Goldie Hawn’s Take on Happiness

Don’t we all want to be a little like Goldie Hawn?

Now 70 years old, this baby boomer became famous with her role on the TV show, Laugh In. Hawn went on to play giddy, ditsy, and adorable blondes in movie roles, became a successful Academy-award winning actress, and seems to have a perpetual smile on her face.

I want to be more silly like Goldie Hawn!

Give me some of that light-hearted happiness. A recent profile described her as “the most deliriously contented person alive.” As Hawn puts it, “I am jubilant. I am silly. I am free.” 

Okay, I confess. I’m jealous of her bubbly and sunny personality. As I’ve admitted before in this blog, I’m way too serious most of the time. I feel like a Debbie Downer in comparison.

In an interview for People magazine earlier this year, Hawn says she remembers being asked at the age of 11 what she wanted to be when she grew up. “Happy,” she answered. “I knew what I really wanted – to live a happy life, as happy as I could,” Hawn adds.

Smart kid.

Although Hawn was born with a happy deposition, she readily admits there were bumps along the way. For example, when Hawn first became successful, she felt anxious and saw a psychologist. Hawn had lost her smile and says it took many years of analysis to get it back. “It wasn’t a quick fix,” she says. “I went through the river, the eddies, the rocks, to get to the other side.” Tough times also included almost losing her first son, Oliver, because of birth complications.

But she got to the other side. Hawn claims it’s not about the obstacle but how you get through it. One of her favorite sayings is: “We are born with the seed of joy; it is up to us to nurture it.”

Recently, Hawn has become a happiness guru of sorts. She wrote three books on mindfulness and developed a research-based training program that helps kids deal with stress and experience more joy.

“One of the reasons I looked into the state of happiness is because I felt this innate tickle inside of me, close to my heart,” she explains. “It’s how I described to Katie [her daughter, Kate Hudson] what God felt like when she was little, because it feels like this amazing sense of joy, just before you are going to laugh. It is the kind of feeling I have, and I don’t remember when I didn’t have it.”

Her advice to parents? The secret to raising happy children is to be happy.

“Children mirror who you are,” she says in an interview with ABC news. “If you’re happy, if you show them smiles, if you show them good attitude, if you show them kindness, understanding, fun. … They just replicate it.”

I guess that goes for us grandparents too.

Can you learn happiness? Yes, according to Goldie. Emotional intelligence: calmness, quietness, concentration, and consideration are key.

Do you agree or disagree? Please share in the comments below!

Need more ideas on how to be carefree like Goldie? Check out my most popular blog to date, Five Ways to Become a Happy-Go-Lucky Person.

Image courtesy of rakratchada torsap at FreeDigitalPhotos.net