Life is all about the pursuit of happiness, so we have put together a list of all the best short happy quotes for positivity and good vibes for you to share. And if you’re looking for very short happy quotes for Instagram to spread the joy we also have you covered.
Now go ahead and browse through to find your favorite.
Short Happy Quotes
“Be happy for this moment. This moment is your life.” – Omar Khayyam
“Life is too short, or too long, for me to allow myself the luxury of living it so badly.” – Paulo Coelho
“Life is too short to live on low-fat everything.” – Kristin Scott Thomas
“If you are too busy to laugh, you are too busy.” – Proverb
“To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people just exist.” – Oscar Wilde
“Happiness is the art of never holding in your mind the memory of any unpleasant thing that has passed.”
“Happiness consists of living each day as if it were the first day of your honeymoon and the last day of your vacation.” – Leo Tolstoy
“It’s been my experience that you can nearly always enjoy things if you make up your mind firmly that you will.” – L.M. Montgomery
“The reason people find it so hard to be happy is that they always see the past better than it was, the present worse than it is, and the future less resolved than it will be.” – Marcel Pagnol
“The only thing that will make you happy is being happy with who you are.” – Goldie Hawn
“Follow your bliss and don’t be afraid, and doors will open where you didn’t know they were going to be.” – Joseph Campbell
“Just because it didn’t last forever, doesn’t mean it wasn’t worth your while.”
“To be kind to all, to like many and love a few, to be needed and wanted by those we love, is certainly the nearest we can come to happiness.” – Mary Stuart
“Gratitude is a vaccine, an antitoxin, and an antiseptic.” – John Henry Jowett
“Learn to let go. That is the key to happiness.” – Buddha
“Success is getting what you want, happiness is wanting what you get” – W. P. Kinsella
“A table, a chair, a bowl of fruit and a violin; what else does a man need to be happy?” – Albert Einstein
“Happy he who learns to bear what he cannot change.” – Friedrich Schiller
“It’s the moments that I stopped just to be, rather than do, that have given me true happiness.” – Richard Branson
“Happiness is not doing fun things. Happiness is doing meaningful things.” – Maxime Lagacé
“The grass is always greener where you water it.”
“Most people would rather be certain they’re miserable, than risk being happy.” – Dr. Robert Anthony
“Happiness is a state of mind. It’s just according to the way you look at things.” – Walt Disney
“The greater part of our happiness or misery depends upon our dispositions, and not upon our circumstances.” – Martha Washington
“Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking.” – Marcus Aurelius Antoninus
“Children are happy because they don’t have a file in their minds called “All the Things That Could Go Wrong.” – Marianne Williamson
“Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be.” – Abraham Lincoln
“For many men, the acquisition of wealth does not end their troubles, it only changes them.” – Seneca
Enjoy small moments as they come. At the end, that’s what makes life worthwhile.” – Nadun Lokuliyanage
“Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile, but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy.” – Thich Nhat Hanh
“Enjoy your own life without comparing it with that of another.” – Marquis de Condorcet
“Roll with the punches and enjoy every minute of it.” – Meghan Markle
“Don’t waste your time in anger, regrets, worries, and grudges. Life is too short to be unhappy.” – Roy T. Bennett
“There is more to life than increasing its speed.” – Mahatma Gandhi
“Life is 10 percent what happens to you and 90 percent how you respond to it.” – Lou Holtz
“Do not set aside your happiness. Do not wait to be happy in the future. The best time to be happy is always now.” – Roy T. Bennett
“Half our life is spent trying to find something to do with the time we have rushed through life trying to save.” – Will Rogers
“You cannot prevent the birds of sadness from passing over your head, but you can prevent their making a nest in your hair.” – Chinese proverb
“Happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family in another city.” – George Burns
“No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.” – Aesop
“Don’t underestimate the value of Doing Nothing, of just going along, listening to all the things you can’t hear, and not bothering.” – Winnie the Pooh
“The truly wise and happy are never rushed.” – Maxime Lagacé
“The foolish man seeks happiness in the distance, the wise grows it under his feet.” – James Oppenheim
“We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.” – George Bernard Shaw
“The best way to cheer yourself is to try to cheer someone else up.” – Mark Twain
“Learn to value yourself, which means: fight for your happiness.” – Ayn Rand
“It was only a sunny smile, and little it cost in the giving, but like morning light it scattered the night and made the day worth living.” – F. Scott Fitzgerald
“Enjoy life while you can. It can be taken in a heartbeat.” – Jasmin Morin
“Life is short, and it is up to you to make it sweet.” – Sarah Louise Delany
“Happiness is not a goal…it’s a by-product of a life well-lived.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
“Let’s not allow ourselves to be upset by small things we should despise and forget. Remember ‘Life is too short to be little.” – Dale Carnegie
“Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.” – Mahatma Gandhi
“If you want happiness for an hour — take a nap. If you want happiness for a day — go fishing. If you want happiness for a year — inherit a fortune. If you want happiness for a lifetime — help someone else.” – Chinese Proverb
“Happiness held is the seed; Happiness shared is the flower.” – John Harrigan
“Enjoy every moment you have. Because in life, there are no rewinds, only flashbacks.” – Anmol Andore
“Embrace your uniqueness. Time is much too short to be living someone else’s life.” – Kobi Yamada
“All happiness depends on courage and work.” – Honoré de Balzac
“I may be a living legend, but that sure don’t help when I’ve got to change a flat tire.” – Roy Orbison
“Happiness is a gift and the trick is not to expect it, but to delight in it when it comes.” – Charles Dickens
“Happiness makes up in height for what it lacks in length.” – Robert Frost
“If you want to be happy, be.” – Leo Tolstoy
“Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.” – Anaïs Nin
“Life is short and you’ve got to get the most out of it.” – Gwen Stefani
“It’s a helluva start, being able to recognize what makes you happy.” – Lucille Ball
“Be happy. It really annoys negative people.” – Ricky Gervais
“Happiness consists more in small conveniences or pleasures that occur every day, than in great pieces of good fortune that happen but seldom to a man in the course of his life.” – Benjamin Franklin
“Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature…. Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.” – Helen Keller
“Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.” – Buddha
“Perhaps they are not stars, but rather openings in heaven where the love of our lost ones pours through and shines down upon us to let us know they are happy.” – Eskimo Proverb
“Optimism is a happiness magnet. If you stay positive, good things and good people will be drawn to you.” – Mary Lou Retton
“People don’t notice whether it’s winter or summer when they’re happy.” – Anton Chekhov
“That man is richest whose pleasures are cheapest.” – Henry David Thoreau
“Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.” – Dr. Seuss
“Wine is constant proof that God loves us and loves to see us happy.” – Benjamin Franklin
“The pleasure which we most rarely experience gives us greatest delight.” – Epictetus
“Simplicity makes me happy.” – Alicia Keys
“Our time in this life is limited. And how we respect that time will create a greater possibility for fulfilment.” – Ruben Papian
“Being happy doesn’t mean everything is perfect. It means you’ve decided to look beyond the imperfections.”
“Happiness depends upon ourselves.” – Aristotle
“Happiness is something that comes into our lives through doors we don’t even remember leaving open.” – Rose Lane
“The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts.” – Marcus Aurelius
“Love is that condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own.” – Robert A. Heinlein
“The most important thing is to enjoy your life—to be happy—it’s all that matters.” – Audrey Hepburn
“If you want something, don’t wish for it. Life is too short to wait.” – Stephen Hines
“For every minute you are angry you lose sixty seconds of happiness.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Nobody can be uncheered with a balloon” – Winnie the Pooh
“Since you get more joy out of giving joy to others, you should put a good deal of thought into the happiness that you are able to give.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
“It is more fitting for a man to laugh at life than to lament over it.” – Seneca
“Life is like a roller coaster, live it, be happy, enjoy life.” – Avril Lavigne
“The only joy in the world is to begin.” – Cesare Pavese
“Happiness does not lead to gratitude. Gratitude leads to happiness.” – David Steindl-Rast
“Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful.” – Herman Cain
“Tension is who you think you should be, relaxation is who you are.” – Chinese proverb
“To be happy, we must not be too concerned with others.” – Albert Camus
“The moments of happiness we enjoy take us by surprise. It is not that we seize them, but that they seize us.” – Ashley Montagu
“There shall be eternal summer in the grateful heart.” – Celia Thaxter
“If thou wilt make a man happy, add not unto his riches but take away from his desires.” – Epicurus
“One of the keys to happiness is a bad memory.” – Rita Mae Brown
“Everyone wants to live on top of the mountain, but all the happiness and growth occurs while you’re climbing it.” – Andy Rooney
“They say a person needs just three things to be truly happy in this world: Someone to love, something to do, and something to hope for.” – Tom Bodett
“I don’t want to get to the end of my life and find that I lived just the length of it. I want to have lived the width of it as well.” – Diane Ackerman
“The happiest people in the world are those who feel absolutely terrific about themselves, and this is the natural outgrowth of accepting total responsibility for every part of their life.” – Brian Tracy
“If you want to be happy, set a goal that commands your thoughts, liberates your energy, and inspires your hopes.” – Andrew Carnegie
“What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others.” – Confucius
“There is no passion to be found playing small – in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living.” – Nelson Mandela
“The mere sense of living is joy enough.” – Emily Dickinson
“Happy people plan actions, they don’t plan results.” – Dennis Waitley
“Happiness is nothing more than good health and a bad memory.” – Albert Schweitzer
“And remember, no matter where you go, there you are.” – Confucius
“A calm and modest life brings more happiness than the pursuit of success combined with constant restlessness.” – Albert Einstein
“Life would be tragic if it weren’t funny.” – Stephen Hawking
“Happiness is a warm puppy.” – Charles M. Schulz
“Happiness is a state of activity.” – Aristotle
“Don’t take life too seriously. You’ll never get out of it alive.” – Elbert Hubbard
“Trouble knocked at the door, but, hearing laughter, hurried away.” – Benjamin Franklin
“There is only one happiness in this life, to love and be loved.” – George Sand
“Happiness is not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort.” – Franklin D. Roosevelt
“Independence is happiness.” – Susan B. Anthony
“Think of all the beauty still left around you and be happy.” – Anne Frank
“Remember, today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday.” – Dale Carnegie
“Let us be grateful to the people who make us happy; they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.” – Marcel Proust
“It isn’t what you have, or who you are, or where you are, or what you are doing that makes you happy or unhappy. It is what you think about.” – Dale Carnegie
“When one door of happiness closes, another opens, but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one that has been opened for us.” – Helen Keller
“Every man has his secret sorrows which the world knows not; and often times we call a man cold when he is only sad.” – Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
“Now and then it’s good to pause in our pursuit of happiness and just be happy.” – Guillaume Apollinaire
“Happiness is a how; not a what. A talent, not an object.” – Herman Hesse
“Happiness always looks small while you hold it in your hands, but let it go, and you learn at once how big and precious it is.” – Maxim Gorky
“Happiness [is] only real when shared” – Jon Krakauer
“If you have good thoughts, they will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely.” – Roald Dahl
“The secret of happiness is not in doing what one likes, but in liking what one does.” – James M. Barrie
“I’d far rather be happy than right any day.” – Douglas Adams
“Time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.” – Marthe Troly-Curtin
“Worry never robs tomorrow of its sorrow. It only saps today of its joy.” – Leo Buscaglia
“Every day is a new day, and you’ll never be able to find happiness if you don’t move on.” – Carrie Underwood
“On a deeper level you are already complete. When you realize that, there is a playful, joyous energy behind what you do.” – Eckhart Tolle
“Plenty of people miss their share of happiness, not because they never found it, but because they didn’t stop to enjoy it.” – William Feather
“Action may not always bring happiness; but there is no happiness without action.” – Benjamin Disraeli
“We become what we think about.” – Earl Nightingale
“If you spend your whole life waiting for the storm, you’ll never enjoy the sunshine.” – Morris West
“There’s nothing like deep breaths after laughing that hard. Nothing in the world like a sore stomach for the right reasons.” – Stephen Chbosky
“I’m always jacked up. I’m pumped up. It’s just, I love life and I’m having fun.” – Terry McAuliffe
“Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.” – Ernest Hemingway
“To be stupid, selfish, and have good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, all is lost.” – Gustave Flaubert
“Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go.” – Oscar Wilde
“No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
“Happiness is not something ready-made. It comes from your own actions.” – Dalai Lama
“Happiness is acceptance.”
“If you think sunshine brings you happiness, then you haven’t danced in the rain.”
“The first recipe for happiness is: avoid too lengthy meditation on the past.” – Andre Maurois
“Our envy always lasts longer than the happiness of those we envy.” – Heraclitus
“The power of finding beauty in the humblest things makes home happy and life lovely.” – Louisa May Alcott
“Life will bring you pain all by itself. Your responsibility is to create joy.” – Milton Erickson
“Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.” – Confucius
“Don’t rely on someone else for your happiness and self-worth. Only you can be responsible for that.” – Stacey Charter
“Tomorrow is promised to no one. Prioritize today accordingly.” – Gina Greenlee
“The grand essentials to happiness in this life are something to do, something to love, and something to hope for.” – George Washington Burnap
“The constant happiness is curiosity.” – Alice Munro
So that is it for our list of Short Happy Quotes. We hope you found the perfect one for you!
For more great ideas, check out our other lists of Short Besties Quotes, Love Quotes for Him, Short Cute Quotes and Happy Anniversary Captions.
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About the Author
Laynni Deir
I am Laynni Deir, writer and editor of Purely Lists. There are times when you are looking for inspiration or aren’t sure what to say and I am committed to providing lists of the best quotes, sayings, messages, puns or captions for any occasion. Whether you are looking for a positive quote, a message for a card, a fun saying for a letter board or caption for your next post or story, you will find the perfect option here.
The goal of Purely Lists is to provide a comprehensive and diverse set of lists to cover every situation from holidays and celebrations to uplifting quotes and general motivation. Whether you are looking for something deep and profound, funny and foolish or positive and encouraging, we strive to offer easy, fast and accessible options.