Happiness and Health
One thing I have recently begun studying is the relationship between happiness and health, as well as the part forgiveness and “letting go” plays in healing.
What is the chief end of man?
Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him for ever.
Westminster Shorter CatechismFor what purpose was man made?
Man was made to love and serve God, and to be happy with Him forever.
Primary Catechism
I find this line from the Declaration of Independence to be absolutely brilliant.
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
United States Declaration of Independence“As a people, we have become obsessed with Health. There is something fundamentally, radically unhealthy about all this. We do not seem to be seeking more exuberance in living as much as staving off failure, putting off dying. We have lost all confidence in the human body.”
Lewis Thomas“Our body is a machine for living. It is organized for that, it is its nature. Let life go on in it unhindered and let it defend itself, it will do more than if you paralyze it by encumbering it with remedies.”
Leo Tolstoy“I see rejection in my skin, worry in my cancers, bitterness and hate in my aching joints. I failed to take care of my mind, and so my body now goes to hospital.”
Astrid Alauda“What some call health, if purchased by perpetual anxiety about diet, isn’t much better than tedious disease.”
George Dennison Prentice, Prenticeana, 1860“Diseases of the soul are more dangerous and more numerous than those of the body.”
Cicero“In a disordered mind, as in a disordered body, soundness of health is impossible.”
Cicero“A healthy body and soul come from an unencumbered mind and body.”
Ymber Delecto“A good laugh and a long sleep are the best cures in the doctor’s book.”
Irish Proverb“Most folks are about as happy as they make up their minds to be.”
Abraham Lincoln“Happiness depends upon ourselves.”
Aristotle“Man is the artificer of his own happiness.”
Henry David Thoreau“Happiness cannot come from without. It must come from within. It is not what we see and touch or that which others do for us which makes us happy; it is that which we think and feel and do, first for the other fellow and then for ourselves.”
Helen Keller“When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us.”
Helen Keller“All seasons are beautiful for the person who carries happiness within.”
Horace Friess“Whoever is happy will make others happy, too.”
Mark Twain“A merry heart doeth good like a medicine: but a broken spirit drieth the bones.”
Proverbs 17:22
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One Response to “Happiness and Health”
By Twila on Apr 23, 2008 | Reply
Interesting! I tried to choose a favourite, but found there were too many! However, Abe Lincoln’s rings especially true.