If we think back on our lives, our time spent here and there, our journey becomes a mental happy place, similar to the second we see the tiny white arrow appear on a YouTube video signaling to us that the button for commercial escape is clickable. Truly, most of us can testify how glorious this moment can be.

In this thinking, we are provided a form of happiness that reminds us of the people who did something so memorable in our life that we still remember the effect their action had on us.

Remembrances of our past experiences could appear in our reflective thoughts, too.

This glimpse into the past can be no longer than the time we spend sliding our thumbs across the unsanitary glass resting on our smartphones, yet it still affects us. It can be a split-second memory that happens and vanishes just as quickly, but still, those seconds have effects that outlast the time we spent in reflection.

We might think reflection only occurs by being next to an open window, hand clutched together in a fist under our chin, staring out at a beaming hot sun reflected on a rippling ocean. Since most of us are in college, work at college and are nowhere near this ocean, the substitute environment can be anywhere.

For instance,we can easily enter reflective thinking by zoning out in class – because who has not done that at least once – walking around Lakeland’s campus or in our cubicle-constricted workplaces.

Reflection can be a tool more useful than just pondering about our past. Maybe thinking back to someone, anyone, who stepped into or out of our story’s history could provide a satisfying sense of purpose within us.

The people that might come to mind first may not always be the people who had positive effects, but the people that have, they will be the ones that have lasting impressions every time we think or hear their name.

The purpose we might find in these reflections gives us hope, which stirs a happiness in us for the coming reflections not yet lived.  

By learning to take the time to reflect, by pausing instead of skipping ahead, we can build that happiness as we wish.