It’s something I’m not particularly proud of doing 15 years after I started the Secret Society of Happy People, but sometimes I have parade-raining thoughts. Parade-raining is unnecessary negative communication. The truth is I’m pretty good about not verbalizing my parade-raining thoughts, so I usually don’t rain on anyone else’s parade. If for example, you announce that you’re going to change jobs and I wonder, “Why would you do that?” because in my mind it doesn’t make sense, I’m probably not going to share that first thought with you.

But sadly I’m culturally trained to jump to “why something won’t work or isn’t a good idea.” I do this in my own life, too. I rain on my parade more often than I like to admit. I’ll think, “I want to go to the mall and just walk around for no particular reason,” then I’ll immediately think,” I have too many other things to do than to waste time”, or “I’ll just spend money I shouldn’t on things I don’t need.” But the truth is sometimes I just need to enjoy being even if it’s at the mall.

But when we rain on our own parade we’re shutting down an intuitive voice that guides us towards living a happy life.  We are parade-raining on our own happiness. If we’re doing this to ourselves, then naturally we’re going to do it to other people, too. Our parade-raining habit is fostered by our “what’s wrong” culture.

I’m not saying we don’t need to weigh all of the possibilities in a situation, but that we need to give the possibilities that make us happy as much merit as we do the ones that don’t.

So what does this have to do with Happiness Happens Month? Well, Happiness Happens Month is when we get to spend 31 days focusing on redirecting our “why this won’t work” or “why we shouldn’t do it” thoughts to happiness and what’s right. It’s a month when we get to celebrate all of the things that bring us joy, contentment and even amusement. It’s a month when our goal is to spread happiness, to get others to notice the happiness in their lives, too.

The purpose of Happiness Happens Month is to remind us to keep developing that habit of happiness so we can be happier for the whole year.

A world full of happier people begins with you.

Have you signed up to be a Happiness Happens Month Ambassador? You’ll get access to a private area on our website with lots of celebration ideas and tools. And mark your calendar for August 8, that’s Happiness Happens Day and HappyThon2013 ~ 24 hours of social media to encourage the conversation about happiness.

Also, if you haven’t visited our home page in the past few days, check it out to see our new video about the purpose of the Secret Society of Happy People. If you’re inspired, consider telling your other not-so-secretly happy friends about us. And we finally made it to Wikipedia (just had to share the happy).

Do you have a parade-raining confession?  I’ll take a look at it when I get back from the mall.

Written by Pamela Gail

Pamela Gail Johnson founded the Society of Happy People in 1998.
The Society is grounded on Pamela’s four key Practical Happiness Principles:

• Happiness Zappers Can be Managed
• Happiness is Personal
• Happiness Changes as You Change
• Happiness is Bigger Than You Think

Pamela identified 31 Types of Happiness that are on the SOHP App Happiness Counter to make it easier to recognize moments of happiness.

Pamela also plans and organizes the Society of Happy People's annual happiness celebrations:

• Happiness Happens Day - August 8
• Happiness Happens Month - August
• Hunt for Happiness Week - January

She's also a speaker, trainer, and author.

A few of her personal smile starters include her monthly book club, yoga, traveling and meeting new happy people.