Happiness is the Cause of Success Not the Other Way Around

Success is discovery of divinity, continued expansion of happiness, realization of important goals, peace of mind, living a miraculous life and enjoying material wealth. Most people think that when they become successful that’s when they’ll be happy. But you must, first, become happy that’s when you’ll succeed.

Happiness is so important that the United Nations in 2012 recognized it as a primary development factor and created the World Happiness Index that ranks countries by how happy their citizens perceive themselves to be. This index is calculated on a scale of 0 to 10, where 0 indicates the worst and 10 the best possible life. It uses per capita income, life expectancy, freedom to make choices, generosity and perceptions of corruption. Happiness is naturally connected to faith and love, and is the mightiest and most magnetic energy in the Universe capable of attracting any success to you.

For example, in 2019, the Algerian national football team beat the Senegalese football team to win the Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) in Egypt because it was happy about the new political changes that were taking place in the country. In fact, Algeria that was ranked number 68 with 1,346 total points beat a seemingly stronger Senegalese football team that was ranked number 22 with 1,515 total points and also Africa’s number one football team, according to the Federation International of Football Association (FIFA).

The first and last time Algeria had won AFCON was in 1990. During almost 30 years from 1990 to 2019, Algeria had gone through many different challenges. From 1991 to 1999 Algeria fought a civil war. After the civil war in 1999, President Abdelaziz Bouteflika came to power. In 2008, the Algerian constitution was amended to remove the two-term limit on the presidency. When President Bouteflika announced that he would seek a fifth term in 2019, after being in power for 20 years since 1999, street protests broke out which prompted him to postpone the election and resign. The resignation of President Bouteflika met some of the demands of the street protesters.

When the Algerian national football team went to Egypt for AFCON competition, the country was still experiencing positive changes for a brighter future. The Algerian football team was inspired to do its best for all Algerians. In an interview before the 2019 AFCON win, Djamel Belmadi, the Algerian national football team coach said, ‘The Algerian team came to Cairo to win the AFCON title.’ The team won because of the extraordinarily increased national positive mental attitude of happiness.

Similarly, Zambia won AFCON in 2012 mostly because of its extraordinarily increased national positive mental attitude of happiness to honor the fallen soccer heroes in an air crash in Gabon in 1993. Nineteen years later, Zambia was playing in Gabon for AFCON competition. After winning, Zambia’s coach Herve Renard in an interview said, ‘The Zambian soccer team had honored the legacy of the Gabon disaster by winning the Africa Cup. The only possibility for us, the fact that we could come here for the final gave us greater inner-strength. We had a stronger force.’ Zambia’s goalkeeper Kennedy Mweene concluded by saying, ‘We were like wild dogs; where there was a ball we were there.’ It was the extraordinarily increased positive mental attitude of happiness at home that mostly enabled the Zambian soccer team to beat a seemingly stronger Ivorian soccer team.

In the same way, following South Africa’s extraordinary and historic positive political events, its national positive mental attitude of happiness drastically increased to a new level since its beginning as a country. They included the release of its national hero Nelson Mandela in 1990 from his imprisonment of 27 years, ending of its racial discrimination of Apartheid in 1991 and achieving its independence in 1994. The late Anti-Apartheid Campaigner, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, colorfully and emotionally described his country’s national positive mental attitude of happiness on the day of its first ever democratic general election. He said, ‘We’re two, three inches taller than we were yesterday.’ He continued, ‘Oh! 1994, April 27! There will not be a day like that ever again. I mean, the sky was blue, with a blue that had never been there before. People were standing in line regardless of race. It was deeply a spiritual experience. It left me breathless!’ Most South Africans were extraordinarily happy and women were singing and dancing almost everywhere.

A year later in 1995, South Africa won its first Rugby World Cup and in the following year 1996 it also won its first AFCON. South Africa had been banned from participating in both international rugby and Olympic competitions for many years because of its racial discrimination of Apartheid. It was the high positive mental attitude of happiness at home that made South Africa’s win of AFCON possible.

Equally, in 1990, a newly re-united Germany won the FIFA soccer World Cup, under similar positive conditions of highly increased national positive mental attitude of happiness, brought about by the collapse in 1989 of the Berlin Wall also known as the Iron Curtain. The Berlin Wall, built by the Soviet Union now Russia, divided Germany into East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic, and West Germany for 28 years since 1961 and separated many families and thousands of people. It had electrified barbed wire fence, booby traps, land mines, strong security search lights, guards and dogs.

In 1987, US President Ronald Reagan went to West Berlin, Germany and made a historic speech at Brandenburg Gate to the people of West Berlin in which he called upon the leader of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev, to tear down the Berlin Wall. He said, ‘General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this Gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!’ Two years later in 1989, the Berlin Wall was torn down under Mr. Gorbachev’s policies of “Glasnost” (Openness) and “Perestroika” (Restructuring).

It was the extraordinarily increased national positive mental attitude of happiness that mostly made possible the winning for Algeria, Zambia, South Africa and Germany. When you’ve a positive mental attitude of happiness, you always see light at the end of every tunnel; but when you’ve a negative mental attitude, you always see a tunnel at the end of every light. Happiness is the cause of success while success is only a condition, effect or result of happiness!

Be happy, first, to succeed in your life.