We all know that planning a wedding, as exciting and wonderful as it is, can be stressful. Preparing a prenuptial agreement often adds to that stress, and can bring up emotional issues. The process you choose to create the agreement can make a difference.

Using mediation or a collaborative process can open up the lines of communication, allows you and your intended to make your wishes known, and start the marriage on a firm foundation. Instead of driving a wedge between you, it can draw you closer together.

Why do mediation and collaborative law work so well? They are both models for open and honest communication.

Instead of one partner presenting the other with a drafted document ready to be signed, both of you take the time to discuss your wants and needs together. The process encourages you each to talk openly about your finances, so all of the concerns around money are out in the open.

The prenup agreement can protect you both: It can help ensure that the non-moneyed spouse will be supported financially and the moneyed spouse can protect his or her assets in case of death or divorce.

Who needs a prenuptial agreement?

It used to be that prenuptial agreements were reserved for the wealthy. But there are many good reasons for the rest of us to consider putting together an agreement before you enter marriage. These may be:

• To protect an inheritance that you (or your parents) want to ensure stays in your biological family.

• To make sure that your family’s business stays with your birth family.

• To ensure that both you and your fiancé are financially supported during the marriage if there is a large difference in income between the two of you.

• To ensure that that you and your fiancé are protected from each others’ debts.

• If one of you has children from a previous marriage, to ensure that those children are protected financially.

Using mediation for a prenuptial agreement

The mediator meets with the couple and helps them create a space of open communication. This allows the couple to discuss everything that’s most important to them, including their fears, expectations, and insecurities around money in the marriage. You can use your sessions to talk about other issues, too, like whether you will have children, or where you will live. These are just a small smattering of things you might discuss. The point is that this is a good time to tell your intended about your hopes and dreams for your happy life together.

The mediator remains a neutral party who helps guide the conversation, clarifies points, and helps you make decisions together. The mediator can help you both go deeper into a conversation about sensitive issues. The mediator will then memorialize your agreement in writing.

You and your intended will each need your own lawyers to review the agreement before you sign it. You must have your own lawyer go over it with you to make the prenuptial agreement enforceable.

Using collaborative law for a prenuptial agreement

The collaborative law process involves the couple and two collaborative lawyers, one for each party. Collaborative lawyers are trained in mediation skills to help guide the conversation and create a safe space for the couple to discuss their values and goals, fears and insecurities around money in the relationship. You may bring in a neutral financial planner to help in the process.

Collaborative lawyers can answer legal questions and give legal advice on the spot, which you can use to help you make decisions together. At the end of the process, one lawyer will draft the agreement, and both will review it with their clients.

Both mediation and collaborative process keep you and your fiancé in the driver’s seat, and help you create an agreement that is tailor made to fit your situation.

Other Suggestions

What makes a good prenuptial agreement? Courts want to know that such an agreement is fair, and that you have entered into the agreement with your eyes open. Here are a few tips to ensure this:

• Start early. The sooner you start (and finish) the process, the better. Give yourself enough time to really think things out, and to gather all the information you need. A prenup signed days before the wedding may be seen as coercive.

• Hire your own collaborative or reviewing attorney. Speak to that person alone. Be honest about your hopes and fears. Interview a few to see who you are comfortable with.

• Be honest about your finances. The more open you are about what you have, the more you protect yourself in the future.

• Look carefully about what your spouse tells you about his or her assets. Does that make sense, given what you know about his/her spending?

• Think about the agreement. Is it fair? Will it leave you both with enough to live on? To rebuild your life? Does it sit right with you?

Conclusion

By opening a conversation about finances and other sensitive issues before the beginning of a marriage, you can ensure that your goals and values are aligned with those of your future spouse. Having these potentially difficult conversations using the mediation or collaborative process can make the agreement stronger, make your discussions easier, and help start your marriage off with open, honest communication and end with happily ever after.

Plant dreams, pull weeds, and grow a happy life. What does that mean and is it possible? We all have dreams, yet there is so much sadness, disappointment, anger and bitterness all around us. How can I get past all that to grow a happy life?

How do we plant dreams?

Plant the dreams of happiness. Show others that there are some good happy people to touch their lives. Plant seeds of joy. Many people are truly surprised by the nice people that cross their paths.

Do nice things for someone-especially when it is totally unexpected. If you help a stranger, you may never know the impact you may have on that person.

Surprise someone. It could be just a small bouquet of wild flowers or an invite for coffee and a chat. It’s the act of kindness that warms the heart for both you and the receiver.

Put a note in your partner’s or child’s lunchbox. Make them smile in the middle of the day. Include a nice thought or saying that will give them food for thought.

Patiently listen to others that have the need for someone to talk to. When you truly listen and sincerely care, they will appreciate the compassion. You may not be able to do anything for them, but just an open, caring, ear may be enough.

Do common everyday things for your family with a happy heart. Those smiles and positive feelings are the recipe for a much happier family that can dream together.

How do we pull weeds?

Anger, disappointment, sadness, and bitterness are the weeds that hang around. It is so easy to let go of those things, if you choose to.

Avoid gossip. It is usually hurtful, whether intentional or not. Say only nice things about people. Change the conversation if others are gossiping. Choose to not listen.

Don’t let negative people get you down. People say don’t hang out with negative, depressing people, but maybe these people need someone positive like you in their life to help them restore happiness in their own life. Be careful that the interaction is positive and it doesn’t end up bringing you down.

When the negative thoughts and the blahs set in, think of something nice and funny-pull the weeds and see the flowers of happiness once again.

Don’t be so hard on yourself. You need to be kind to yourself and be happy before you can help and influence others to do the same.

How do we grow a happy life? Do we now have a happy life?

Eleanor Roosevelt said, “Happiness is not a goal… it’s a by-product of a life well lived.” Think about it. –“Grow a happy life”– Life means on-going. To be happy every day means to live in the positive. It is always working on that happy spot.

You will learn to smile at the little things.

You will learn to let go of stress.

You will learn to be thankful for what you do have.

You will feel good knowing you touch someone’s life in a positive way. You may restore that person’s faith in mankind. You may put a smile on their face.

Plant dreams, pull weeds, and grow a happy life. Help others do the same. Grow your gardens together! It really is easy and rewarding. Everyone involved feels good.

Setting

There are obviously two places you can hold the photo session- indoors or outdoors. Whichever you choose you need to keep the lighting, time and the mood of your pet in mind. Take your pet’s preference into account when choosing the setting. You need your pet to be in a good mood.

The perfect day

Pythagoras says, “Animals share with us the privilege of having a soul,” and you would want your snapshots to reflect this soul. It’s all about the rightness and brightness of light. Choose a day which is not too bright neither too dark, you want the lighting to just right to make your photos appear au natural and not screaming ‘it took me ages to click this!’

It’s all about the timing

Your pet will not stay put and you should use this to your advantage. Coax him, bribe him and use a calm tone to get him to the right position you want. A happy pet equals happy pictures.

Camera settings

If you have got a cooperative pet who loves photography sessions then this will be a cake walk for you. However, not every cat and dog likes the camera flash; it scares them, makes them nervous. That’s why you need a day which isn’t too cloudy or too bright. Besides, the flash tends to give a washed out effect, so you would want to turn it off.

The subject and the number

You need not have a particular pose in mind; you can encourage your pet to move about while you go on clicking. Take a handsome amount of pictures, because your pet will not always heed to your request and peer into the camera for you. The more the merrier, you can always discard the ones which don’t look good to you.

The surprise factor

Use toys, whistles, gestures and treats to grab their attention, if outdoor photography has led them to chase a butterfly or mantis. This might make them bounce back towards you leaving you with an adorable shot. Distractions work best at giving you the perfect shot and viewing your pet in a different light, literally.

The Angle

Angle matters, when you are snapping his pictures. Taking it from a high angle is very common; why not crouch down to his level and try clicking? You will have some beautiful pictures of your four-legged darling. Bend yourself, lean, move slowly and engage your pet’s attention. You will be have a fun session as will your cat or dog.

Make sure to reward your pet afterwards for being cooperative, and being so photogenic. Happy clicking to you!

You landed here probably because you’re a dog parent. So, how’s your pooch? Are you enjoying each other’s company? Most likely! Well, it actually depends on you. Yes, you. And… your dog’s attitude? No, dear! Your relationship with your furry baby is your sole responsibility. The moment you welcomed that cutie in your home, it became a member of your family. Being a dog parent is a sweet responsibility, and you should really do your best to become a good one. Now, have you done dog training? Does your furry buddy know the right areas to pee and poop? Does it know its limits? Go on, read this piece of writing that will surely help you train and maintain a good relationship with your pooch. You’re reading this because you want to sustain the happiness that you already have with your dog, right? (Of course, the mere presence of a dog can make us happy!)

The Happy Dog and Parent

Below are some important thoughts to keep in mind while teaching various things to your dog.

• Know that it depends on the breed.

You have learned that your neighbour’s corgi is very easy to train, so you expect the same for your beagle. But you should know that different breeds have different traits especially when it comes to trainability. A corgi is much easier to train compared to a beagle, but that doesn’t mean you have to give up on your pet. You just need to be in the know of the proper approach for your dog’s breed, and you’ll surely succeed in your teaching goals.

• Understand that it may take time.

Apart from knowing the traits of your pet, you should also remind yourself that you can’t just see great improvements overnight. For instance, enhancing your talents requires a lot of training sessions before seeing significant results. The same thing may happen as you try to potty train your pet.

• Don’t get mad at your dog.

Be firm, but don’t yell at your pet. You wouldn’t want fear to be the foundation of your relationship, would you? Be patient enough. Getting mad at your pet will not lead to proper motivation and good results.

• Acknowledge small achievements.

Of course, your pet deserves some treats! Cheer for it and give it a reward for every small achievement. Dogs are smart, and they can be easily motivated to do good especially if they know that they’ll be rewarded for it.

• Remember that a dog is indeed a man’s best friend.

As they say, dogs are capable of giving unconditional love. Hence, treat your pet well. Be gentle during your training sessions. Your pooch is not your enemy, but your best friend.

Happy Home!

Obviously, this is the result of the kind-heartedness that you and your dog naturally possess. You guys can indeed bring out the best in each other, but know that everything should start in you. If you do things right, everything else will really follow. Gentle training plus genuine love equals a happy dog and a happy parent. And of course, a happy dog plus a happy parent equals a happy home!

Practicing law, while a learned profession, is also a business.

Just like any business, its practitioners need to market themselves in order to attract customers: as anyone can tell you, there’s no shortage of lawyers out there. They’re all competing for a limited amount of client dollars, and many of them are offering substantially similar services. As a result alongside the predatory attorney sharks swim the marketing remora fish, competing for a limited amount of attorney marketing spend.

Naturally enough, as the marketing people know and encourage, the attorneys seek to differentiate themselves from one another; to improve their position in the marketing “pecking order,” with a view to increasing market share.

The marketers have figured out an effective way to appeal to the archetypal self-respecting attorneys’ superiority complex. They encourage those attorneys to seek participation in surveys that affix superlative rankings to certain of them. Superlatives like “super” or “best.”

You might be surprised (or you might not) to learn that the process by which these superlatives are affixed is neither as objective nor as scientific as it might at first appear.

Let’s examine why.

Before we do, two caveats.

First, before you assume we’re just aggrieved wannabes who didn’t get selected for these accolades, know this: we have been invited to participate in the selection process, as well as solicited to purchase advertising space of one sort or another by the marketing people that publish these lists. We have made a deliberate decision to refrain from participation. We’re pretty confident our clients think we’re good at what we do and that, for want of a better term, is good enough for us.

Second, we are not casting any aspersions on the attorneys who participate in the creation of these lists. We don’t know all of them, but we do know some, and almost all of the ones we know we would consider good lawyers. Not “super” or “best,” just good, and we think that ought to be good enough for them, and more to the point, good enough for their clients.

After you read this, we hope you’ll understand why we don’t participate.

First of all (and you really should read this sentence more than once) these rankings are not based on client testimonials or client reviews; they’re not based on client input at all. In other words, no clients are canvassed to participate in these surveys. Not a single one. We think this means the whole thing starts from a shaky premise. To us it seems a little like asking the owners, cooks, and wait staff to review the restaurant they all work in.

While the marketers tout their selection and ranking processes as “rigorous” and “objective,” in reality it’s little more than a brother-in-law referral system.

If you network with other lawyers enough (read spend your time at lawyer-organized functions, or work in a large enough law firm), you’ll be able to garner sufficient “peer recognition” (read make enough friends who are also lawyers) to not only secure a nomination, but also ensure that leads to “qualification.”

Where does that qualification lead?

Well, the marketing departments of the organizers and publishers of these rankings get to take a shot at up-selling the “supers” and “bests” with some primo-advertising space in their magazines and online directory services. That advertising space is offered at a “preferential rate,” whatever that means.

The “super” and “best” attorneys get to tout their newly-acquired status on their websites and mailers too, so that their prospective clients can see how “good” they are.

At the end of the day though, the “supers” and the “bests” aren’t necessarily “supers” and “bests” in the eyes of the people who really ought to be asked whether they are or not: that would be their clients.

They aren’t nominated by the people they work for, and for whom they purportedly seek to achieve results; rather they are nominated by the people they work with, just like those cooks and wait staff we alluded to earlier.

We think practicing law is about helping our clients to achieve their legal goals. We don’t think it’s about seeking recognition from our professional competitors. And while we’re not so holier than thou as to refrain from any marketing – indeed, below this article you’ll find links back to our website – we do think the superlatives are a little disingenuous.

Given that attorneys often prosecute claims against businesses engaging in deceptive trade practices, it would be nice if some of them applied a little more scrutiny in that regard to their own marketing practices.

We recognize it’s nice to be well-thought of by other people and all, sure; particularly people we’re close to, like friends, colleagues and family. We’re just not too keen on impropriety, and canvassing our friends and colleagues to proclaim we’re the “super” and “best” just seems a wee bit improper. We think there might be something in the ethical rules about that.

So, for the time being, we’re happy being “good,” and we’re even happier if our clients think we are too.

What is the one thing you want more than anything else for the people you love the most? If you had a magic wand what would you grant your family and friends? What is it that everyone wants?

To be happy!

How can you make other people happy until you are happy? How can you be happy?

Lester Levenson, creator of The Sedona Method, discovered the key to happiness. He searched for 47 years and nearly died in the process but he did find it. Do you want to know what it is?

Lester had a breakthrough after much soul searching and found out how to be happy only after reviewing his entire life. He spotted a common pattern, one that was present in every happy moment.

Whenever he was feeling love towards another person he felt happy. And whenever he felt any other feeling he was not happy.

Test this principle for yourself. Think of a time when you were blissfully happy. Did you feel loving at that time? This works for me every time. Is this easy or what? Simply amazing!

If this sounds too simple to work I know that you have not tested it for yourself. Turning on a light bulb is easy too only because someone else figured it out!

Now it is time for Happy Talk or how to talk in a way that makes your family and friends happy…

1. Be Happy Yourself

Spend twenty minutes asking yourself:

• who do I love most in my life?
• what do I love most about myself?
• what things do I love most in my life?

After doing this exercise you will feel much happier. And you will have done it without having to spend any money on expensive clothes, cars or holidays!

2. Spread the happiness

Now that you feel happy you will radiate this to whoever you spend time with. Happiness is infectious. Just be yourself and top up the happiness by quietly asking yourself the above three questions when you are in company.

3. Show your friends and family how to be happy

Depending on how well you know your friends you may want to approach this step in one of two ways.

If you want to play it safe ask your friend to talk about times when she was happy. Let her talk and just listen as she relives those wonderful times from the past.

Share your own favorite moments too. Enjoy yourself!

If the people you are with are more open to the ideas we are discussing here take them through the steps I covered above in section one. Ask them these questions:

• who do you love most in my life?
• what do you love most about myself?
• what things do you love most in my life?

The Dalai Lama teaches that the purpose of life is to be happy. Go on and live a life of purpose with your family and friends!

The comedian Father Guido Sarduchi noted that we could all save a little time if we trimmed the fat from the Happy Birthday song. He proposed:

Happy birthday to you

Happy birthday dear Guido

Happy birthday to you

After all, what’s really gained from that second “happy birthday to you?” Isn’t an ABA format as good as an AABA?

Most jazz tunes are AABA with eight bars per section and 32 bars for the whole song. The blues also is AABA both in its chord changes and first-line lyrics repeated. In limericks too the rhythmic pattern is AABA. In classical Indian music the AABA form consists of four “matras” or sections, the third of which is “empty.” At a classical Indian concert you’ll see audience members backhand-sweep the air on the empty third matra as though brushing away flies.

It’s not just “Happy Birthday.” Apparently ABA isn’t necessarily as resonant with us as AABA. And why?

Maybe AABA affords the maximum tolerable repetition. Two A’s in a row is fine but three is monotonous. Still, music isn’t about tolerability. It’s about enjoyment and a certain metaphoric resonance with the patterns of life. Life is full of patterns and surprises so we resonate with both. Music is full of tantalizing patterns and attention-teasing surprises. In music’s bait and switches the AA is the bait and the B that follows is the switch. You can’t have a surprise exception to a pattern until you have a pattern, and the minimal pattern is a single repetition: AA.

I’ve long been interested in two possible ways rules work. One version is that all rules come in opposing pairs. For example, sometimes you should accept things as they are and sometimes you should resist things. Assume a 50/50 probability an ABAB, like coin-flips on each of the rules.

The other interpretations is that one rule dominates but with occasional exceptions. For example, assume that you should generally accept things as they are, but that there will be the occasional need to resist also. The minimal way to express this would be AABA.

I think there’s an analog to AABA in child development, helping children develop deep resonance with the patterns of life. First a child must learn rules like “be nice” through repetition. Once the pattern is established, the child learns to diverge from the pattern when necessary. For example when someone asks for something inappropriate, a child shouldn’t feel compelled to be nice.

Indeed, split the AABA pattern into two patterns and you get the two versions of how rules work. AA implies that A is always the rule. BA implies that rules alternate 50/50.

Adulthood is living by the A-rules, knowing that there will be B-exceptions and wondering when those exceptions are. For example, there are times when we break the rule that one should be nice. We take note when we do, wondering, “Was that OK?”

We note the exceptions, and the noting shows that there was a rule in the first place. That’s the real meaning of “The exception that proves the rule.” More accurately we could say that by taking note of the divergence from the rule we prove that there was a rule we diverged from.

Classic psychological research shows that people who doubt their own beliefs are more inclined to proselytize in favor of them. Shakespeare’s “The lady doth protest too much, methinks,” reflects this. If I say, “No, believe me. I meant to do that. That’s what I should have done,” I demonstrate that I’ve noticed that I’m making an exception from a rule. We say what we, ourselves need to hear. We need to hear reasons for making the exceptions we do.

And apparently we need to hear a fair amount of AABA, a pattern that reflects that there are both patterns and exceptions.

Nurture and nature play important roles as far as raising children is concerned. There are several things that parents should do to ensure that children are raised in the right manner. Parents should ensure that the children consume the right nutrients, get enough quality sleep and stay healthy, both emotionally and physically. Here are some steps that may help you raise a happy child.

First, you should let your child be aware that you’re excited to see them as they enter the room. You should let them see that light dance inside your eyes when they look at you. You should be mindful of their presence through showing them your smile, and warmly greeting them. Call out their names aloud. Your child adores you the most. And imagine the returns after childhood that’s filled with much affection.

Secondly, you should teach the child it is okay to be bored. Yes, as parents our normal instinct is to keep on entertaining the child every waking hour. If we don’t have the energy and time, we allow the babysitter to do it on our behalf. However, when we depend on TV, or any other form of entertainment, we only succeed in limiting their imagination. The child has clear imaginations that only flourish when nurtured. But without opportunity for creativity, it all withers away. Give the child a piece of paper and crayons instead.

Thirdly, the child should know that they are more vital than work. You should give the child tender loving affection. The child doesn’t just need you around. He or she need you present. Therefore, play with the child. Discover what’s important to them through asking questions and be attentive to their answers. The child deserves a little bit of you every day. You shouldn’t let your work separate you from the child. Letting him or her know they are important just makes them happy.

Fourthly, you should allow the child to make a few rules. You do not have to make them the boss so as to let them feel that they are empowered. Sometimes, power struggles with the children are a result of them feeling they have lost control. You may curb easily such instances through allowing the child to feel like they are making some decisions. This is going to make them follow the rules.

Lastly, you should model appropriate behavior. Children normally do what they see, and not what they are told. When you need the child to be mindful of others, you too should do the same. When you need the child to be happy, you should also smile without hesitation. You are the role model to your child.

Happiness Is A Choice

How To Be Happy? There are 2 types of happiness. There is the happiness that we feel in response to an external event or circumstance. An obvious example of this would be our reaction to winning the lottery!

Then there is the happiness that is cultivated internally. This is the energy that arises as a conscious choice rather than the more ephemeral reaction to a piece of good news.

In this article we are going to focus on happiness as a choice.

How To Be Happy – And How Things Are

We all struggle and strive to attain health, wealth and personal happiness. Yet these three big areas: our health, our wealth and our relationships are where we all get hung out to dry – sooner or later.

It is as though there is an inbuilt design flaw that ensures that we all suffer at some point – one way or another.

In the Buddhist perspective, “seeing things as they are” (Sanskrit yatha-bhutam darshanam) basically means to see that all human experience is stamped by three characteristics:

* Impermanence (anitya)

* No-self (anatman)

* Suffering (duhkha)

This is how things are.

As we become aware of these characteristics our point of focus shifts away from the content of our experiences and toward our response to them.

At time of writing in the middle of the Covid-19 lockdown this is a very pertinent point!

However, as Thich Nhat Hanh writes in “Being Peace”:

“… life is filled with suffering, but it is also filled with many wonders, like the blue sky, the sunshine, the eyes of a baby.

To suffer is not enough. We must also be in touch with the wonders of life. They are within us and all around us, everywhere, any time.”

Zen teacher Alan Senauke offers the following advice for keeping your Joyful Mind when fear and suffering threaten it:

“Joy is an active principle, not a swamp of passivity. No one can steal it… We have choices even though they are often hard to see.”

How To Be Happy – Choose To Be Happy

In the bible (Philippians 4:4 NKJV), the psalmist writes: “This is the day the Lord has made; we will rejoice and be glad in it”

He doesn’t say “yesterday was a good day so let’s give thanks for that” or “tomorrow will be a good day so I’ll scrape through today and hang on for tomorrow”

He says today… now… this present moment… we choose to give thanks for this day.

When we complain it is often self-focused – about our current experiences and what I want or don’t want.

Happiness is a choice and it comes to those who look beyond themselves to something greater than their own immediate personal happiness based on their circumstances.

The apostle Paul was frequently imprisoned and on one occasion when he was incarcerated with no prospect of release he wrote: “Rejoice in the Lord always… always be joyful… “

His joy was grounded in his focus and was not a reflection of his circumstances.

How To Be Happy – A View From The End

In 2015, the award-winning journalist John Leland (on assignment from “The New York Times”) spent time with number of older people with the initial expectation of learning about how they cope with the effects of aging in terms of physical and mental health and overall quality of life.

However what he found was quite extraordinary, despite their circumstances these people lived positive and joyful lives. He captured and expressed his experiences in Happiness Is a Choice You Make: Lessons from a Year Among the Oldest Old:

“Older people consistently reported just as many positive emotions as the younger participants, but had fewer negative ones. They also had more mixed emotions, meaning that they didn’t let frustration or anxiety keep them from saying they were happy.

Consciously or unconsciously, they were making the choice to be happy even when there were reasons to feel otherwise…

Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, or fMRI, the researchers found that the emotional processing center of older people’s brains, the amygdala, fired more actively when they looked at positive images than negative ones; younger brains reacted to both equally.

In this, older brains resemble the brains of people who meditate.”

Leland offers a compelling explanation from the psychologist Laura L. Carstensen, founding director of the Stanford Center on Longevity:

“Her hypothesis, which she gave the wonky name ‘socioemotional selectivity,’ is that older people, knowing they face a limited time in front of them, focus their energies on things that give them pleasure in the moment, whereas young people, with long horizons, seek out new experiences or knowledge that may or may not pay off down the line.

Our default position is that we’d be “happy if only” every bad thing went away. Whereas, these old people accepted that there are always challenges in life and they choose to be “happy in spite of.”

How To Be Happy – The Cognitive Approach

In A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy William B. Irvine shares the wisdom of Stoic philosophy and reveals how its insights and advice are refreshingly relevant to now.

In summary, here are 3 key takeaways:

1. “What’s The Worst That Could Happen?” – This is what the Stoics refer to as “the premeditation” – which means that there’s a lot of value in thinking through carefully, and consciously about the worst that could happen. In most situations your thought process will show that your anxiety about those situations are out of proportion or exaggerated

2. “Fake It To Make It” – Irvine refers to Seneca, who says that when we are angry we should take steps to “turn all (anger’s) indications into their opposites.” We should force ourselves to relax our face, soften our voice, and slow our pace of walking. If we do this, our internal state will soon come to resemble our external state, and our anger, says Seneca, will have dissipated.

3. “Make It A Treat” – The Stoics understood that denying yourself something makes you appreciate what you would otherwise take for granted, and they regularly undertook quite stringent exercises in self-denial and over long periods of time.

We have left the best and most powerful key to how to be happy to last.

Be grateful!

The practice of gratitude really does make us happy.

Not only does gratitude make us happy there is considerable research that shows that there are many physical, emotional and spiritual benefits that we can enjoy from this practice.

To make a start on how to be happy, all that is needed is a change in perspective.

You can feel it right now if you choose to.

“Joy does not simply happen to us. We have to choose joy and keep choosing it every day.” (Henri Nouwen)

Read more on: How To Be Happy

After you have tried nearly every straightforward strategy to get your husband to call off the divorce, it’s natural to begin to consider strategies that are not so straightforward. People often consider using reverse psychology in order to get their spouse to consider making a change. One example is pretending to be happy about the divorce when you really are anything but.

You might hear a wife say: “my husband is probably only a few months away from making sure our divorce is final. He knows that I don’t want a divorce. He claims to feel awful about breaking up our family but he says that he just doesn’t see any other way. He has agreed to go to counseling to help our children deal with the divorce. I had hoped that the counselor would be able to show him that a divorce should be the last option. But so far, that hasn’t been working out. He seems to be determined to move forward. I have tried negotiating with him. I have tried begging him not to do this. I have tried promising him the changes that I know that he wants. None of this makes any difference to him. He says that no matter what I do, his mind is made up. Since my being devastated by the divorce doesn’t seem to make any difference to him, I’ve considered using reverse psychology and pretending to be happy about the divorce. Will this work? If I pretend to be happy about all of this, will he stop wanting to divorce me?”

This is a very common question and many wives try this. I can’t tell you that it doesn’t work because I used a variation on it that did work. However, I stopped short of pretending to be happy about us splitting up. My husband never would have believed that. I knew that I couldn’t pull it off. (And many wives who try this tell me that their husbands didn’t believe them anyway.)

Instead, I went to stay with family in another town. I guess you could say I was resigned to the fact that my husband was going forward. I didn’t pretend to be happy about it but it was obvious that I was backing off and was no longer trying to fight him on it. And this actually did give him pause. I believe that he was shocked by this and this disarmed him to a certain extent. And this pause gave me the opportunity to try some different things that eventually worked.

But I don’t think that this alone is what saved my marriage. I think that it was the work that I did after the pause which made the difference. I do believe that in some cases backing off of all of the opposition can make your husband stop and pause. Some will take this even further and they will pretend to be happy about the divorce.

They’ll tell their husband that they have suddenly realized that a divorce really is the best thing for all parties and she’ll try to convince him that she is now excited for the opportunity to meet new people and to just live her life without all of the drama. Many hope that this will make their husband uncomfortable and jealous, which will show him that he still cares about his wife and that maybe he doesn’t want a divorce after all.

I do understand the thinking behind this, but it isn’t without risk. It could backfire. Your husband could be relieved that you are now happy. Or, he could be a bit put off and distance himself even more. Or, he could one day resent that you were actually happy about this. That’s why I believe that the safer bet is to act resigned and accepting rather than happy. I know that this might sound like a small distinction. But I believe that it is an important one.

Because when you back off, it’s still clear that you love your husband and would like to save your marriage. So instead of claiming to be happy, you’d say something like: “I wish I could change your mind, but it’s pretty clear that you are determined to go forward. I am not going to keep pressuring you about this because its obvious that my attempts haven’t worked. So, I’m going to begin to live my own life and work on myself. I am going to try to be as happy as I possibly can with this scenario because I have to think about my own well being and that of our kids. I hope that we can have a good and continuing relationship for their sake. And I do wish you nothing but the best moving forward. I hope that you feel the same way. And who knows what tomorrow brings? But for now, I just have to back away.”

Do you see the difference? This may still give you that pause that you are looking for, but you haven’t lied and you haven’t tried to sell something that is so big of a stretch. Plus, your husband isn’t as likely to become angry or distant since you are still keeping your integrity and your feelings about this are more understandable than claiming to completely change your mind so dramatically to pretend that you are actually happy.

Of course, each marriage is different. I can’t tell you which strategy might work better, but I was always more comfortable stopping short of pretending to be happy. I knew that I couldn’t sell it. My husband knew I’d never be happy about the end of my marriage.