A real education will not teach you to compete; it will teach you to cooperate. It will not teach you to fight and come first. It will teach you to be creative, to be loving, to be blissful, without comparing yourself to others. It will not teach you that you can be happy only when you are the first—that is sheer nonsense. You can’t be happy just by being first, and in trying to be first you go through such misery that by the time you become the first you are habituated to misery.

By the time you become the president or the prime minister of a country you have gone through such misery that now misery is your second nature. You don’t know now any other way to exist; you remain miserable. Tension has become ingrained; anxiety has become your way of life. You don’t know any other way; this is your very lifestyle. So even though you have become the first, you remain cautious, anxious, afraid. It does not change your inner quality at all.

A real education will not teach you to be the first. It will tell you to enjoy whatever you are doing, not for the result, but for the act itself. Just like a painter or a dancer or a musician…

There’s no virtue in competition

You can paint in two ways. You can paint to compete with other painters; you want to be the greatest painter in the world, you want to be a Picasso or a Van Gogh. Then your painting will be second-rate, because your mind is not interested in painting itself; it is interested in being the first, the greatest painter in the world. You are not going deep into the art of painting. You are not enjoying it, you are only using it as a stepping-stone.

You are on an ego trip, and the problem is that to really be a painter, you have to drop the ego completely. To really be a painter, the ego has to be put aside. Only then can existence flow through you. Only then can your hands and your fingers and your brush be used as vehicles. Only then can something of superb beauty be born.

Real beauty is never created by you but only through you. Existence flows; you become only a passage. You allow it to happen, that’s all; you don’t hinder it.

But if you are too interested in the result, the ultimate result—that you have to become famous, that you have to be the best painter in the world, that you have to defeat all other painters hitherto—then your interest is not in painting; painting is secondary. And of course, with a secondary interest in painting you can’t paint something original; it will be ordinary.

Ego cannot bring anything extraordinary into the world; the extraordinary comes only through egolessness. And so is the case with the musician and the dancer. So is the case with everybody.

Let go and be in the flow

In the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna says: Don’t think of the result at all. It is a message of tremendous beauty and significance and truth. Don’t think of the result at all. Just do what you are doing with your totality. Get lost in it, lose the doer in the doing. Don’t “be”– let your creative energies flow unhindered. That’s why he said to Arjuna: “Don’t escape from the war… because I can see this escape is just an ego trip. The way you are talking simply shows that you are calculating, you are thinking that by escaping from the war you will become a great saint. Rather than surrendering to the whole, you are taking yourself too seriously– as if there will be no war if you are not there.”

Krishna says to Arjuna, “Just be in a state of let-go. Say to existence, ‘Use me in whatever way you want to use me. I am available, unconditionally available.’ Then whatsoever happens through you will have a great authenticity about it. It will have intensity, it will have depth. It will have the impact of the eternal on it.”

Jesus says: Remember, those who are first in this world will be the last in the kingdom of God, and those who are the last will be the first. He has given you the fundamental law– he has given you the inexhaustible, eternal law: Stop trying to be the first. But remember one thing, which is very much possible, because the mind is so cunning it can distort every truth. You can start trying to be the last– but then you miss the whole point. Then another competition starts: “I have to be the last”– and if somebody else says, “I am the last,” then the struggle, the conflict, begins again.

I have heard a Sufi parable:

A great emperor, Nadirshah, was praying. It was early morning; the sun had not yet risen, it was still dark. Nadirshah was about to start the conquest of a new country, and of course he was praying to God for his blessings, to be victorious. He was saying to God, “I am nobody. I am just a servant– a servant of your servants. Bless me. I am going on your behalf, this is your victory. But I am a nobody, remember. I am just a servant of your servants.”

A priest was also by his side, helping him in prayer, functioning as a mediator between him and God. And then suddenly they heard another voice in the darkness. A beggar of the town was also praying, and he was saying to God, “I am nobody, a servant of your servants.”

The king said, “Look at this beggar! He is a beggar and saying to God that he is nobody! Stop this nonsense! Who are you to say your are nobody? I am nobody, and nobody else can claim this. I am the servant of God’s servants– who are you to say that you are the servant of his servants?”

Now you see? The competition is still there, the same competition, the same stupidity. Nothing has changed. The same calculation: “I have to be the last. Nobody else can be allowed to be the last.” The mind can go on playing such games on you if you are not very understanding, if you are not very intelligent.

To be competitive is ugly, violent

Never try to be happy at the expense of another man’s happiness. That is ugly, inhuman. That is violence in the true sense. If you think you become a saint by condemning others as sinners, your saintliness is nothing but a new ego trip. If you think you are holy because you are trying to prove others unholy… That’s what your holy people are doing. They go on bragging about their holiness, saintliness. Go to your so-called saints and look into their eyes. They have such condemnation for you! They are saying that you are all bound for hell; they go on condemning everybody. Listen to their sermons; all their sermons are condemnatory.

And of course you listen silently to their condemnations because you know that you have made many mistakes in your life, errors in your life. And they have condemned everything– so it is impossible to feel that you can be good. You love food, you are a sinner. You don’t get up early in the morning, you are a sinner; you don’t go to bed early in the evening, you are a sinner. They have arranged everything in such a way that it is very difficult not to be a sinner.

Yes, they are not sinners. They go early to bed and they get up early in the morning… in fact, they have nothing else to do! They never commit any mistakes because they never do anything. They are just sitting there almost dead. But if you do something, of course, how can you be holy? Hence for centuries the holy man has been renouncing the world and escaping from the world, because to be in the world and be holy seems to be impossible.

My whole approach is that unless you are in the world, your holiness is of no value at all. Be in the world and be holy! We have to define holiness in a totally different way. Don’t live at the expense of others’ pleasures– that is holiness. Don’t destroy others’ happiness, help others to be happy– that is holiness. Create the climate in which everybody can have a little joy.

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Let me share one such experience with you. I was travelling to Mumbai during the monsoons. All along the way it was beautiful. The flowers had blossomed with the touch of rain and the rocks were covered with myriad colours of green. In between the rocks and the niches, the rain water cascaded and tumbled, forming small streams and miniature waterfalls all along the road. The rain had washed away all the thick layers of dust, which summer had inflicted on the trees and rocks. The rains have this magical quality of transforming the landscape of India: it gives a fresh coat of green all around, and somehow makes everything look absolutely enchanting. Mother Nature’s ways are indeed mysterious and captivating!

If you have ever taken the old highway from Pune to Mumbai during the monsoon, you would have seen hundreds of people soaking wet in the rain, as they take in the freshness and the life-giving quality of the pure rain water. Seeing the splendour of the monsoon, I thought to myself, “This rain, our life-giving south-west monsoon, falls only during four months of the year. But there is the rain of grace, which falls continuously on us, all our lives, sweeping away the accumulated dust and dirt of a dead past. Alas, why do we not get drenched in this shower of abiding grace?”

We, in India, are very particular about our morning bath; for many devout souls, it is almost a ritual. We clean our physical bodies, but, we rarely cleanse our inner self.

The rains have this magical quality of transforming the landscape of India: it gives a fresh coat of green all around

Three kinds of rain

Gurudev Sadhu Vaswani often used to tell us that there are three kinds of rain. The first one is the pure waters of the satsang. These Divine waters flow through the sacred words of saints and from the scriptures. They flow from the positive circle of the continuous incantation of prayers and mantras. These words cleanse your interior, and give you an integration of mind, heart and soul. These words purify you even as the holy waters of the Ganga cleanse you from within. The waters of the satsang are indeed a source of great purification.

The very word satsang, means fellowship of truth and truth, as we know, is a hard taskmaster. Truth is ever vigilant and, like a sentinel, stands brandishing its iron weapon, preventing any unauthorised entry into its domain. For inside the domain of truth, there is only truth, there is One Name and One Love. Once you enter this domain you cannot come out. Satsang of the true type permits you to glimpse this realm; it enriches, empowers and beautifies the inner self.

The second type of rain is the experience of the interior world. You can contact this source of grace through meditation and silent communion with the Divine.

The third type of rain is experienced through selfless service. We all need to have the experience of selfless service. This is like a shower of blessing and joy that invigorates our very spirits. We should spare at least a part of our expenses to be spent in the service of the poor. The waters of selfless service have a magical effect on the body, mind and spirit. They wash away the ego, the cobwebs of the mind and the lower emotions of the heart. Selfless service washes our inner instrument or antahkarana, and leaves us with a lasting feeling of joy that no personal extravagance can ever match. Selfless service should be undertaken with a feeling of devotion. It is an offering to God.

The waters of selfless service have a magical effect on the body, mind and spirit

A word of caution to workaholics

It is true that all work is worship of God; and we should put maximum effort into whatever we wish to achieve. But, work should not be killing! It should not drain your spirit or kill you with the slow poison of stress, anxiety and fear.

My dear ones, do not become workaholics, create time for your own self. For, ultimately you have to live for your own self. Allot time for silent meditation, for your soul needs meditation. Have you ever wondered what is the noblest thing on the earth? Let me answer, in the words of my Gurudev, “The noblest work is to cultivate the soul.” In order to cultivate the soul, we should sow the seeds of love, selfless service and devotion.

We should set apart time for silent communion with God, and offer the service of love to those who are less fortunate than we are. We will then experience divinity in our everyday life.

Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa often gave the example of a goldsmith. A goldsmith burnishes the gold in the fire, he bellows the air and moulds the gold into a beautiful shape. This is a tremendous effort, after which he relaxes with his hookah, inhaling the aroma of tobacco. Like the goldsmith, we too should put in our best efforts and then relax in silence, inhaling and exhaling the Name Divine. The Name Divine can be of Rama, Krishna, Shiva, Jesus, Buddha or anyone who to us is symbolic of the Truth.

In order to cultivate the soul, we should sow the seeds of love, selfless service and devotion

Bliss is your birthright

Keep your heart pure, the heart is the seat of the Lord. Decorate the interiors of your heart with love, longing and devotion. Let your heart be pure and divine. This will happen only when you sublimate your senses, creating a pure and a loving place for the Lord to reside. Once the senses are sublimated, the Divine Energy, the positive life force will flow in.

This Divine Energy is there within each one of us, but it is barricaded, blocked, suppressed by the lower emotions. Hence, we are unable to feel, to experience the beauty of the Divine Energy. Take the first step on this inner journey, discover your ‘self’, and the miraculous wonders of the interior world. Experience the bliss that is there within you, and belongs to you as your birthright. This journey will ultimately lead you out of the cycle of birth and death.

Adapted with permission from How to overcome depression By J P Vaswani

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I like to think of My Ego as a misery factory—a fairly large one with several misery machines, which run quietly and have great capacity to produce misery and insanity. Its products are the psychological equivalent of intoxicants like alcohol and drugs. Under their influence, I lose all perspective. The products include judgement, righteousness, comparison, entitlement, anxiety, self-pity, envy, fear [psychological, not instinctive], hatred, possessiveness, anger, guilt, resentment, inferiority complex, revenge and many more.

The misery factory works 24/7 and its raw material is the collective unconsciousness of all humanity, which is free and available in ample quantity. Its power supply is imagination. The factory has received funding from a society that promotes the idea of separation, conflict and one-upmanship. No wonder nearly all fellow humans also have their own ego factories.

My Ego is that part of my self that is completely identified with the ideas of separation from others

Annihilation ahead?

The chief consumer of the products of My Ego is the conditioned mind, which has been led to believe that these products are needed for its survival. But I know that this is a lie. Far from being necessary, these products are highly toxic and act like slow poison that will ultimately annihilate its owner and the entire human species.

Sometimes I wonder if complete lockout is the only solution. Perhaps management buyout is a better idea—that way I can take control of the factory and change its core products. What if I found a way to convert the machines into producing bliss instead of misery? What if they start manufacturing life-enhancing substances—tolerance, forgiveness, courage, peace, understanding, respect, freedom, happiness and love?

An important breakthrough

I figure that one way to make the machines stop making misery and start making bliss is to replace the basic raw material—use consciousness in place of unconsciousness. The trouble is that consciousness is in short supply, its only source being a high degree of presence. I have been experimenting with this for a while and though my research is far from over I am happy to report that I have had an important breakthrough. I have found that I can successfully cut off the factory’s power supply using a phenomenon called meditation.

What if I found a way to convert the machines into producing bliss instead of misery?

This is how it works: While meditating, my overactive imagination stops and My Ego comes to a grinding halt. But this phase doesn’t last and as soon as my imagination returns, the factory starts again and the insanity returns. Still, this has been a useful discovery, because it allows me time and space to cultivate the art of presence which, in turn, helps me produce the raw material of consciousness required for bliss in ample quantities.

The more I meditate, the easier it gets to stay present, yielding more and more consciousness, until one day meditation won’t be required—I will be simply present. The misery machines will then finally become transformed into bliss machines and My Ego will be transmuted into My Ecstasy, a factory I wouldn’t mind owning!

This was first published in the April 2015 issue of Complete Wellbeing.

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So always look at what happens when you do something: if you become peaceful or restful, it is right. This is the criterion; nothing else is the criterion. What is right for you may not be right for somebody else; remember that too. Because what is easy for you may not be easy for somebody else; something else may be easy for him. So there can be no universal law about it. Every individual has to work it out for himself.

Two Reasons Why We Choose Unhappiness

This is one of the most complex human problems. It has to be considered very deeply, and it is not theoretical—it concerns you. This is how everybody is behaving—always choosing the wrong way, always choosing to be sad, depressed, miserable. There must be profound reasons for it, and there are.

1. Being miserable feeds the ego

First, the way human beings are brought up plays a very definite role. If you are unhappy, you gain something from it. If you are happy, you always lose. From the very beginning, an alert child senses this distinction.

Whenever he is unhappy, everybody is sympathetic toward him. Everybody tries to be loving toward him. And even more than that, whenever he is unhappy, everybody is attentive toward him, he gains attention. Attention works like food for the ego, a very alcoholic stimulant. It gives you energy; you feel you are somebody. Hence so much need, so much desire to get attention.

If everybody is looking at you, you become important. If nobody is looking at you, you feel as if you are not there, you are a non-being.

The ego exists in relationship. The more people pay attention to you, the more you gain ego. If nobody looks at you, the ego dissolves. If everybody has completely forgotten you, how can the ego exist? Hence the need for societies, associations, clubs. All over the world clubs exist—Rotary, Lions, Masonic Lodges—millions of clubs and societies. These societies and clubs exist only to give attention to people who cannot get attention in other ways.

From the very beginning a child learns the politics: look miserable, then you get sympathy, then everybody is attentive. Look ill—you become important. An ill child becomes dictatorial; the whole family has to follow him—whatever he says is the rule. When he is happy, nobody listens to him. When he is healthy, nobody cares about him. From the very beginning we start choosing the miserable, the sad, the pessimistic, the darker side of life. That’s one reality.

2. Happiness attracts jealousy

A second thing related to it is: whenever you are happy, whenever you are joyful, whenever you feel ecstatic and blissful, everybody is jealous of you. Jealousy means that everybody is antagonistic, nobody is friendly; at that moment, everybody is an enemy.

So you have learned not to be so ecstatic that everybody becomes inimical toward you—not to show your bliss, not to laugh.

Look at people when they laugh. They laugh very calculatingly. It is not a belly-laugh, it is not coming from the very depth of their being. They first look at you, then they judge… and then they laugh. And they laugh to a particular extent, the extent you will tolerate, the extent where nobody will become jealous.

Even our smiles are political. Laughter has disappeared, bliss has become absolutely unknown, and to be ecstatic is almost impossible because it is not allowed. If you are miserable, nobody will think you are mad. If you are ecstatic and dancing, everybody will think you are mad. Dance is rejected, singing is not accepted. A blissful man—we think something has gone wrong if we see one.

Misery Is Accepted as Normal; Bliss Is Viewed as Nonsense

What type of society is this? If someone is miserable, everything is okay; he fits because the whole society is miserable, more or less. He is a member, he belongs to us: If somebody becomes ecstatic, we think he has gone berserk, insane. He doesn’t belong to us—and we feel jealous.

Because of jealousy, we condemn him and we try in every way to put him back to his old state. We call that old state normality. Psychoanalysts will help, psychiatrists will help to bring that man to the normal misery.

Society cannot allow ecstasy. Ecstasy is the greatest revolution. If people become ecstatic, the whole society will have to change, because this society is based on misery.

Signs That You Are Choosing Misery

If people are blissful, you cannot lead them to war—to Vietnam, or to Egypt, or to Israel. No. Someone who is blissful will just laugh and say: This is nonsense!

If people are blissful, you cannot make them obsessed with money. They will not waste their whole lives just accumulating money. It will look like madness to them that a person is destroying his whole life, just exchanging his life for dead money. And the money will be there when he is dead. This is absolute madness! But this madness can not be seen unless you are ecstatic.

If people are ecstatic, then the whole pattern of this society will have to change. This society exists on misery. Misery is a great investment for this society. So we bring up children…  from the very beginning, we create a leaning toward misery. That’s why they always choose misery.

In the morning, everybody has a choice. And not only in the morning, every moment there is a choice to be miserable or to be happy. You always choose to be miserable because there is an investment. Because that has become a habit, a pattern; you have always done that. You have become efficient at doing it; it has become a track. The moment your mind has to choose, it immediately flows toward misery.

Misery seems to be downhill; ecstasy seems to be uphill. Ecstasy looks very difficult to reach—but it is not so. The real thing is quite the opposite: Nobody wants to be miserable and everybody IS miserable.

Education, culture, parents, teachers-they have done a great job. They have made miserable creatures out of ecstatic creators. Every child is born ecstatic. Every child is born a god. And every man dies a madman.

This is your whole work-how to regain childhood, how to reclaim it. If you can become a child again, then there is no misery. I don’t mean that for a child there are no moments of misery-there are. But still there is no misery. Try to understand this.

A child can become miserable, intensely unhappy in a moment, but he is so total in that unhappiness, he is so one with that unhappiness, that there is no division. The child separate from unhappiness does not exist. The child is unhappiness—he is so involved in it. And when you become one with unhappiness If you become so one with it, even that has a beauty of its own.

So look at a child—an unspoilt child, I mean. If he is angry, then his whole energy becomes anger; nothing is reserved. He has moved and become anger; there is nobody manipulating and controlling the anger. There is no mind. And then see the beauty, the flowering of anger.

The child never looks ugly—even in anger he looks beautiful. He just looks more intense, more vital, more alive-a volcano ready to erupt. Such a small child, such a great energy, such an atomic being-with the whole universe to explode.

And after this anger the child will be silent. After this anger the child will be very peaceful. After this anger the child will relax. We may think it is very miserable to be in that anger, but the child is not miserable—he has enjoyed it.

If you become one with anything you become blissful. If you separate yourself from anything, even if it is happiness, you will become miserable.

So this is the key. To be separate as an ego is the base of all misery; to be one, to be flowing, with whatever life brings to you, to be in it so intensely, so totally, that you are no more, you are lost, then everything is blissful.

Misery or Happiness—The Choice Is Yours

The choice is there, but you have even become unaware of the choice. You simply choose it automatically. There is no choice left.

Become alert. Each moment when you are choosing to be miserable remember: this is your choice. Even this mindfulness will help, the alertness that this is my choice and I am responsible, and this is what I am doing to myself. Immediately you will feel a difference. The quality of mind will have changed. It will be easier for you to move towards happiness.

And once you know that this is your choice, then the whole thing has become a game. Then if you love to be miserable, be miserable, but remember that this is your choice and don’t complain. There is nobody else responsible. This is your drama. If you like it this way, if you like the miserable way, if you want to pass through life in misery, then this is your choice. You are playing it. Play it well!

Don’t go and ask people how not to be miserable. That is absurd. Don’t go and ask masters and gurus how to be happy. The so-called gurus exist because you are foolish. You create the misery, and then you go and ask others how to uncreate it. And you will go on creating misery because you are not alert to what you are doing. From this very moment try, try to be happy and blissful.

Excerpted from Body Mind Balancing, Courtesy: OSHO International Foundation

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Leaders of countries, including Prime Minister Modi and President Mukherjee, are no doubt motivated by all four because their careers afford them all four of those motivators. But that doesn’t happen to many people.

Perhaps you go to work every morning just so that you earn enough money to make a good living for yourself and your family. Maybe the security of your job helps you relax, so you can enjoy other things in your life. If your career gives you power or fame, perhaps money isn’t your greatest motivator.

I have learned over the years that I am not motivated by any of those four. Instead, I believe with all my heart that I have been motivated completely by the search for happiness. I want to be happy in this life. If what I do for a living did not make me happy, I’d choose another career even if it paid less than the one I have. And the one I have as a writer and a speaker doesn’t pay that much, believe me, but it makes me happy.

I’m one of the happiest people I know

Over the years I have travelled, read, played, loved and experienced life to the best of my ability. I’m your average woman who lives life simply, one day at a time, just like most people. Like most ordinary people, I know a little bit about a lot of things, but not a whole lot about any one thing. I’m not a gorgeous beauty, nor do I spend hours every day trying to be. I don’t obsess about exercise or food. I do my best, but I don’t waste time beating myself up if I gain a few pounds or eat too many sweets.

I have a good husband, relatives and friends who love me. I have a small, stress-free condo that’s paid for, and the sun, beaches, swimming pools and a good bicycle to keep me healthy and happy.

I believe with all my heart that I have been motivated completely by the search for happiness. I want to be happy in this life

Honestly, I’m one of the happiest people I know. I do not believe for one nanosecond that money or wealth makes anyone happy. Even though I don’t have a lot of money, I’ve lived an interesting, fulfilling, relatively stress-free life with more adventures than most of my friends who have lots more money than I have. Happiness is a goal I have achieved for most of my life.

It helps that I’m a frugal soul who still looks for restaurant coupons in the paper, buys many of my clothes at consignment shops, and enjoys the thrill of a good bargain. But the main ingredients of happiness have nothing to do with being frugal or for that matter with money at all.

It cannot be found outside

My years of experiences have taught me that nothing that is outside of ourselves makes us happy. Nothing. Not good health, free time, luxuries, being in control of others or being successful in business or finance. Happiness comes from within. It’s a state of mind, an attitude.

How do I know this? Because I’ve met people who are very happy and yet they struggle from pay cheque to pay cheque. I’ve met people who are happy and yet they’re in poor health or physically challenged in ways we cannot even comprehend. I’ve met people who have more money than they could spend in a lifetime and yet they are not happy. Being successful can only make you happy as long as the happiness comes from doing something with your life that has something to do with the talents you were given at birth. If it’s money that drives you, chances are you are not truly, intrinsically happy.

My years of experiences have taught me that nothing that is outside of ourselves makes us happy

Many times when people become executives who are in control of many people, their lives simply become so stressful and busy that they barely have time to tie their shoes, let alone step back and actually enjoy their wealth, power or business success. The pressure to keep the status quo is so great that they can’t leave work for one minute, even when they’re trying to relax at home with their families. Their cell phones, computers, iPads and other electronic gadgetry make sure that their minds are never more than a click away from running things.

It’s never in the future

Another thing I’ve learned about happiness is that it doesn’t matter what’s ahead for us in this great scheme of things. What matters is whether or not we’re happy today. Right now. Are you? I am. I really, truly am.

I was raised in a happy two-parent family with hard-working parents who instilled good moral values in my life. I graduated from college, married, divorced, lived in five different states and raised four children with very little income. Thanks to inexpensive friend passes on airlines where some friends worked, I’ve seen much of the world and had amazing adventures. However, it wasn’t the adventures that made me happy. It was [and is] having the freedom and the determination to never say no to an opportunity that makes me happy. The strength to be adventurous and happy comes from being bold, taking chances.

It doesn’t matter what’s ahead for us in this great scheme of things. What matters is whether or not we’re happy today

For some, the ability to be happy is clouded by worry, stress, despair, fear or not being able to forgive or ask for forgiveness. Whenever any of those things hang over my head like a huge black umbrella, I fix it. I talk to friends, get counselling, pray, write about my feelings, sort things out logistically, then often I take a vacation to make sure I’m not running on empty… even if it’s just an afternoon walk along the beach. I know I have to get rid of the negative things in my life if my goal is to be a happy person.

It’s my job alone

Along the way I discovered that the only person who can make me happy is me. It’s not fair to blame someone else if I’m unhappy because it’s not their job. The job of making me happy is mine alone.

Over the years I’ve asked many people what, according to them, were the five ingredients to happiness and invariably they blurt out “lots of money” or “a bigger retirement fund.” Or they name things money can buy: “A bigger house”, “an expensive automobile”, “a trip around the world”, “a yacht”, “real diamonds”, “a maid” and so on. Or they say something too difficult to accomplish like, “World peace, perfect health or a cure for all diseases.”

Once at a holiday party that a big company was sponsoring, the attendees were in a festive free-for-all mood. During an after-dinner speech I was giving, I asked the audience, “What makes you happy?” A woman raised her hand, giggled, then shouted, “Great sex and good chocolate!” We all had a big laugh; then I reminded her that both are temporary and being intrinsically happy is a much bigger, longer-lasting feeling.

Another older woman at a church group said good health had to be one of the most important ingredients to real happiness. I reminded her that we all know people who don’t have good health or are physically challenged in some way and yet are quite happy with their lives.

You may be asking, “What happens when life throws me a curve? What happens when a loved one gets cancer? Or teenagers are brutally slaughtered by one of their own? Or a family member gets involved in drugs? Or a marriage fails? How do you find happiness as a refugee in a country where tens of thousands of people are pushed out of their homes by enemy soldiers? How can people be happy when they’ve lost their homes because of the raging fury of devastating tornadoes, hurricanes, floods or earthquakes?”

It’s not fair to blame someone else if I’m unhappy because it’s not their job. The job of making me happy is mine alone

The five ingredients for happiness

How do you find happiness when life throws a curve? The same way you find happiness on a normal day when the sun is shining and the boss is happy and your spouse not only did the laundry last night but gave you a tender hug before you left in the morning. You depend on the five ingredients for happiness: someone to love, something to do, something to hope for, something to believe in and laughter. You simply grab on to them with even more grit and determination. When you’re caught in the midst of a gully-washing nightmare in life is when you really need someone to love more than any other time. When the chips are down is when you need something to do to begin to repair and rebuild. When life seems its bleakest is when we must have something to hope for on a grand scale. Something to believe in makes it possible to go on. And laughter makes the journey worthwhile and fun.

I believe that if we have the five ingredients, our lives will naturally be happy. The best thing is that all five are easily attainable. All five start from deep within ourselves and grow and flourish until our happiness quotient bubbles up and out and becomes contagious. Before you know it, not only are you happy but you’re helping to make others happy as well. What a concept!

1. Someone to love

I believe it. I live it. After all, what good am I if I don’t walk the talk? The fact is simple. I’m happy and I know why. Anybody can be happy if you have someone to love. That’s the first ingredient to happiness. Someone to love. Notice I didn’t say someone to love me. Or someone to love you. No, I said someone to love. It’s the act of loving someone else that makes us happy.

Personally, I’m blessed with so many people to love that it’s no wonder that I am conscious of being happy every day of my life. I love my amazing father and step mom. They head the list because they’re the oldest and deserve the most respect. Dad [95] and Bev [90] have been married since 1982 [my mother died in 1979].

I love my four incredible children—Jeanne, Julia, Michael and Andrew. I think the fact that I dragged them through two marriages and two divorces makes me love them all the more because they survived and they are all incredible, smart, interesting and talented humans. I am very proud and happy to have them in my life. Three have spouses, one is in a relationship, and they all have children. They’ve given me nine incredible grandchildren to love.

I have one brother and one sister, a sister-in-law and a brother-in-law. Three nieces, one nephew, dozens of cousins and only one aunt still alive out of 12 aunts and uncles. It’s a good family, scattered all over the country, but when we get together we enjoy each other and every minute of our time together. And like I said, I am totally aware every day of my life how much I love this family of mine.

The interesting part of loving someone else is that it usually produces a boomerang effect. The love we give out is almost always returned back to us. But it isn’t about being loved in return. It’s about simply loving someone, nourishing that love. Give anyone—a spouse, child, parent, other relative, friend, neighbour, co-worker or teacher—your time, energy and devotion and bam! Happiness becomes a part of your life. It’s the act of loving someone else that makes us happy.

Anybody can be happy if you have someone to love. That’s the first ingredient to happiness. Someone to love

2. Something to do

Will the person who doesn’t have something to do please stand up? We all have plenty to do, don’t we? Something to do is one of the five ingredients to happiness because we must have something worthwhile to fill up our days or our whole purpose for being on this earth is for nothing.

We need to be productive members of society, working to make things better in our world. Whether we have a career outside the home or we work at home taking care of our families, most of us have plenty to do, so it isn’t a problem. However, many older retired people actually don’t have enough to do and that’s when they need to get off the sofa, turn off the TV and volunteer their time to help others if they want this piece of the happiness puzzle.

Even when we plan a vacation where we can escape to an island and do nothing for days on end, we invariably get tired and bored with nothing to do. After a few days of sun, sand, sea, surf and little drinks with umbrellas in them, we sit up, dust off the sand and say, “Hey, let’s do something today! Let’s go exploring. Let’s go into town, go for a hike, try snorkelling, visit the local museum. I can’t stand to sit here another minute!”

The trick is finding the right things to do. It could be noble things, interesting things or helpful things. Volunteering, no matter how old you are, is absolutely one of the best things we can do with our lives. Isn’t the Golden Rule all about doing for others that which we would want them to do for us? Donate your time, talent and treasures so that others may have better lives. It’s something to do and will most definitely make you happy.

Volunteering, no matter how old you are, is absolutely one of the best things we can do with our lives

3. Something to hope for

The one thing that prevents us from becoming a world full of babbling psychotic, depressed, stressed-out individuals during this highly stressful 21st century is the third thing on my list of five ingredients for happiness: something to hope for. This one is imperative because without the hope that some things in our lives will change or be different or get better, then we simply have no reason to look to the future. Quite simply having a hope or a dream makes us happy.

Why do you think so many older people in homes for the elderly are so unhappy? They have no one to love, little to do and nothing to hope for. Many just sit around in wheelchairs waiting to die. Hope is such a splendid gift because it buoys us up in times of tragedy, bad health, lost jobs, death of a loved one, divorce, or any of life’s pitfalls.

Here’s an assignment. Write your dream or goal on a piece of paper… at least one thing you’d like to do, accomplish or experience before you die. Something that will make you happy once you do it. Place that paper on your refrigerator, on top of your computer, or on the bathroom mirror… any place where you’ll see it every day. And then get busy making that dream come true. You are the only person responsible to make your dreams or goals come true. Make sure your dream is something you can control. Winning the lottery doesn’t count.

When I speak to groups I often have the participants write down their dreams on paper that I collect. At least 90 per cent of all dreams that people have seem to fall into one of eight categories—get rich, retire, travel, lose weight, get more education, change careers, dreams for others [they want their kids or grandkids to be happy and successful, etc.] and what I refer to as the impossible dreams: world peace or a cure for all diseases.

Hope is such a splendid gift because it buoys us up in times of tragedy, lost jobs, illness, divorce, or any of life’s pitfalls

Years ago, I asked a group of my women friends to share their dreams or goals. Connie said she wanted to become an accomplished writer and make enough money to also be a philanthropist. Her first dream may take 20 years like it does most writers, and the second may be out of her control. Hopefully she’ll fine-tune her goal into something like selling one article to a magazine in the next six months. It’s important to keep our goals, hopes and dreams in bite-size chunks so we can actually make them happen.

Elaine said she’d like to work with wood and find her creative voice. Bravo! Now there’s a dream that’s doable. I hope she’s enrolled in a woodworking class at a community college by now.

Deborah’s dream was to integrate her smarts and experience and talent into a position where she can make a difference in the world. Sounds like she could use the help of a good career counsellor who can help find out where her strengths lie and what her options are.

Kitty wanted to visit Iceland, write about her travels and get her travelogues published. She went on the trip, kept a detailed journal and sold a few articles about her experiences.

Jean, who was in her mid-70s at the time, wanted to finish the eighth edition of a college textbook she wrote years ago and to keep her health in top shape by continuing her weight training and her three mile walks every day. Jean’s dreams and goals kept the younger ones in our group inspired to the max. Now in her 90s, Jean has finished even more editions to her college text and still exercises every day.

Karen, who worked as a home health nurse, said her goal was to become a more positive influence at work. She said her work environment had become riddled with rumours and back-biting gossip and she wanted to be a catalyst for helping change the attitude and camaraderie on the job. She said she was going to bring in a box to work where fellow employees could drop the funniest, most outrageous things that happened at work. Her dream was to replace stress with laughter on the job.

Whitney, in her early 20s, was working on her Ph.D. She said her goal was to facilitate a woman’s group like the one in my home that evening. She wanted to encourage and empower women. Right on!

What’s your dream? What is it you’re hoping for? Whether you’re 18 or 98, write it down and then get busy making it come true. Something to hope for is the most delightful of the five things we need to be happy because hope and dreams give our lives wings.

It’s important to keep our goals, hopes and dreams in bite-size chunks so we can actually make them happen

4. Something to believe in

Something to believe in is critical in this happiness puzzle because it takes care of all those things we simply can’t understand or explain. It’s a place to tuck away the scary parts of life and simply stop worrying. Having something to believe in is a gigantic comfort. Faith in your belief system is a gift. Some have the gift, some don’t. Something to believe in: faith, religion, spirituality, a being greater than ourselves, like happiness itself, must come from within.

The religions of the world provide us with deities: God, Mohammed, Buddha, Jesus, Confucius and many, many more. Hinduism has diverse beliefs and traditions but no single deity. Each religion has a history and ability to quell our spiritual fears and anxieties. If we want to be truly happy, we need to relax and let religion do its thing. In Christianity, there’s a saying, “Let go and let God.” In other words, go to God with your problems, fears, anxieties and then relax. Have faith that God, or whatever deity you believe in, will do for you what you can’t do for yourself.

It’s nobody’s responsibility to force feed faith into my veins and make me faith-filled just like it’s nobody’s responsibility to make me happy. I have the gift of faith. I appreciate the fact that I have that gift. I use it daily because my faith tells me that I can’t solve all of life’s problems. But I can turn them over to my God. Faith is a lovely gift. I don’t think it’s something I can create for others, but it is a gift that goes a long way in the pursuit of happiness.

5. Laughter

I’m a big fan of laughter. The gift of laughter is such an important ingredient for happiness that I’ve saved it for last. It’s the one ingredient that turns happiness into joy, into giggles, into slap-your-thigh outrageous wonderment and delight at life itself. Laughter is happiness turned vocal.

Laughter is in my key-ingredients-for-happiness list because it is a critical part of our physical and mental wellbeing. Joy from our inner souls spills out from our bodies as laughter. Laughter helps us physically by elevating our thymus cells that are used in defence against viruses and rejection of foreign tissues. Laughter releases endorphins, which also help build up the immune system that keeps us healthy by fighting off sickness, germs, viruses, infections and disease. Laughter massages our internal organs and increases oxygen to the blood by 10 times, thus raising our energy levels.

Laughter reduces our blood pressure. A minute of hearty laughter can produce a heart rate equal to that of 10 minutes of rowing on an exercise machine. Laughter benefits the respiratory tract, helping people at risk for pulmonary infection to clear their lungs of air containing carbon dioxide and water vapour and replace it with oxygen-rich air. Coughing produced by laughter can clear the trachea and bronchi of mucus. Laughter makes you breathe from a deeper place in the lungs. It relaxes the skeletal muscles in the arms and legs to improve circulation.

Laughter turns happiness into joy, into giggles, into slap-your-thigh outrageous wonderment and delight at life itself

Laughter also helps us mentally. It improves our moods, reduces depression, helps us sleep and it brings us into the present where there is love and hope, and away from the past where there may be sadness or regret. When laughter is a part of a conversation it helps you remember things you say and things you hear. Watching a funny movie can eliminate tension and anger and greatly ease depression.

Career counsellors and human resource professionals look for people with a good sense of humour and an ability to laugh because studies have shown that such people have better problem-solving skills and are usually more creative than people who don’t have a sense of humour.

You may be saying, “That’s easy for you to say, but I’m not funny.” You don’t have to be a natural born comedian to put laughter into your life. Share jokes you hear at work with your friends. Put a rubber chicken in your guest bed when you have houseguests. Wear a crazy hat to your next party. Play harmless practical jokes that will make the people you care about laugh with delight and then plot ways to return the laughter. Tell stories about the dumb or silly things you’ve done in your life. Hang out with funny people and let it rub off on you. Go to funny movies. And remember, you don’t stop laughing because you grow old; you grow old because you stop laughing.

So, be happy…because it’s easy

So, you can see that happiness in this world is not that difficult to find—you can make it happen. It just takes five simple things: someone to love, something to do, something to hope for, something to believe in and laughter. All of which you have.

The post 5 simple ingredients to make a perfect recipe for happiness appeared first on Complete Wellbeing.

Happiness, like so many things in life, is subjective. No two people will give the same response to this question: “How do you define happiness?”

We are all unique, and you will create your own meaning of happiness and of bliss. You may even rediscover and recreate your definitions of both throughout your life, perhaps even as you read this.

The multiplicity of happiness lies in the subtle experience of the word itself. On the one hand, the word conjures feelings of joy, visual images of gleeful smiles, or contented moments of idyllic bliss on a tropical beach. Whatever happiness feels like for you, it fills you up inside. Everyone wants to be happy.

On the other hand, striving to be happy sees most people trying to change everything and everyone around them, dictated by some deep-seated belief that it is an external experience. The oversight of happiness seekers is not realising that it is a state of being rather than an external experience. When people realise that they need to look within, and connect to themselves, happiness becomes a much more challenging concept and an even more challenging experience to find.

My role here is not to tell you what happiness is. My role is to help you rediscover it for yourself. However, just as I’m sure you have, I have experienced it in so many forms. Yet no matter the variation, the result was always the same for me: fleeting.

» Storybook happiness

We frequently compare ourselves and our lives to others. We strive to have the storybook-perfect life we perceive some others as having. Because they appear happy, we believe they are happy and make all kinds of wild assumptions as to the reasons for their happiness. We believe they must have found the key, that they must have all the right happiness ingredients. We want their “happily ever after”, so we seek to emulate what they have. Sadly, we believe that whatever they have is better than our own lives.

This stems from not truly accepting who you are. When you don’t love and cherish yourself, it is easy to compare yourself, often less than kindly, with someone else’s life. You may perceive others to be more beautiful or successful than you, to have more thoughtful partners than you, or to have nicer homes than you. Sometimes you may go a step further, comparing yourself to people you don’t even know, like the airbrushed gorgeous celebrity on the front of your favourite magazine or even fictional characters in television shows.

We judge all these people based on what we see—without any true insight into their lives. If what we see mirrors our perception of happiness, often we will go to extreme lengths to create our storybook happiness.

» Surprise happiness

Happiness has been defined as an emotional state characterised by feelings of enjoyment, pleasure, and satisfaction. Enjoyment, pleasure, and satisfaction … In my view, these are all the result of doing something—cause and effect, if you like. Depending on who we are with, what we are doing, and how we are feeling [the cause], we can dip in and out of the effect of happiness on a daily or even an hourly basis. It’s almost as if happiness is a surprise we are looking for and even trying to make happen, but we never quite know when it will appear.

We can all think of moments or events that have made us happy and put smiles on our faces. Perhaps for you, it came from receiving unexpected flowers from your husband, hearing a sincere and heartfelt thank you from a colleague, or even enjoying the simple pleasure of a sunny day. It might even be the way you feel when you buy something new or receive a gift. Perhaps you even base how loved you feel in a relationship on the number and size of loving gestures and gifts. Or you try to create surprise happiness for others by lavishing them with gifts rather than seeing that the best gift is your time and unconditional love.

The feelings of happiness associated with these things may last a while, but eventually the feelings fade and we wait for the next moment to be happy because of something or someone. It is no wonder that although we strive for more and more, we’re constantly left feeling unfulfilled.

» Surrogate happiness

Surrogate happiness comes in three forms: when you base your happiness on someone else’s expectations of how your life should be lived, when you put all your energy into making someone else happy because you believe that will make you happy, and when you expect someone else to make you happy through his behaviour and actions.

Happiness by expectation: Too many people are living lives that are not theirs to live. They live their lives according to what others think is best for them. Foremost, our parents shape us. Sometimes we are so desperate for their approval and love that we live our lives the way we believe they think we should. What our friends, colleagues, and even the media think is best for us also influences us. Sometimes we are so busy pleasing people that we give away ownership of our lives. We ignore our inner voices and let others’ opinions divert us from our paths. Now is the time to give up living your life according to other people’s expectations.

Happiness by sacrifice: For many of us, it is easier to give love than to receive love. Some people ignore their own needs, preferring to focus all their energy on making someone else happy.

Sometimes this is shaped by our upbringing. In my own life, I have been used to putting others before myself since an early age. The eldest of four children, I was a second mum to my youngest sister before I had reached the age of 10. She would choose to come to me with her problems, climb into my bed for reassurance if she had a nightmare, and confide her fears and dreams to me. I love my two sisters and my brother dearly, but being the responsible-before-my-time older sister shaped my belief that my role in life was to nurture others and put their needs before my own. That continued well into adulthood. I believed my role and my happiness stemmed from making others happy.

The truth is that you can’t make anyone else happy. Others are in charge of choosing to be happy all by themselves. Of course, we are here to love, nurture, and care for and share our lives with other people, but not to the point of sacrificing our own needs to meet theirs.

There is a lot of literature around about the benefits of doing good for others… and how doing so makes you feel happy. Indeed, a compassionate and generous heart is a wonderful gift. But the happiness that comes from doing good for others will only be fleeting unless you first bestow yourself with gentle compassion.

Happiness by delegation: You can no more make another person happy than that person can make you happy. True happiness comes from within. When you delegate your responsibility for your own happiness to someone else, you unfairly tip the scales in your life. You unwittingly create a situation where neither of you will be happy because of the expectation of being made to feel happy. Often we look to our partners in our relationships to make us happy, as if it is their job. Yet we become more and more miserable when they don’t live up to our expectations of making us happy, particularly if we believe that we are experts at doing it for them. Other people enrich our lives, they support us, they treasure us, and they love us. But happiness is your choice. No one can create it for you.

If you are searching for happiness in an external source or from another person, you hide your true self. You forget what makes you happy, what you want, what you need. Eventually, you no longer remember who you are, and soul sadness is inevitable.

you can no more make another person happy than that person can make you happy. True happiness comes from within

» Someday happiness

Someday happiness is having a happiness plan. It’s when we plan to be happy . . . someday, when all the stars in our lives come into alignment and create a cosmic burst of happiness. A happiness plan is believing that happiness is all about having the right ingredients in one’s life. Much like following the recipe for your favourite cake, when you have all the right ingredients, the oven turned to just the right temperature, the perfect baking time, and a beautiful platter to serve it on to someone special in your life, that’s when happiness will be created. Of course, this is all at such a deep subconscious level that we don’t really ever realise we even have a happiness plan. But most of us are putting off happiness, telling ourselves we’ll be happy when we are mortgage-free, happy when we lose five kilos, or happy when we take a well-deserved holiday. We’re putting off happiness today, tomorrow, and even next week or next year, until our storybook lives are perfect, rather than focusing on being happy now.

» Soul happiness

Can you remember the last time you were deeply, blissfully happy, when you were so happy that you felt you were beaming with joy… so happy that you felt lovingly content with yourself… so happy that you wanted to break into song… so happy that everywhere you looked, everything and everyone had a golden glow… so happy that you felt indescribably beyond happy? For a moment, hold that feeling of deep, blissful happiness in your heart. Imagine if you could feel that way for more than just a day, a week, or even a month or a year. Imagine if you could feel deep, blissful happiness all the time. When you do, that is what I call enduring bliss.

For me, enduring bliss is feelings of pure, unburdened joy. It is when you connect so strongly to your light and your happiness within that it becomes an infinite source of joy in your life. In some ways, enduring bliss is impossible to truly define. It is beyond happiness.

Happiness transforms from fleeting to enduring the moment you really embrace and love the brilliance of you. I believe that happiness and a life with purpose are intrinsically linked. I also believe there is a difference between happiness and enduring bliss. We often settle for fleeting happiness without realising that we have the power to move beyond happiness to enduring bliss. Enduring bliss is part of who we are. Enduring bliss comes from happiness of the soul rather than happiness of the mind.

Soul happiness is a trinity within; I believe we can’t truly be happy in a lifelong way unless we love ourselves, honour ourselves, and authentically live our soul purpose.

We are limiting happiness because we are limiting love. By loving yourself unconditionally, you give your true self a stage. When you love yourself, your spirit shines. You have purpose. You have peace of heart. You move from doing things you think you have to do to be happy, to finding joy and abundance in doing what you love. You change your vibration from one of seeking, striving, and pursuing to one of peaceful contentment.

Happiness of the soul is when we become love and when we become happiness. That is enduring bliss. Soul happiness transforms our daily experience of fleeting happiness into lifelong enduring bliss.

The happiness plan

Let’s explore in more depth the concepts of storybook and someday happiness; both of which are the stuff our happiness plans are made of.

In developed countries around the world, we have never had more ability to make our own decisions and discoveries. Right now we can be, do, and have more than at any other time throughout history. Fuelled by society, consumerism, and lavish access to material things, we push ourselves harder and harder to achieve our visions of perfect happiness. We strive for our storybook dream lives where we get to have and do everything our hearts desire. We tell ourselves that we’ll be happy, someday, when we “get there”.

But in the process of focusing on creating the wealth and success that we think will make us happy, we have lost sight of who we really are. The more we focus on creating happiness, the more we forget that happiness is already within us. The more disconnected we become from our true selves, the more unhappy and discontent we become. The search for happiness is causing us to feel empty, to feel as if there must be something more. We feel as though because we haven’t found it yet, we need to search higher and wider. The search becomes more intense as we focus on doing and having more and more. We begin questioning and searching for what we really want in life.

It’s curious how we can go from a time of knowing that we are perfect, whole, and complete to striving to create happiness—but only when we have all the right ingredients in our dream lives. Our subconscious beliefs, fleeting thoughts about things we want or need, and even our obsession with controlling every minute detail of our lives shape our happiness plans. Your beliefs behind storybook and someday happiness combine to create the ingredients in your happiness plan.

Your happiness plan may look a little like this:

• I’ll be happy when I get a pay rise at work . . . maybe this year.
• I’ll be happy when I finish my degree . . . three years.
• I’ll be happy when my partner proposes to me . . . who knows.
• I’ll be happy when I have a baby . . . in the five-year plan.
• I’ll be happy when my friends are more thoughtful . . . who knows.
• I’ll be happy when I live in my dream house . . . in the ten-year plan.
• I’ll be happy when I go on holiday . . . six months.
• I’ll be happy when the weather improves . . . who knows.
• I’ll be happy when my kids do well in school . . . who knows.
• I’ll be happy when . . .

We strive so hard to have all the right ingredients in our perfect, happy lives. Most of these ingredients won’t come to fruition today or tomorrow, some won’t for years, and many we have no control over. And we wonder why we can’t quite touch enduring bliss. We may create fleeting moments of feeling good, satisfied, or rewarded, even fleeting moments of happiness. But mostly these feelings always go away, leaving us feeling anxious about cramming as many things into our time as we can, focusing on the next thing we want to have or do or achieve. We feel confused, empty, and as if we’re still searching for something. What we are searching for is enduring bliss.

The guilt and fear of happiness

Some people choose to feel guilty about being happy! They are stifling their enduring bliss because they don’t want to appear too happy. I like to think that you can be so happy that when others look at you, they become happy too!

But it is difficult to be surrounded by people who may not be on quite the same vibe as us—people who may have an unhappiness habit and are constantly complaining about the many people, situations, and events that cause them to be unhappy, sad, and depressed. Happiness really is a choice. When they choose to see such things as triggers for unhappiness, they will be.

We stifle our happiness because we fear how it will make people feel. The best way you can show these people that no one can make you unhappy and nothing can make you miserable unless you let it, is to be the positive, happy you.

People have a fear of happiness. Consider how often we say or hear these types of things: “It’s too good to be true,” “It’ll never last,” and “I’m just waiting for something to go wrong.” We literally are creating a state of unhappiness for ourselves because we think we can’t possibly be that happy. It’s as if complete happiness has become so unattainable—in our own minds—that we are looking for reasons why we can’t have it or expecting it will be taken from us.

It’s as if happiness is a gift bestowed on us if we are really good . . . and which can be taken away just as quickly as it was given. Some people have an attitude of “If I expect the worst, then when it happens, I won’t be upset, because I knew it was going to happen anyway.” It’s no wonder we feel so miserable.

Then there are some who feel guilty about being happy because of larger global issues. There is so much poverty, suffering, and hurt in the world that it can affect us, if we let it. When there is world happiness, there will be a world full of peace, love, and abundance for all.

I believe that rediscovering your happiness within is vital for lifting the happiness vibration of the entire planet. I believe that world happiness starts with you. Feeling guilty about radiating your positive energy regardless of what is happening in your world serves no one, least of all you. The stronger and more radiant you are, and the more in tune you are with your true self, your true purpose, and happiness within, the more you can serve as a positive influence on the world.

Even happy people feel unhappy sometimes

The worst thing to be thinking right now is that unhappiness is a bad thing. Even happy people experience unhappiness sometimes, and it’s OK.

Just because you choose to make happiness your way of being doesn’t mean you won’t ever experience unhappiness. Everyone has low days, everyone faces challenges, and everyone experiences loss or trauma in some measure.

Unhappiness is sometimes an inevitable part of the school of life. When you connect to your light within and know that happiness dwells within you, you are better able to handle the times when your mind draws unhappiness to your attention. You are better able to see unhappiness for what it is, to understand where it has come from, and to move through it more easily.

It’s not about being happy all the time; it’s about being happy by choice.

Unhappiness causes the most discomfort when you try to resist it. If you take the role of observer and accept that everything that happens in your life happens to teach you, then you can transition more quickly back from your ego state of unhappiness to your soul state of happiness.

Rediscover you

The greatest lesson and purpose in your life is rediscovering you, recognising that you are the single defining factor in your own happiness, allowing yourself to give and receive love and to simply be.

If we are born pure, in touch with our true selves, our souls’ essences, and our happiness within, then it is the layers of life, wrapped around us over time, moulded by experiences, and shaped by beliefs, that create our feelings of emptiness, of searching, of feeling as if there must be something more. In essence, we are trying to remember what we already know, what is already a part of us. We are trying to remember where we put the key to the place where we have safely hidden our precious jewel of happiness. Really, we spend most of our lives trying to remember where we hid ourselves.

By now, you may be able to see some patterns or occasions where you are preventing your own happiness, usually not by choice but by virtue of years and years of conditioning about what you have to do to create a happy life. In effect, without realising it, you are sabotaging your own efforts at happiness.

If you feel as if your ego is ruling your life and choosing unhappiness over happiness with monotonous regularity, it’s time to start recognising when, why, and how this is happening.

It’s about now that you may be thinking, This sounds lovely, but it all seems too hard and unattainable, and I’ve got too much going on right now. I’ll come back to this when I have time.

So pause and consider that now is your time.

Give yourself permission to be completely open, uncensored, and deeply honest with yourself, for it will change your life. There are times to let things happen, and there are times to make things happen. Choose to make your life beautiful now.

The post The path to lasting happiness, through self-love appeared first on Complete Wellbeing.

Those who are both aware of and comfortable with their sexuality enjoy better interpersonal relations—whether with partner, friend or colleague—as they have a better perception of the influence they are capable of exerting on people around.

Spiritual bliss that follows a heightened state of awareness induces a feeling of being beyond it all. Likewise, sexual gratification also yields an experience of being away—albeit momentarily—from the aches and pains of mundane living.

Why, then, those who make spiritual enlightenment their aim often celibate? It would be quite a blow for a spiritual seeker to wake up one day and find that s/he has renounced what many call one of life’s more [some would say most!] pleasurable activities in vain.

Spirituality vs Sexuality

Spiritual enlightenment is a quest that calls for an inward journey. It is essentially about understanding the self by connecting within and then carrying that heady experience from without. It is a process of self-empowerment. A seeker aims for full control over his/her experience of bliss. In other words, you may switch on/off as you will, when you please, for as long as you desire, for the switch is in your hands.

Sex, as we know, needs two to tango. Sex is all about understanding your partner, and connecting without to feel whole within. As psychologist Erich Fromm explained in his amazing book The Art of Loving, our need to love lies in the experience of separateness along with the resulting need to overcome the anxiety of separateness by the experience of union.

Spirituality Is in the Mind, Sexuality in the Body

Spiritual bliss is a mind game. It is experienced in the mind both during and after a meditation session. Sexual bliss is largely a play of our body organs—an increased flow of blood in the genital region followed by muscular contractions experienced as release that is fleeting.

The mental liberation experienced during meditation is energy-giving. Sex, in spite of giving you a momentary high, is energy-depleting.

A spiritual high may be maintained for as long as you [and, you alone] are able to. A sexual high is largely dependent on your partner’s sexual prowess. Physical organs need rekindling to re-induce pleasurable sensations.

Yet, for many, sex is the closest they will come to experiencing spiritual bliss in their lifetime!

However, it goes without saying that there can be no replacing the original.

Spiritual bliss wins hands down when it comes to control, intensity and duration. In other words, think of sex as an alternative for you to enjoy until you choose to dive within.

Redefining Bliss

Since we were not born to be celibate, is there a way for you to enhance your blissful experience born of sexual indulgence? There is!

Aim to be a detached love

This may sound contradictory for you would believe that you need to feel involved when making love. But, step aside [in your mind] from your own needs and try to focus on your partner’s desires instead. You’ll love better and be loved more for it in return.

Learn meditation

Yes, even if you do not plan to turn celibate. Meditation is all about being aware of your inner spark. This will happen only after you are more conscious of your senses. You may not experience bliss instantly, as a Buddhist monk does, but you’ll certainly acquire a new sensitivity that will enhance your enjoyment of sensual pursuits.

Sexual bliss is an escape from the drudgery of modern living. Use your power of imagination to train your mind to take pleasure from a situation so that when you have sex, you are not merely relying on your bodily response. Allow your imagination to soar. Practice to look intently at a picture-postcard scenery. Then close your eyes and imagine the same vista. Try the same exercise [recreate the scenery in your mind] with your eyes open. Once you get a hang of it, allow your mind to conjure a sensual image of your choice. Keep this image in mind when you make love. It works!

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