We are all here for happiness. It’s the big one. “I have to be happy.” Can you feel the pressure associated with this need? It’s enough to make you unhappy.
Happiness is what everyone ultimately craves whether they realize it or not. The new sports car is happiness in the form of an object. The new relationship – another object. You might say, I want love from the new relationship, but if we peel back the layers of this – Why do you want love? Because love makes me feel happy. Almost every desire we have is ultimately rooted in the need to attain personal happiness.
And when we do seem to have it, it slips through our fingers far too easily. It is fragile. Built from a house of cards. Our happiness can collapse just like that. A late arriving bus, a subtle intonation in a friend’s comment, or misreading the tone of a text message. Anything and everything can unsettle this paper thin happiness which we work so hard to cultivate. And then here we are once again having to rebuild it. It doesn’t seem to get any easier either. Experience doesn’t make it appear any faster next time around.
In order to understand happiness it is helpful to investigate unhappiness and how we inflict it upon ourselves. Our unhappiness can mask and dilute any semblance of happiness we find so it is important to address our discontent first and foremost. Here is an overview of just a few ways we cause our own suffering.
When desire arises within us we outwardly project an expected version of how life should be for ourselves and whether we realize it or not, we adhere very strictly to this imagined reality our thoughts have created for us. And if reality does not conform to the expectations of our desire we immediately open ourselves up to unhappiness. “I have been waiting to see this movie for months. I am excited to see it. It should be great.” In this example, if the movie is anything but great then we have opened the door to unhappiness. And it’s entirely self-inflicted.
Now there is nothing wrong with having desires. They are what make life rich and varied. However, it is when we identify so strongly with our desires and attach to a particular outcome that we expose ourselves to unhappiness.
Another foundational reason that causes our own unhappiness is in the nature of where we seek happiness – namely the objects of experience. The issue arises because on some level we are seeking permanent happiness but we are looking for it in objects of impermanence and so there will always have to be a next thing to seek out. And in this way our pursuit of happiness is a never ending and ultimately unsatisfying search. We are seeking something that does not exist in the places we are looking for it. And here we are today, aged 30, 50, 70 – a life spent looking and still feeling like we don’t truly have it. It’s fleeting. It never lasts.
These are just a few ways in which we can start to look at our patterns of behavior that cause us discontent.
You can find lots of scientific backed resources for happiness online in searches such as, What are 5 things that make you happy? What are the 7 keys to happiness? And in doing so you will notice a recurring pattern of topics such as, showing daily gratitude and appreciation, spending quality time with friends, having more experiences, being present etc etc..
These are all wonderful activities to engage in but not as a means to have lasting contentment because as I expressed previously, all such activities are impermanent and so continuous effort needs to be put in to maintain the happiness in another form. It’s like you are a plate spinner forever trying to keep your happiness from falling.
What all this highlights is the tremendous effort we appear to have to apply in order to acquire and maintain our happiness. We constantly have to reinvent new ways of being happy. But it doesn’t have to be this way.
What is required is a different approach to happiness because if you have spent a lifetime searching for happiness and you currently find yourself reading this article then you are probably ready for a new approach to happiness.
At the core of my live course ‘Finding Happiness’, is the ability to create a foundation of peace. Peace is something we all want but don’t actively seek out. Love and happiness seem to be far juicier fruits. Societally we are encouraged to pursue love and happiness first and foremost. For example, there are an abundance of television shows which demonstrate the attainment of happiness and love but never peace.
However, peace is the unsung bedrock of happiness. Culturing a ground of peace lays the foundation for a different kind of happiness to arise. One which is not reliant on external influences and is not affected by them either – a happiness built on solid ground.
From this firm ground we are in a better place to reflect outwards into the world so that we come from a place of wanting to simply express ourselves joyfully and creatively so that you can enjoy life again rather than looking at the world as a resource from which I can harvest happiness. The latter is a contracted energy rooted in a sense of lack and fear of the unknown.
Imagine going into an experience without the pressure for it to make you happy? All the anxiety and tension associated with the expectation simply evaporates and you are left free to just express yourself outside of this insatiable need for experiences to feed your need for happiness.
If you are interested in learning more then click through to read about the course, ‘Finding Happiness’.