10:15… the professor is droning on about a topic you have little to no interest in… 10:17, only two minutes have passed? You are thinking about where you will eat for lunch, you are daydreaming about the weekend, your mind could not be any further from the task at hand, and maybe, you are unhappy.

Recently, I was listening to an archive episode of TED Radio Hour from NPR titled “Simply Happy.” If you are unfamiliar with this podcast, each episode deals with a different topic through the integration of TED talks pertaining to the subject, and this particular episode dealt with, as you may have already guessed, happiness.

For years, humankind has been concerned with obtaining and holding onto happiness, and many great minds such as Aristotle believe happiness is the ultimate goal – our main purpose. Whether you agree with Aristotle or not, being happy is something to strive towards.

“Simply Happy” discusses some different ways we may be limiting ourselves from achieving happiness, and I realized one of these limitations is very prevalent in my own life and the lives of my peers.

We have all found ourselves willing time to move faster, searching the recesses of our mind for anything interesting enough to mentally remove ourselves from our current class, job, task, or errand; however, surprisingly, when your mind is elsewhere and not focused or engaged in a present activity, you are significantly less happy.

If you want to live a happier life, engage yourself with the world around you.

No doubt, some moments are easier to embrace than others. There are living winter sunsets that gracefully dip beneath the horizon and there are gray organic chemistry labs that go on for hours, but if we challenge ourselves to focus our attention on the present moment, whatever that moment may be, ultimately, we will be happier for it. So how do we keep our minds from wandering in the efforts to be happier?

Take pride in your work.

When you care deeply about your work, you are likely to be more attentive and focused.

Set goals.

Not all work will feel worth completing, but ask yourself how seemingly useless assignments may contribute to larger goals such as getting into graduate school or landing the job you want.

Be thankful.

Thank the sun for rising, thank your parents for the chance to pursue higher education, thank your roommate for not killing you after you hit snooze on your alarm fifty times in a row. Being thankful allows for you to recognize and focus on the little things that may go unnoticed when our minds are elsewhere.

There are many paths you can take on the journey to happiness, but simply grounding yourself in the present may be a shortcut to living a happier life. Reader, I challenge you to live in the moment because there is something truly beautiful in the ability to live in the here and now, to memorize the extraordinary details hiding in the present, to hear beneath the chaos or the nothingness and discover hearts beating in sync with our own, to be happy.