Saturday, 22 September 2012

hargeet singh brar_BLP057_Happiness_September 2012


All seasons are beautiful for the person who carries happiness within." – Horace Friess

 

Happiness is as a butterfly which, when pursued, is always beyond our grasp, but which if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you.Happiness is the art of never holding in your mind the memory of any unpleasant thing that has passed. We begin from the recognition that all beings cherish happiness and do not want suffering. Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life, the whole aim and end of human existence. The basic thing is that everyone wants happiness, no one wants suffering. And happiness mainly comes from our own attitude, rather than from external factors. If your own mental attitude is correct, even if you remain in a hostile atmosphere, you feel happy. Men spend their lives in anticipations, in determining to be vastly happy at some period when they have time. But the present time has one advantage over every other – it is our own. Past opportunities are gone, future have not come. We may lay in a stock of pleasures, as we would lay in a stock of wine; but if we defer the tasting of them too long, we shall find that both are soured by age. Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking. Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be. People spend a lifetime searching for happiness; looking for peace. They chase idle dreams, addictions, religions, even other people, hoping to fill the emptiness that plagues them. The irony is the only place they ever needed to search was within Philosophers, scientists, and comedians have taught us a lot about happiness.  Maybe one of the most important lessons they’ve taught us is to look inward for happiness.  Sometimes it’s right in front of you and you just have to grab it.   They’ve also taught us that our thought patterns can limit or enable our happiness.  They’ve  taught us that happiness isn’t static.   They’ve taught us that happiness isn’t about things.  In fact, sometimes it’s about doing … doing what we love.

I think the key themes boil down to how we talk to ourselves, how we respond to things, how we make meaning, who we spend time with, and how we make the most of what we’ve got.   The other key thing is that happiness is dynamic and it’s not a static state.  It’s about living, learning and growing, and rolling with the punches.  I also think it’s important to think of happiness as a skill.  Drive from happiness.  For durable happiness, lead your happiness from the inside out.  Most importantly – enjoy the process. Happiness cannot be traveled to, owned, earned, worn or consumed. Happiness is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace and gratitude.Happiness, it seems to me, consists of two things: first, in being where you belong, and second -and best -in comfortably going through everyday life, that is, having had a good night’s sleep and not being hurt by new shoes. There is a wonderful mythical law of nature that the three things we crave most in life — happiness, freedom, and peace of mind — are always attained by giving them to someone else. When we feel love and kindness toward others, it not only makes others feel loved and cared for, but it helps us also to develop inner happiness and peace. I guess there is neither happiness nor misery in the world; there is only the comparison of one state to another, nothing more. He who has felt the deepest grief is best able to experience supreme happiness. We must have felt what it is to die, that we may appreciate the enjoyments of life.

Even a happy life cannot be without a measure of darkness, and the word happy would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness. We humans are social beings. We come into the world as the result of others’ actions. We survive here in dependence on others. Whether we like it or not, there is hardly a moment of our lives when we do not benefit from others’ activities. For this reason it is hardly surprising that most of our happiness arises in the context of our relationships with others. Being happy is something you have to learn. I often surprise myself by saying "Wow, this is it. I guess I'm happy. I got a home I love. A career  that I love. I'm even feeling more and more at peace with myself." If there's something else to happiness, let me know. I'm ambitious for that, too. The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts: therefore, guard accordingly, and take care that you entertain no notions unsuitable to virtue and reasonable nature. Happiness is a journey, not a destination; happiness is to be found along the way not at the end of the road, for then the journey is over and it's too late. The time for happiness is today not tomorrow. We always have enough to be happy if we are enjoying what we do have--and not worrying about what we don't have. It is neither wealth nor splendor, but tranquillity and occupation, which give happiness. The happiest people seem to be those who have no particular reason for being so except that they are so.

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