Eleanor Roosevelt was not only the first lady of the United States, but also a well-known politician, human rights activist and writer. Two years before her death, in 1960, she wrote the book Teacher Life, in which she put all her experience and knowledge. One of the most powerful chapters in it is about happiness.
“Happiness is not a goal, but a by-product. Paradoxically, the desire to enjoy life is a sure way to make yourself miserable. After a very short time, you realize that few things can truly make you happy. The reason is that interest in life and hope for the future live in us only when we bring joy to other people. […]
It is easy to slip into preoccupation with oneself, egocentrism – and this is a fatal step. When a person is concerned only with himself, his health, personal problems or the little things of everyday life, he immediately loses interest in other people. Even worse, he loses touch with life. From this point, one step to losing interest in the world and life in general. This is the beginning of the end, the approach of death.
I was once asked what I consider to be the three main conditions for happiness. I replied, “The knowledge that you have always been honest with yourself and the people around you. The consciousness that you have done everything you could, in your personal life and in your work. And the ability to love others. But there is another fundamental condition, and I do not understand how I could forget about it: the consciousness that you are somehow useful. Being useful – whatever form it takes – is the price we all have to pay for the air we breathe and the food we eat and the opportunity to live on this earth. Being useful is in itself a reward and the first step to happiness, just as self-pity and avoidance of life’s difficulties are the beginning of suffering.
Read more:
- What helped me get through the ordeal
Your life belongs to you – but only if you yourself are at the helm. The rules you live by should be your rules, your values, your beliefs about what is good and what is bad, what is true and what is false, what is important and what should not be given importance. If you accept the rules and values of someone else or a group, a team that puts pressure on you, you change yourself, give them your power. The more you sacrifice yourself, the less human remains in you.
* E. Roosevelt «You Learn by Living: Eleven Keys for a More Fulfilling Life» (Harper Perennial, 2011).
Eleanor Roosevelt – wife of American President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a prominent public figure. She was born into a wealthy family that belonged to high society in the United States, lost her parents in early childhood (mother died of diphtheria, father – from alcoholism). She began an active political career to help her husband, who in 1921 fell ill with polio. She defended the rights of women to work and equal pay with men, helped talented young people from poor families get an education, stood at the origins of the creation of the UN and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.