Welcome to the 12th Humormeister's Forum edition

Starting off the New Year, there are a lot of exciting things happening on the website.

I have added a FREE e-book page. The book's title is "Kids say the doggonest things" The book shows the hilarious expressions, opinions and observations by our richest humor source - young children.

You can now take a survey on the website to find out whether you need 'more humor' in your life. Look for thew 'humor quiz page.'

A number of new topic pages have been added, as we keep on expanding.

Article of the month:

Remaining positive and holding on to happiness despite the difficult times we experience

Every minute of the day we are bombarded with bad news from radio, TV, newspapers, and the Internet. So even if we aren't negatively affected by the downturn in the economy, it is easy to become depressed.

If we are to elevate ourselves out of the negative results of the economy, we need to adopt a more optimistic perspective and a more positive outlook, so that we can conquer the economic difficulties we are facing.

If we only take our cues from the electronic and printed media, we can easily get sucked into a negative spiral with no hope, or positive expectations of the future.

We have to condition ourselves to stop listening to negative news. We have learn not to give in to the fears the media bombards us with. and give more credibility to ourselves that we can look forward to better days, and decide that we will do whatever it takes to achieve a positive outcome.

There is still a lot to be happy about, such as family, friends, the small things in life, which in many instances give us the most happiness.

I remember with the last economic downturn, many high paying positions were lost. Many of the highly paid individual who lost their jobs went on to lesser paid positions, or became self-employed. Ironically many of these people were known to say that although they earned a lot lees, they were much happier and did not have the stress they had before.

So what started out as a totally devastating experience resulted in happier and more satisfying endings. What people have to remember is that when one door closes another door opens up.

Happiness is not always what we currently have or enjoy, but perhaps is what we didn't dare to pursue before, because of fear of the unknown, or unwillingness to give up what we were currently sure of and could count upon.