What is happiness?
This is a question that has not bothered me for a long time, precisely because I don’t know how to answer it.
I am not the only one. Through all these years I have lived with all sorts of people: rich and poor, powerful and mediocre. In the eyes of all who have crossed my path – and here I include warriors and wise men, people who should have nothing to complain about – I have always found that there was something missing.
Some people seem to be happy: they just do not think about it. Others make plans: “I’m going to have a husband, a home, two children, and a house in the country”. While this keeps them occupied, they are like bulls looking for the bullfighter: they don’t think, they just keep moving forward. They manage to get their car – sometimes even a Ferrari – and they think that the meaning of life lies there, so they never ask the question. Yet, despite all that, their eyes betray a sadness that they themselves are quite unaware of.
I don’t know if everyone is unhappy. I do know that people are always busy: working overtime, looking after the kids, the husband, the career, the university degree, what to do tomorrow, what they need to buy, whatever it is they need to have in order not to feel inferior, and so on.
Few people have ever told me: “I’m unhappy”. Most say: “I’m fine, I’ve managed to get all I ever wanted”.
So then I ask: “What makes you happy?”
They answer: “I have everything that a person can dream of – a family, a home, work, good health”.
I ask again: “Have you ever stopped to wonder if that is all there is to life?”
They answer: “Yes, that’s all there is”.
I insist: “So the meaning of life is work, the family, children who grow up and leave you, a wife or husband who will become more like a friend than a true love-mate. And one day the work will come to an end. What will you do when that happens?”
They answer: there is no answer. They change the subject. But there is always something hidden there: the owner of a firm who has still to close the deal he has always dreamed of, the housewife who would like to have more independence or more money, the new graduate who wonders whether he has chosen his career or has had it chosen for him, the dentist who wanted to be a singer, the singer who wanted to be a politician, the politician who wanted to be a writer, and the writer who wanted to be a peasant.
In this street where I am sit writing this column and looking at the people passing by, I bet that everyone is feeling the same thing. That elegant woman who has just walked by spends her days trying to stop time, controlling the bathroom scales, because she thinks love depends on that. On the other side of the street I see a couple with two children. They live moments of intense happiness when they go out with their kids, but at the same time their subconscious is busy thinking about the job they might not get, the tragedies that might occur, how to get over them, how to protect themselves from the world.
I leaf through magazines filled with famous people: everybody laughing, everybody very happy. But since this is a segment of society that I am quite familiar with, I know it is not like that: everyone is laughing or enjoying themselves at the moment that photo is taken, but at night, or in the morning, the story is always quite different. “What can I do to keep on appearing in the magazine?”, “how can I disguise not having enough money to afford all this luxury?” or “how can I manage this life of splendor to make it even more luxurious, more expressive than other people’s?”, “the actress whom I am seen with in this photo, laughing and having a great time, she could steal my part tomorrow!”, or “I wonder if my clothes are nicer than hers. Why do we smile so much if we loathe one another?”
To end, I recall the words of Jorge Luis Borges: “I will not be happy any more, but that doesn’t matter, / there are many other things in this world”.
Do not doubt the search
Sri Ramakrishna tells of a man who was just about to cross a river when the teacher Bibhishana approached him, wrote a name on a piece of paper, fixed it to the man’s back and said:
‘Fear not. Your faith will help you to walk upon the waters. But the moment you lose your faith, you will drown.’
The man trusted Bibhishana and began to walk effortlessly across the waters. At one point, however, he had an immense desire to know what his teacher had written on the piece of paper fixed to his back.
He got hold of it and read what was written on it: ‘Oh God Rama, help this man to cross the river.’
‘Is that all?’ thought the man. ‘Who is this god Rama anyway?’
As soon as doubt entered his mind, he went under and was drowned.
I THINK happiness can be truly achieved by serving others…..the moment we lose our ego but keep self esteem high, we find that we r taking most right judgements to ourselves & others. other importent factor is abolishing the tendency to expect from others….if we rely on a person but hr doesnt turn up , we need not to feel sad or disappointed….but take it as his good intentions that atleat he tried to….
all these things r tough to follow in reality but that is what we call the spirit of service…spirit to come out of sadism & thanking god for the beautiful life he has given…life is not about expecting things but to give thins to it….thats the only path to happiness…
I do not know what happiness is.. I haven’t found it yet… I’m unhappy… yes I can “feel” happy for certain moments, yet my path is long and, at times, hard… my life is not mine because I’m here to help and protect others… yes, I am a warrior of the light… I am a tool in God’s hands and I follow the path that He has chosen for me and I do it with a smile on my face most of the time… the times that I do not smile is when I feel sad to know and see how the world is and where it’s headed… yet, I keep on walking the path coz I have faith that God knows best…
I do not care about things that most ppl do: status, appearances of having a better life than my neighbor, work, etc… I go through life obeying God… in that I don’t mean man made religions… I mean God with whom I have a connection and dialog with…
I learn the lessons that I have to learn and teach them to my daughter, for there’s lessons that she can learn without having to end up licking her own wounds… I licked my own wounds with the passing of time, which brought along many battles where my sword had to fall upon others and some swords fell upon me, and hopefully my daughter will learn the lessons without getting as many scratches and scars as I have…
Today, I am not happy… I feel sad… sad coz I see what’s coming for certain of my loved ones… too many ppl fear… fear stops everything… too many ppl do not care about their loved ones and/or neighbors… that! makes me sad…
I love to feel my heart soar, knowing that I will go through another battle and I’ll be ok no matter how many scars and wounds I get…
Right now, it’s an interlude for me… status quo… where I can try to rest a bit… nonetheless, I’m on my guards coz I know the battle’s not over yet…
I follow the signs God puts on my path… I have been physically ill for a month and havent gone to work… and God showed me that I have to move back to my hometown to help my soul-sister who’s been through a lot lately (end of a relationship with her daddy’s baby boy… her brother just died… wondering how she’ll provided financially for her kids and pay the rent alone, etc…)… I have to go there coz God showed me, through signs on the road, that I have to go there…
I was suppose to go in another city to help another of my friends do a healing center… yet, at the last moment, God, showed me by changing things amongst the ppl that were suppose to go help create the healing center, that I had to take a pose from that project and go help my soul-sister… and that when she’ll be ok, I’ll return to my initial path and move to that other city to help create the healing center…
We need to follow the signs on the road… the omens… and not get entangled with the superficialities of life…
At work one day, I was listening to a team lead tell me how he’s always wanted to open a boutique in London (UK)-we’re in Canada-… and I asked him “why dont you?”… and he replied to me that he couldnt anymore coz he was stuck in a government job with good money, a good pension plan and that he was too old to be dreaming about such a thing as a boutique in London… and that, anyway, there was a lot of boutique in London like the one he always dreamed of doing… I said to him “you’re only stuck here if you want to… if you dont wanna be stuck, then there’s no job, no money, no pension plan nor no age that can stop you from following your dream”… I told him to read your book “The Alchemist” which, surprisingly, he had never heard of.. he said that he’d think about it… that was like 2-3 months ago… He’s still working at the government job…
What is happiness? I dont know, but I do know that we cant find it when we feel stuck… We always have a choice… always… We have the choice to choose and we also have to choice to not choose… either way… it’s a choice…
We also have the choice to look within us for God and His voice… He guides us all the time and never falters… We’re the ones who choose to listen or not to Him…
Eventually, one day… when we’ll be near our last breath… God, if he hasnt done it before, will show us true happiness… I just guess that, by that time, it`s gonna be too late to post the answer, of what happiness is, here on this blog lololol… that`s ok lol… coz searching for happiness is like searching for the Holy Grail… you cannot find it… it finds you… and it`s usually already inside of you… all buried deep down… like a diamond surrounded by coal lol…
Beijocas Fofas Paulo… e bom de ver como voce escreve… a paciencia que voce tem… de mesmo que o amor que voce nos tem…
Grando abraco (xi-coracao – em portugues de Portugal lol)…
Sly
P.S.: obrigada pelos links que voce poem sobre a voca fan page no facebook…
Happiness is being able to share, or rather, give yourself to the world. This is hard to attain, because real happiness entails selflessness.
Happiness is something that calms the soul, gives ourselves inner peace.
Happiness starts in believing in yourself, and that in the end, not everything is only about you. Its about what you do and how you touch other people’s lives.
I am not able to be happy. The happiness is a harmony, and harmony is a state of mind. I know that it is necessary for me for happiness – faultless health, to love and be favourite, absence of material problems. Once, me have told that I will be never happy, because I will not have not enough something. Indeed. I do not have not enough man, I do not have not enough sex, I do not have not enough money. But I live, sometimes I joke and I smile. Because I the young, clever and beautiful girl. I still trust in love. Also I believe that all the best at me ahead, because to me as early as 20 years…
Happiness is also a feeling of contentment something which can be avhieved by giving
just help a person in trouble and see how content you feel
All of us know how content we feelwhen we do something for our loved ones
People are trying to catch happiness different kind of stimulants, example: new car,house,fine dining,alcohol,sex, ext.
Happiness is founding your inner child in you.
La felicidad es satisfaccion, la satifaccion de haber logrado las metas que desde niños nos fueron inculcadas y las que nos trazamos a medida que transcurre nuestra vida…Una mujer catolica es feliz por haberse casado por la iglesia, jaja o al menos dicen que ese es un momento de gran felicidad, sin embargo esto se le fue inculcado, por ciertos valores familiares y religiosos. La meta de lograr una carrera en la universidad…no puedo negar que senti una inmensa satisfaccion cuando logre graduarme y sin embargo no fue lo que esperaba…existen muchas cosas que nos llenan de satisfaccion pero todo necesita su complemento y a pesar de que logremos cumplir todas nuestras metas y sueños siempre quedara algo que no nos dejara ser realmente felices..por eso..no creo que exista la felicidad total..existen satisfacciones!!
Happiness… that is what I always say to someone on their birthday, wedding and other gracious day, that I wish them all the happiness in the world. But, will it be possible to have both happiness and emptiness inside your heart? How to be able to always be happy… sometimes even that everything around me seems like hell, I always try to find the positive side, I am able to feel happy, but inside, I feel empty…