The Pursuit for Happiness
abracad, · Categories: self help, spiritualityA Guide to Happiness
Why are we born into this world of many problems, that also offers many potential pleasures? Is it merely to collect as many fleeting moments of happiness as we can amass during our equally fleeting lifetime? Or is there some deeper purpose we ought to be pursuing to make the most of our incarnate time? Looking across the varied spectrum of humankind the answers to these questions are many and varied.
Happiness Psychology
There are the few that adopt the monastic-type existence of withdrawal into a world of material abstinence and intense inner contemplation. Perhaps they give life to that unspoken guilt within many that the pursuit of happiness is somehow wrong, ie selfish, or obscuring some more profound reason for being. And there are the many that hedonistically live life as though it's all there is and thus should be milked to the full regardless of the cost to others. Of course, the majority exist somewhere between these two extremes.
The Art of Happiness is the first inspirational book for a general audience by the Dalai Lama. Through meditations, stories, and the meeting of Buddhism and psychology, the Dalai Lama shows us how to defeat day-to-day depression, anxiety, anger, jealousy, or just an ordinary bad mood. He discusses relationships, health, family, and work to show us how to ride through life's obstacles on a deep and abiding source of inner peace.
One thing's for sure, you were born into this world in order to live. Though withdrawal from the world may be the chosen path of the few, it is not a path to be undertaken lightly. It is certainly not a path for those who happen to feel they've been dealt a bad hand from which they's rather escape. Rather, it's a path for those who feel they've experienced all the world has to offer in this life or those that went before. It's a positive choice of new experience.
Assuming retreat is not for you, to what extent is the pursuit of happiness appropriate? Some religious interpretations view the state of being happy as somewhat sinful, as though it's synonymous with neglecting one's earthly duty. This is nonsense. Happiness is our birthright, but not its totality.
How to Achieve Happiness
Many people act as though happiness is a state that is aspired to, and when reached can last forever. But there is no place of lasting happiness. Instead we can experience moments of happiness and pleasure, regardless of our status, but these must always be relinquished. For as well as being born to pursue pleasure, we were also (mainly) born to experience the many ways of the world. It's as though the happy moments are the reward for completing the lessons.
What is it that we are all looking for? A continuous state of happiness with no taint whatsoever of sorrow. The reason this is our goal is because imperturbable happiness is our very basic nature! And what is imperturbable happiness? Complete and total freedom, and that is freedom to do or not to do anything and everything. This is the real natural state, before, we encumber it with limitations.
Life is like an obstacle course, there is no shortage of things to test/teach us. But there's also no shortage of things to bring us joy. Sure, we have to negotiate the difficulties when they arise, but too often we focus only on the negative, neglecting the vast amount of positives that surround us every moment.
The key to happiness is finding your purpose and going for it for all you're worth. It's no wonder so many get frustrated from just drifting aimlessly along with no sense of reason. Just knowing that you're progressing towards your reason(s) for being is a great feeling. Actually, whether you get there or not is somewhat academic, since the fulfillment is usually an anticlimax compared to the journey.
Don't try too hard. Happiness is an elusive beast in that the more you actively seek it the less it's likely to appear. Instead live your life to the full. Value, and make the best of, each moment. If you can do this, happiness will inevitably follow.
Wealth and Happiness
Happiness, studies show, is not the result of good genes or luck. It can be cultivated by identifying and nurturing traits that we already possess - including kindness, originality, humor, optimism, and generosity. Seligman provides the tools you need in order to ascertain your most positive traits or strengths. Then he explains how you will not only develop natural buffers against misfortune and negative emotion, but also achieve new and sustainable levels of authentic contentment, gratification, and meaning.
Happiness is free. It doesn't come from "things." Things may bring a very shallow and short-lived happiness, but it is an illusion. We imagine that having the next best "thing" will somehow complete our happiness, and so it might seem for a very little while, until we start to desire the next best thing... Find happiness in the little things, the satisfaction of a job well done, being in the beauty of nature, spending time with loves ones...
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Filed in: self help, spirituality
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