Happiness is like a domino train

Happiness quite unshared can scarcely be called happiness; it has no taste. Charlotte Brontë

The kind of happiness that Brontë is referring to in today's quote is quite different than the kind I talked about in Monday's daily quote. That kind of happiness was the things we do or strive to do to fill us up. Today's happiness is organic. It comes through no real effort and has not real motivation oftentimes. It is simple and unconditional.
The happiness we are talking about today comes through the most unlikely things, the smallest gestures, the simplest of activities. And when we don't share it, getting to the point of the quote, it is dulled. Happiness unshared lacks the luster it should have. We should not hoard happiness for ourselves, we should share it so that it multiplies and acts as a domino train.* Think of yourself as the first domino that gets tipped over - allow yourself to get tipped over in happiness - and spark someone else with happiness so they can spark someone else and on and on. What lifts you? Is it a good cup of coffee? Cup of tea? A good book? A funny movie? Flowers? Beer night with the guys? Bowling with the group? You see what I'm saying. When I'm happy I can't help but share it, everyone I come into contact with benefits (and my husband wholeheartedly agrees! ha!) from my happiness because when I am truly happy and not faking it I can't help but not share it and it becomes sweeter the more I share it. And that leads to one last point - don't fake happiness. Don't even attempt to. Everyone knows when it's fake and trying to share that just leaves a bitter taste in their mouths as well as yours. If you can't be genuine in your happiness then just be genuine with where you are at that day. The hope is someone else in your life is experiencing genuine happiness, tipping over, and will spark it in you! :)

*I'm a visual kind of person so here's a video to help refresh your memory on domino trains. :)

Butter someone up

There are two probable origins for this idiom and I think both are equally plausible. The first one is that when you spread butter on bread you are buttering it up like one would do when trying to flatter someone. The second is in ancient India there was a practice of throwing balls of butter at statues to ask for favor, i.e. buttering them up. ( source ) When we use the phrase today we generally mean that extreme flattery is used to gain information or favor. It's not always necessarily a compliment.

A dime a dozen

"It's said that in the year 1796, the first U.S. dimes were produced for circulation. Hence, it would make sense for this phrase to originate sometime after." Read more here . Today the phrase carries the meaning that something is cheap or without value if it can be lumped in with other similar or exactly-like things. It's more of an insult than anything.

Life according to van Gogh...sort of

There are two ways of thinking about painting, how not to do it and how to do it; how to do it -- with much drawing and little color; how not to do it -- with much color and little drawing. Vincent van Gogh in a l etter to Theo van Gogh, April 1882 Life is a little bit like today's quote from van Gogh. Some of us live life focusing on the drawing - the details - and have very little color. Others of us go for the color and forsake, to a degree, the drawing - the details. Unlike painting, according to van Gogh, one is not wrong over the other but somewhere in between the two would be the best I would think. If you look at some of van Gogh's paintings I feel like you can see where he might have struggled between the "how to do it" and the " how not to do it" (as he admittedly loved color so much but knew he had to focus more on the drawing) and that seems to be reflected in his life as well. In the end he wasn't able to find the ...

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