoice when he is confronted with obstacles, for it means that he has reached the end of some particular line of indifference or folly, and is now called upon to summon up all his energy and intelligence in order to extricate himself, and to find a better way; that the powers within him are crying out for greater freedom, for enlarged exercise and scope." - James Allen

Happ-E-Mail :) Lynn Haney and I have developed a 7-week writing workshop course called "Write Your Story," in which we're going to help people find and then shape stories about their lives that they want to tell. The course will begin Oct. 23 and run until Dec. 11, (afternoon, evening and even weekend sessions are forming now). We're giving it in a home setting just off Exit 59 in Guilford--at a big country table with plenty of refreshments--in a low-key, friendly and encouraging environment, with lots of individual attention.

CLUB HAPPINESS, E-CLUB :) Everybody should join this club, try it, you'll love it!!!

Time: Monday, November To Be Announced from 7:00 - 8:00 PM, EST in the USA.
Phone number: (712) 775-7000
Your Access Code is: 122856#.
The Virtual Happiness Club is free, just your normal long distance charges apply. The first 90 callers may participate. The Virtual Happiness Club meets one Monday each month.

FAIRFIELD CONNECTICUT HAPPINESS CLUB :)

Date :) Thursday, November 15, 2007
Time :) 7:00 - 9:00 P.M.
Place :) At the Fairfield Public Library, Rotary room, 1080 Old Post Road, Fairfield, CT 06824

WESTPORT, CONNECTICUT SMILING SINGLE SENIORS HAPPINESS CLUB :)
We have a wonderful presentation by Sabita Cohen a holistic nutritionist and medical message therapist. Her theme is laughing and learning your way to health and happiness.

Date :) Thursday, October 25, 2007
Time :) 6:30 - 8:00 P.M.
Place :) The Westport Senior Center, 21 Imperial Ave. Westport CT 06880.

Admission is free and the meetings are for people single and over 50 years old. Meet some wonderful people using happiness in their lives. Stay happy and healthy - get well connected. Stacy Enyeart is the group facilitator. Future meetings to be announced.

GREENWICH CONNECTICUT HAPPINESS CLUB :)
We are going to try something new this time....a SUNDAY meeting! Bring the whole family. We'll play games, and teach you happiness tools. These are actual tools and techniques that you can use.

Topic: Increasing Positive Emotion! "TRY THIS" exercises and interactive talk by Senia Maymin MBA, MAPP, who will share her work on happiness with you. Featured guests who will say a few words: Dusty Baldridge, Nicholas Hall and Joy Balridge

NEW!!! NORWALK, CONNECTICUT SENIORS HAPPINESS CLUB :)
Kelsang Shenden, Ph.D. is a Buddhist Kadampa Nun. Kelsang will teach from the book: Eight Steps To Happiness, a series based on showing how we can transform our mind of dissatisfaction and suffering into the perfect Wisdom - Compassion and Happiness of a Buddha. This course is designed for everyone including beginners with emphasis on the cessation of painful limitation and the development with freedom and confidence of a vital relationship within ourselves and with others.
Date :) Thursday, October 18, 2007
Time :) 10:30 AM - 12:00 P.M.
Place :) The Norwalk Senior Center
Address :) 11 Allen Road, Norwalk, CT 06851.
Kelsang Shenden, Ph.D., a Buddhist Nun is the group facilitator. Admission is free, to make your reservation please call Debbie Cole at 203 847-3115 Ext: 104. Meetings are held every Thursday each week from 10:30 AM - 12:00 P.M.

Date :) Wednesday, October 24, 2007

STAMFORD CONNECTICUT TEEN HAPPY CLUB :)

Open to all high school students. Meetings are held twice a month on Saturdays from 11:00 - 12:30 P.M. At the Daniel and Grace Tully & Family Health Center, 32 Strawberry Hill Court, Stamford, Connecticut 06902.

Event Description: Positive Choice and Decision - Making! How can we most effectively use them! Hosted in association with the Creativity and Personal Mastery program at Columbia Business School, as taught by Professor Rao. No dues, no registration and open to everyone!

Date :) Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Time :) 7:00 - 9:00 P.M.
Place :) At Columbia Business School - Warren Hall Room 416 (4th floor) corner of Amsterdam and 115th street, Columbia University campus New York, NY 10027

MENTORS HAPPINESS CLUB :) Meeting: We will be meeting on our conference phone line that will be open to all Happiness Club facilitators everywhere. More information to come.

Virtual Happiness Club - For more information:

New - Happiness Club WWW Chapter - For more information:

Mentors Happiness Club - No meetings scheduled at this time.

Happ-E-Quote :) "Never doubt that a small, group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." - Margaret Mead

Happiness is an inner state of well being. A state that enables you to profit from your highest thoughts, intelligence, wisdom, awareness, common sense, emotions, health, and spiritual values.
Happiness is one of the most important things in your life. Don't give away your power by being unhappy! Practice "Premeditated Happiness," because happiness is an issue of power. We give our power to others for many reasons. We mistakenly think that doing this will make us happy. The truth is that we have given others power over ourselves. We can now consciously reclaim our power and experience happiness. Happiness does wonders for your soul. Now is the time to learn to use happiness for dealing with challenges and difficult people so you can empower your life. Reading this newsletter will not just make your life better; it will make the world a better place...because you have decided to be happy!

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"May the good lord be with you, Down every road you roam, And may sunshine and happiness, Surround you when you're far from home." - Words from the song Forever Young by Rod Stewart

"Unhappiness is a form of suffering." Eckhart Tolle. "Do or do not. There is no try." Yoda

If you're not happy by now, it's time to have a talk with yourself.

Make the Happiness Decision Now! THAT'S ALL FOLKS...NOW BE HAPPY!

© Copyright 2007, Lionel R. Ketchian, all rights reserved.