Happiness is… an inside job!
Happiness is… the pursuit of just about everyone. We believe if a person can achieve happiness in their life then that is a life well lived. We want it. We deserve it. We dream of it. If I ask you “do want to be happy?” I expect you to answer a resounding “yes”. Who doesn’t want happiness? But what is this thing that you say you want. Have you defined it for yourself…or is it someone else’s notion of happiness that you have signed up to without realising…or have you bought into the idea that happiness is an illusion….fleeting…for others but not for you? Do you harbour a blind faith that if you play the game of life then happiness will be gifted upon you?
General assumptions about happiness
-That happiness is….a smile…a summer’s day…the birth of a baby…a sunset. Some define happiness as experiences. The problem with this definition is that you have to wait for these occasions in life and sometimes they can take a while to happen. What a shame to only have happy moments once or twice a year. Happiness associated to events is very spasmodic.
-That happiness will be … when…I have a beautiful home …car…job…and a wonderful partner. For some the whole idea of happiness is conditional and somewhere out there in the future. Everything has to be just perfect for the arrival of the happiness god. These people slave all their lives only to find that all the material things they accumulated doesn’t bring the happiness they anticipated. More than that they cannot refer to happy times because they were too busy… getting…hoarding …acquiring stuff. Happiness attached to things leads to disappointment in the end.
-That happiness is because I am a good person…I deserve to be happy. This is the cause and effect approach to happiness. If you think you should be happy because you deserve it…you are in for a nasty shock. The shock is called life. You see life is neutral. It isn’t fair…who said it would be? It isn’t easy… but who said it would be. All the evidence tell us that life is hard…that life is suffering yet we think we can override this by being good. If we take this approach to happiness then we open a can of worms for ourselves. What happens when we are good but still not happy…then what? Does this mean that there is something wrong with us? We are not enough. Happiness measured on how deserving you are will eat up your self-esteem.
-That happiness is an emotion. Happiness is not an emotion…never has been… never will be. It is however, very closely linked to the emotions…when you are happy you feel great. When you feel great you release a strong cocktail of drugs such as endorphin, serotonin dopamine oxytocin and these drugs give you a natural high. We call this natural high ‘happy’ and we are addicted to it. The fundamental function of our emotions is to play a vital role in our survival. Your emotions are too busy making sure that you don’t kill yourselves…keeping you out of danger…helping you make decisions…motivating you to do stuff…helping you understand yourselves and the environment… to be bothered about whether you are happy or not. That’s your job!
Somehow emotions have been labelled ‘good guys’ and ‘bad guys’. The ones that make us sad are bad and the ones that make us happy are good. There is no such thing as a good emotion or a bad emotion. Every emotion does its job. The opposite of happiness is not sadness. Sadness is an emotion which is necessary to express grief. It is the systems way of healing and finally coming to terms with loss. It is our system’s way of missing someone who was dear to us. The sadness we feel is in direct proportion to the love we had for them. If we have loved and lost…or loved and miss someone who has passed… sadness is the price we pay to have loved…it is a necessary price.
The issue with emotions is that they are designed to come and go. They react to the environment. If our system senses danger no matter what it will react. If you attach your happiness to your emotions then you are in for a bumpy ride. All you need to do is miss the train and that’s it…your whole day is messed up.
The nature of happiness
Happiness is a state of mind. If you have been running around trying to find happiness in external stuff look no more.
What’s more happiness is your state of mind when it is natural. It is unnatural to believe that happiness can be anything other than you. Everything about you is designed for happiness. Defining happiness is like asking a fish to describe wet. It is difficult to describe because happiness within you is as natural as a fish in water.
Happiness cannot be taught, bought or sold. You choose it. You decide to wear the happy coat not the grumpy coat. You either live in a garden full of flowers or you live in the garden full of creepy crawlies. In the natural state of mind, happiness runs from being contented with what you have in this world… to out and out bliss. The natural state can only be broken if you do not maintain it. A happy state of mind is not mamby pamby. Happy people do not go around singing “cum by ya” all day long. Happy people are dedicated to being happy. They guard their happiness with a keen eye. They know that life has ups and downs and they decide to ride the waves with a positive mental attitude. They do not take life and its antics personally.
The opposite of happiness is misery and happy people chose not to live their live in misery.
Be happy
Everything that we experience in life we have capacity for. We have capacity to feel hunger. We do not say I need to find my hunger. Or I deserve to eat. Nobody argues with this basic human need. You may look at a cake and desire it. But where do you feel the hunger pangs? In your gut. Right! There too lies your happiness. Hunger is a basic physiological need happiness is a need of the soul. It is essential.
If you say “I’m happy” then you are happy. In my favourite film Beetlejuice. In order to conjure up the ghost Beetlejuice they had to say his name 3 times. Beetlejuice… Beetlejuice… Beetlejuice! Well you don’t have to say I’m happy 3 time you only have to say it once. If you say it once then you are it. You are happy. If you put up conditions then they will serve as barriers and it will not come. If you put a timer on happiness it will not show up. If you say that a job or a person or a place or a food or a shampoo can make you happy… it will only come for a while. The happiness state of mind can be turned on my self-recognition. So to spell it out: In order to be happy you have to recognise that you are happy. How you recognise you are happy is by counting your blessings and showing gratitude. How you show gratitude is by being kind and generous to others. When you are kind to others it will make them happy. And this is confirmation of your own happiness. Because you cannot give something to others that you do not already have!
20 years experience….Consultant and Trainer to large companies including Microsoft and Intel…Subscribe and every 7 – 10 days you will receives… career coaching… life skills and professional advise…from me…Bev
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Mind Synergy
Engineer In Heels
