The secret to happiness?

This seems to be an ageless question explored by the greatest of minds and the humblest of souls.  It seems to be a question I've been asking all my life, to no avail.  It is only now I am starting to understand what it means to be happy.  I think the reason why this question is so hard to answer is because most people view happiness as something external to us. It's not something we can provide for ourselves, but instead something that needs to be possessed like a car or something.  "I will be happy when I land that 6-figure salary job; when I get my million dollar house; when I find my prince charming; when I win the lottery!"

But Marie Curie once said, "We must believe that we are all gifted for something, and this thing, at whatever cost, must be attained."  This "thing," whatever you want to call it, perhaps your destiny, perhaps your soul, perhaps your inner voice; it is the realization of this destiny or the fullest expression of this inner voice that one achieves true happiness in life.

Perhaps you don't know what is your destiny?  I certainly don't.  It's not so concrete or simple as "I want to have a million dollars."  Instead, I think that in all of us there is a inner voice waiting to be heard.  I certainly feel it in myself.  Recently, I just finished reading a deeply moving book, The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho.  The novel beautifully weaves a story of a young shepherd on a journey that takes him into distant lands where he discovers his destiny and the secret to happiness.  On the journey the boy learns that "change through love" is the means to find your destiny.  

"Change through love." When I read this verse it was as though a flash went off, as though everything I have been feeling coalesced and became so clear and obvious.  These few words reveal that when you do something out of love, you are listening to your heart and you come one step closer to your destiny, you come one step closer to finding true happiness.  "Change" is the personal growth that one undergoes.  Change through self-improvement, through personal growth, through your personal enlightenment driven by the love of the thing you are pursuing, is the act of fulfilling your destiny.  I repeat, "We must believe that we are all gifted for something, and this thing, at whatever cost, must be attained." This "gift" that is within all of us is only fully manifested when we pursue it through love.  Love is the only force powerful enough that will reveal the hidden potential within all of us.

People can be motivated by many things-fear, insecurity, anger, hatred, envy, revenge, even a sense of inferiority, and being motivated in this fashion may also help you attain your personal goals.  But I believe only driven through love can a person fully express that inner voice we all have within ourselves.  It's a voice that tells me when I haven't been true to myself; that I've made decisions for the wrong reasons; that I haven't been living up to my potential; that I'm allowing others to control my life because I'm too scared to be heard; that I've traded up something important within myself.  It's that gnawing restlessness you feel in your heart.  It happens when you know you're staying at a job because you're too scared to leave; when you sit at a conference table and choose to agree because you want to please your boss; when you befriend others because of what they own instead of who they are; when you drown your soul in mindless distractions such as TV, food, and pursuit of material goods.  For a short time during those mindless distractions you will experience a great high, perhaps like taking drugs, but then you'll crash and be left with an emptiness so devoid of life that it would suffocate you.  The suffocation would be so unbearable that it'll just drive you towards these distractions again, sinking yourself deeper into a dark abyss.   

We all have an inner voice, those who have the courage to listen will hear it loud and clear, but those who don't will only hear it softly.  They will hear it crying softly in the dark recesses of their hearts on silent nights when they have temporarily sobered, and be filled with a deep sense of regret.  But the next day as they fill their lives with the normal hustle and bustle of things "they have to do," that voice will disappear in the clamor of everything else.  But that gnawing feeling will always resurface again in your moments of sobriety.  But as you continue to ignore this voice, it would eventually grow so soft that you would barely notice it.

But we must always remember, that voice is there, we need only to have the courage and faith to listen to it.