The purpose of life is to be happy – so says the Dalai Lama. However, most people aren’t really sure what happiness actually means. Does it mean having a lot of nice things – nice home, second home, flashy car, nice clothes, nice vacations? Because, it seems that over the last few years, plenty of people fell into the trap of evaluating their happiness based on what they owned – and of judging their happiness by comparison to what others had. Believe it or not, I had a client call me a while back to tell me that his wife was threatening to leave him because and I quote ‘The neighbours go on better vacations!’ Wave her off, I said!
Happiness isn’t about having lots of nice things – it doesn’t exclude them, but they are not the be all and end all. Happiness is about having good times or, as I say to my clients, ‘being gurdy!’ It’s a feeling that you have that all is well with the world and your little piece of it. It’s a sense of wanting for nothing – not not wanting to go further on the sensational adventure of life’s rollercoaster – but simply of wanting nothing more in this perfect moment.
Happiness is a now thing. Unfortunately, the normal mind is not present now, so it simply cannot experience happiness. Research explains that the average mind is stuck in the past (especially on the childhood experiences that have created our self-image) and focused in the future (either looking forward to something good, wanting for something that we haven’t got or worrying about something or other that we don’t want to happen). Given all the facts no way is it possible for the normal mind to be happy – on an ongoing basis.
To be happy, you simply have to become abnormal. Normal people couldn’t be bothered to turn up to their own lives – and there’s more than seven decades of research that proves this beyond a shadow of a doubt. To experience effortless happiness (oh and that includes effortless success) you’ve got to turn up to the present moment – the only time and place that you can live your life. It takes a focused and tuned in mind to be present – there are many different ways that you can develop your focus and talent for paying attention. But your happiness and success depend upon it – they are correlated with how well you pay attention – again an ability that the normal mind will never master. You must relearn how to pay attention – it was second nature to you when you were child when you experienced everything new by using all of your five senses. To be happy and successful you have to come to your senses all over again. Once you do, you won’t have to go in search of happiness – happiness will simply find you.
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