Melting Snow

War Chest Wednesday: Happiness versus Contentment and Summer

Wednesday, July 5, 2017

"Health is the greatest of gifts, contentedness the best riches; trust is the best of relationships, Nirvana the highest happiness."
Buddha

The War Chest Wednesday prompt for "30-Day Blogging Challenge ON HIATUS" 
Is it better to be happy or simply content? Is there a difference?

Happiness Versus Contentment

According to the Merriam-Webster online dictionary, a contented person is one who is "feeling or showing satisfaction with one's possessions, status, or situation."1 Some of the definitions for happy are "enjoying or characterized by well-being and contentment", "expressing, reflecting, or suggestive of happiness", and "having or marked by an atmosphere of good fellowship."2 Despite the fact, that contentment is a component of happiness, there is a subtle difference between the two conditions. A person can be contented without being happy because contentment is satisfaction with your situation, possessions, and status in life.

The "Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise"  prompt for Day 1208
"To see the summer sky is poetry, though never in a book it lie-true poems flee." Write your thoughts about this.

Summer

Summer is a happy season.
Under the green limbs of a cottonwood tree,
My childhood passed in contentment,
My imagination wandered across fairy tale lands,
Even now, several decades later, I miss the cool summer breeze.
Remembering childhood fantasies I laugh happily.

Footnotes
1  https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/contented
2  https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/happy