Quote of the day by C.S. Lewis: 'Don't let your happiness depend on something you may lose'

Quote of the Day for Sunday is ready for readers as "Chronicles of Narnia" creator C.S. Lewis once wrote "Don't let your happiness depend on something you may lose". The iconic quote underlines the essential necessity of life - happiness.

However, the author has exhorted people not to expect too much happiness from mundane things such as possessions, wealth, fame, jobs. C.S. Lewis hinted that such things can be temporary and if someone's joy depends upon these factors then happiness may become a rare factor.

That line from C. S. Lewis gets at something pretty timeless: if your happiness is tied too tightly to things that can disappear—status, possessions, even certain relationships—you’re setting yourself up for instability. It doesn’t mean those things don’t matter. They do. But Lewis is pointing toward a deeper kind of grounding—values, character, faith (in his context), or inner resilience—things that aren’t as easily shaken.


It’s less about detaching from life, and more about not handing over control of your well-being to things you can’t keep forever.

C.S. Lewis was honoured with a memorial stone in Poets' Corner at Westminster Abbey in central London. Lewis died at the age of 64. He was buried in Oxford.

Lewis is best known for his Narnia children's fantasy series about the adventures of a group of children who stumble across a magical world where they encounter the talking lion Aslan and the evil White Witch among others.

The most famous was "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" published in 1950, and the seven-book series as a whole has sold over 100 million copies and been adapted for radio, television, stage and film. Lewis's other works include "The Screwtape Letters", and Westminster Abbey described his "Mere Christianity" as "a classic of Christian apologetics, seeking to explain the fundamental Christian teachings to a general audience."

Lewis was born in Belfast in 1898 and won a scholarship to study at Oxford University in 1916. In 1917 he was commissioned as an officer and fought on the frontline during World War One where he was wounded in 1918.

Lewis returned to Oxford where he taught English and was a close friend of "The Lord of the Rings" author J.R.R. Tolkien. He married late in life and his relationship with American Joy Gresham was captured in Richard Attenborough's award-winning film "Shadowlands". Lewis died on the same day that U.S. President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas.