How to be Happy

Millions Searching: How to Be Happy

Why So Many of Us are Looking for Answers

Do you know what over 45,000,000 people search for on GOOGLE monthly? Four words: How to be happy.  45,000,000 people. And that’s just on the main search engine.  As amazing as the number is, something struck me (after I picked my jaw off the ground): This number could potentially be tripled if you take into consideration that happiness seekers might word the phrase differently.  Some may search for ways to be happy or how to be happier.  Others may take a different approach and look for ways to snap out of a bad mood or how to overcome the blues.
As part of my web publishing business, I spend at least one day each month researching what people are researching.  It feels as though I”m looking over the shoulders of scads of people as they sit down at their computer and search for answers, solutions, tips, and…. ultimately, happiness.  In addition to contact forms, e-mail, and comments, this gives me a better idea of what people are actually looking for and what they’re actually interested in reading about.
Good stuff for a writer to know, right?
Why are so many people searching for the secret to happiness?
I can sum up the answer to that question with four phrases:

• Life's Tough
• The Economy
• Baby Boomers
• Google

• Sickness, death, empty nests, loneliness, and financial problems are cruel facts of life and each are more than capable of robbing even the happiest person of a little sunshine.

Starting with number 4 , Google – and the internet, in general – has made it so blissfully easy to find what we need, when we need it.  The information is amazing when you think about it! If we have something on our mind, BAM, we’re just a couple of clicks from advice, tips, suggestions, and much needed inspiration and motivation. So, Baby Boomers and their children head right for the most popular website destination of them all: Google! The trusty little box awaits their deepest concerns and in mere seconds, there are lists of answers waiting for them.
The economy, is blamed for just about every ill in the world right now.  The problem is, people have had a deep-down yearning for happiness long before the recent economic roller coaster. It’s an inborn desire. We all want to be happy – happy feels good!   Before I come across as the PR agent for the economy, let me admit that it adds to people’s list of woes.  We aren’t able to buy anything and everything we want (again, at the risk of sounding like a PR department, I”m not sure I’ve ever been able to do that). Tragically, many people ARE struggling. I read about people losing their jobs as well as their homes. It’s heartbreaking and it’s also easy to see why a lot of families are having trouble staying together. I guess it’s tough to stay together when you’re struggling just to keep it together.
Life’s tough.  Amen and amen. How often do things happen to us and one of the first things we think of is, “I thought this only happened to other people.”  When I got a call that my sister-in-law had been killed in an accident, it was as though life froze for a minute as my brain tried to process it. Is this really happening? This is like something you read about in the newspaper. When the story in the newspaper (there was one, of course) hits close to home, it’s almost surreal.  This woman had fought cancer and survived and she loses her life in an accident?
Loved ones die, they get sick, they do things we wish they wouldn’t and sometimes it seems they’ve completely lost their minds.  We often have to watch as bills pile up as money refuses to keep up (talk about an epic fail in supply and demand).  Many people had to watch, with tear-filled eyes, as people they loved headed off to fight in a war they hated.