Here is the observation I had noticed a
long time ago; happiness is not something that happens randomly. This thing has form and it follows rules and
they seem to be:
·
Happiness does not happen because of good luck or
because the fickle finger of fate picks you out for some grand event. No one is special and conversely no one is
non-special.
·
Happiness is not something that can be purchased
nor can it be controlled or for that matter caused to occur on command by some
grand authority. Although many have
tried.
·
Happiness does not depend on the world about us,
although conversely the world about us can affect some of the various outcomes
of its occurrences.
·
Happiness seems to be more an interpretation of
the world both about us and within us, with all of this being taken in some
sort of strange mix or recipe that is constantly changing and is difficult to
replicate. The formula might not work
the second time the way it did the first time.
·
Happiness, in fact, seems to be a condition that
we must be prepared for, that we must cultivate and nurture, and then be
prepared, if necessary to defend, but not from a place of unity but rather
from a place of deep privacy¾as an individual.
·
The variations on the happiness formulas
seem to be more effective with those people who have learned to work with inner
experience(s). It seems that they will, to a certain degree, be able to
determine the quality of their lives as it relates to having or not having
happiness.
·
The ability to determine the having or not
having of the presence of happiness seems to be as close as any of us
can come to causing happy to happen. It
can be a conscious decision to be or not to be, pardon the pun, but not always.
·
It also seems a given that we cannot reach
happiness by consciously searching for it.
The very effort of trying to search for it seems to defeat our every
effort to have or possess it. Happiness
cannot be owned; it can only be experienced.
·
Happiness seems to be the process of being fully
involved with every detail of your life, subjectively not
objectively.
·
The key statement in describing the process of
being involved in life seems to be as completely as possible,
and completely as possible does not seem to depend on any opinion
or definition of what is good or bad or how those cognitive markers of good or
bad are held in the mind of the beholder.
Just because you are prepared to fight to the death for your
beliefs doesn’t mean they are true.
·
Happiness seems to occur because of the intensity
of the involvement with life and not in the outcomes that intensity seems to
want to provide so that it could be easily seen and judged by others.
·
Degree of intensity of the involvement necessary
to induce happiness will vary from individual to individual as well as from
situation-to-situation. Thus it follows
that degrees of intensity i.e. very intense to mildly intense are not markers
that can determine the outcome of creating happiness. It is just a necessary factor that varies
from time to time.
·
The Laws Of Paradox seems to affect the
outcome of having some or not; for instance: don't aim for it because the
Laws Of Paradox will tend to cause you to increase the size and
shape of the target you have set for yourself and then at the same time cause
you to miss with greater frequency. Something like Chinese handcuffs, the harder
you try the more difficult it becomes.
·
Happiness and success cannot be pursued for
their own sake.
·
Happiness and success, to be most effective must
sneak up from behind and envelop us ... It is something that happens to us
while we are busy doing something else … as the inadvertent, unintentional
after-effect of our efforts to simply get on with the business of being
ourselves and by doing whatever is next simply because it is there and needs to
be done. Then this seems to need to be
taken into consideration with the effort made by the individual to be willing
to work in the shadow of his or her spiritual self and then deliberately
attempting to work with the spiritual forces of the Greater Way of Things.
·
Again paradox.
The Art of Trying Not to Try.
·
So how can we reach this elusive goal that
cannot be attained by a direct route? My
practice and practices of the past 20 or so years has convinced me that there
is a way.
It is a circuitous path
of going nowhere the long way in search of someone who was not lost and there
all along … You. And it can only begin with a willingness by the participant to
want to make the journey.
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