When asked about happiness, we usually think of something extraordinary, an   delight, which seems to get rarer the older we get.    For kids, happiness has a magical quality. Their delight at winning a race or getting a new bike is unreserved .    In the teenage years the concept  of happiness changes. Suddenly it's conditional on such things as excitement, love and popularity. I can still recall the excitement of being invited to dance with the most attractive boy at the school party.    In adulthood the things that bring deep joy----love, marriage, birth----also bring responsibility and the risk of loss. For adults, happiness is complicated     My definition for happiness is "the capacity for enjoyment". The more we can enjoy what we have, the happier we are. It's easy to overlook the pleasure we get from the company of friends, the freedom to live where we pleased, and even good health. I experienced my little moments of pleasure yesterday. First I was overjoyed when I shut the last lunch-box and had the house to myself. Then I spent an uninterrupted morning writing, which I love. When the kids and my husband came home, I enjoyed their noise after the quiet of the day. Psychologists tell us that to be happy we need a mix of enjoyable leisure time and satisfying work. I don't think that my grandmother, who raised 14 children, had much of either. She did have a network of close friends and family, and maybe this is what satisfied her.     We, however, with so many choices and such pressure  to succeed in every area, have turned happiness into one more thing we've got to have. We've so self-conscious about our "right" to it that it's making us miserable. So we pursue   it and equal it with wealth and success, without noticing that the people who have those things aren't necessarily happier     Happiness isn't about what happens to us----it's about how we see what happens to us. It's the skillful way of finding a positive for every negative. It's not wishing for what we don't have, but enjoying what we do own. People who equal happiness with wealth and success   _  .
consider pressure something blocking their way have no idea to make correct choices attach too much importance to their right to happiness are more likely to be happy