Spontaneous Happiness Quotes

“If you want to be in optimum emotional health, realize that social isolation stands between you and it. Reach out to others. Join groups—to drum, meditate, sing, sew, read, whatever. Find communities—to garden, do service work, travel, whatever. We humans are social animals. Spontaneous happiness is incompatible with social isolation. Period.”
― Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Happiness

“But hard does not mean depressed, just as easy does not mean content.”
― Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Happiness

“One of the findings of the landmark Social Capital Community Benchmark Survey of almost thirty thousand Americans, published in 2000, was that those who give contributions of time or money are 42 percent more likely to be happy than those who don’t give.”
― Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Happiness

“Remember that foul words or blows in themselves are no outrage, but your judgment that they are so. So when anyone makes you angry, know that it is your own thought that has angered you. Wherefore make it your endeavor not to let your impressions carry you away.”
― Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Happiness

“One who contains content, remains content.”
― Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Happiness

“Based on my reading of the scientific literature on the relationship between inflammation and depression, I now recommend it to you as an effective strategy for attaining optimum emotional well-being, and I have included details of it in the program at the end of this book.”
― Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Happiness

“in fact, that researchers in the field of psychoneuroimmunology have developed a cytokine hypothesis of depression, which argues that proinflammatory cytokines are the key factor controlling the behavioral, hormonal, and neurochemical alterations characteristic of depressive disorders, including much of the depression that occurs with cancer.”
― Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Happiness

“The dominant model of disease in our time is biomedical, built on a foundation of molecular biology. As Engel explains, It assumes disease to be fully accounted for by deviations from the norm of measurable biological (somatic) variables. It leaves no room within its framework for the social, psychological, and behavioral dimensions of illness. The biomedical model not only requires that disease be dealt with as an entity independent of social behavior, it also demands that behavioral aberrations be explained on the basis of disordered somatic (biochemical or neurophysiological) processes. Thus the biomedical model embraces both reductionism, the philosophic view that complex phenomena are ultimately derived from a single primary principle, and mind-body dualism.”
― Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Happiness

“A Sufi fable tells of a ship of pilgrims engulfed by a great storm at sea. The passengers are gripped by fear. They wail and moan, sure that death is imminent. Only when the storm subsides do they notice that one of their number, a dervish, has sat through all the tumult in calm meditation. They crowd around him in wonder, and several ask him, “Don’t you know that at any moment we could have perished?” He replies, “I know that I might perish at any moment always and have learned to be at peace with that knowledge.”
― Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Happiness

“My personal opinion is that the neutral position on the mood spectrum—what I called emotional sea level—is not happiness but rather contentment and the calm acceptance that is the goal of many kinds of spiritual practice.”
― Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Happiness

“emotional well-being must come from within, because reaching external goals often disappoints.”
― Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Happiness

“Mark Twain advised to “drag your thoughts away from your troubles… by the ears, by the heels, or any other way you can manage it,”
― Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Happiness

“Pay attention”
― Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Happiness

“compassion and affection help the brain to function more smoothly.15 Secondarily, compassion gives us inner strength; it gives us self-confidence and that reduces fear, which, in turn, keeps our mind calm. Therefore, compassion has two functions: it causes our brain to function better and it brings inner strength. These, then, are the causes of happiness.”
― Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Happiness: Step-by-Step to Peak Emotional Wellbeing

“People fifty-five and older who volunteer for two or more organizations have an impressive 44 percent lower likelihood of dying—and that’s after sifting out every other contributing factor, including physical health, exercise, gender, habits like smoking, marital status, and many more. This is a stronger effect than exercising four times a week or going to church; it means that volunteering is nearly as beneficial to our health as quitting smoking!”
― Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Happiness: Step-by-Step to Peak Emotional Wellbeing