Tricky I Shadow
Banned
Being taught how to be happy kinda defeats the purpose. True happiness comes from within.
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Teach me how to be happy
- Thread starter maomaoIYP
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Meditation is mostly about stilling the mind, to be rooted in the present going and flowing of what's going on. I'll explain it at a little bit of a higher level that goes into topics like not-self/ego-death, which is my kinda jazz, but I hope it offers some clarity on why it's quite notable. You may not get all of it, and that's okay, but the key thing you can get from it is it helps calm you and root you to the present state of affairs, which is where one has any actual presence.
Our core level of suffering starts in the mind, first and foremost. The problems that make us suffer usually do not make us innately suffer, unless we run with the thoughts or images that they do; not getting something going your way is just the way it is, but how you think about that will affect your response. Consider how people suffer from illness in life: you will almost here the words "I didn't expect my life to be like this" and that's a core signifier. Our problems are never usually what is, but what we think about them. Death makes us suffer specifically because we think it shouldn't be, for example.
Meditation helps one see this very clearly if one delves deep. To paraphrase Rupert Spira, who teaches nondualism and Vedanta philosophy, we tend to identify with contents that arise in awareness, be it thoughts or emotions, personalize it, and then project it into the experience. The "mystical" thing and why doing so is often a mistake is that the contents arise in awareness, which is like a screen. We confuse the arrival of thoughts, concepts, and emotions that appear in awareness and identify them as me, which only plays deeper into the illusion of selfhood and risks making even larger bugbears of suffering to what goes on. A key trait one can get out of meditation is to be in a state that "swims" with what goes on instead of playing it as "my story," as one of victimhood, for that only warps the lens and only feeds thoughts that expand any issues that aren't normally expanded to such a degree. "I need to improve myself" shows this kind of conflict, for we define ourselves dualistically, as somehow two agents; a doer and one to be done deeds upon.
I don't expect you to get involved in topics of not-self with meditation right away, so I can suggest some basic, introductory resources for you. One of which is the application Calm, which covers the basic of basics about meditation itself. A person who I also recommend looking up about much of this in an incredibly digestible way is Jon Kabat-Zinn, who's probably one of the leading people promoting topics like mindfulness and wellbeing. He talks about much of these topics without any spiritual or intellectual barrier, which is almost always a handicap for some interested in this domain.
I hope some of what I rambled about helps.
travisbickle
Member
It's about felling like a room. A room without a roof but no room has a roof they have ceilings. So feel like a room.
lets take just this one part. You're 35. Average life expectancy for a male in the US is 78.74. So already you aren't halfway through.
Were you planning to acheive much at kindergarten? probably not. Lets be generous and say you could reasonably start achieving and progressing in your life goals at 18. In that case you've only been going for 17 years. Less than half your time since birth you even had a chance to be productive. And if you retire at 65, you have another 30 years still to do good stuff. So you're barely 1/3 into your career/adult life
You have *plenty* of time to do good stuff, achieve what you want.
True Savior
Member
To me a a happy life, is one without stress , with a stable income that allows me to live with no worries, and with a partner whom i can share everything.
Sadly, i cannot even comply with a single one of my requirements.
I dont know why but yesterday i felt like shit. So much to the point i don't remember feeling so bad. And nothing particular really caused. Maybe a momentarily awareness that I can't fulfill those needs.
Sadly, i cannot even comply with a single one of my requirements.
I dont know why but yesterday i felt like shit. So much to the point i don't remember feeling so bad. And nothing particular really caused. Maybe a momentarily awareness that I can't fulfill those needs.
Stuff like this is exactly why we have huge problems related to politics: Apathy.
The dude wants to be happy, not uptight.
I'm not being 100% serious, but in the end, have your say and live your life.
Your mistake is what I highlighted earlier: you are looking for it in status, in acquisition. This is a mistake because even if you get what you want it cannot last, for you cannot hang on to a state in this cosmos, for everything is change, and not a single thing can be held onto.
By longing for a peaceful life, you of course will define yourself as an antithesis of that. The same with income; you want no worries, so of course you are defining yourself with a world of worry. Instead of looking for stability in a world without one, can you accept the unstable state of what there is? This of course would require you to examine those very ideas and desires you have longing for stability, but perhaps you will see much of your suffering probably comes more from the desire on what should be instead of the circumstance of what is. That's ground zero for human suffering.
Can you accept life for life as it is, prior to your projections about it? This is the game where peace and happiness will be found.
Good, I hope not, as those kinds of philosophies are poisonous and encourage voter apathy.
Apathy is acceptance, but in many cases, change will happen through futility. Much of the political system here in America has actually become rigged where futility will produce the answer, not reason, and not action.
Such an arrangement greatly risks apathy, but for many of our problems, they're held and ran by hands that bar everyone else from the table. That's what happens in an oligarchy.
A Fish Aficionado
I am going to make it through this year if it kills me
Go back to school and so something like an MPH, or medicine.
You still won't be happy.
You still won't be happy.
Monocle
Member
Happiness is fleeting. You can't stay high on positive emotions 100% of the time. It's better to chase long term satisfaction by organizing your life in a balanced way that lets you spend as much time as possible doing what you want. Ideally, you'll find a way to get paid for something you love. Find purpose in a creative activity or project that you can call your own.
Milly Osworth
Member
Find a girlfriend, it makes all the difference.
A Fish Aficionado
I am going to make it through this year if it kills me
clyde with the truthbombs.
SomedayTheFire
Member
smoke, drink and do drug. you'll be very happy then.
Monocle
Member
I just smoked all my liquor and snorted the ashes. My dog's pawprints sound like The Beach Boys. Send further instructions.
Depends on the drugs, no? You'll probably get more out of LSD than cocaine.
What if an assassin silently sneaks in and shoots you on the toilet? They're gonna find your dead body with poop on it.
But I like to go with the door open too.
brianjones
Member
👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼
True Savior
Member
Foffy i added something to my post.
Why can I not held onto it? My past experiences say otherwise.
I disagree because I dont desire it as merely an antithesis of my life, but instead I have been partially in those states, and my return to them is a main goal.
Why can I not held onto it? My past experiences say otherwise.
I disagree because I dont desire it as merely an antithesis of my life, but instead I have been partially in those states, and my return to them is a main goal.
The Spoony Hou
Member
God, you're so much like me it HURTS!
I was always very lonely, but I managed to find my girlfriend. She saved me my life.
I realize I'm not actually helping you, so I apologize. How about finding something new to do, that you think might be interesting? When I was 20 (I'm 35 now) I started going to a Japanese course, and the new friends I made pretty much changed my life. They dragged me into martial arts, which dragged me into other stuff, and I'm really happy about all the crazy stuff that ended up happening.
Without learning Japanese I wouldn't have (eventually) met my girlfriend (and my ex), so you never know.
You can't find happiness because you don't know yourself well enough. You've been living the life people expect you to, instead of pursuing what you really want. Just do one step in that direction.
Because none of those things you list are stable factors. You can find a partner but that inevitably ends either in a break up or in death. A stable career can turn unstable in the blink of an eye. And stress is an unavoidable part of life.
The past is the past, as it's what was. What was doesn't particularly mean that's what is now, or what may be later.
If everything is change and nothing can be held onto, why exactly do you think you can hang onto your wealth any more than you can hang onto yourself, which is always in a state of change and ultimately fragility? By assuming you can, you risk totally bottoming out when and if you experience first hand the futility in that.
This is the problem of desire. Risk longing something hard enough, and the thought of want turns that into a noose, so you choke and suffer by lacking it. And as I said earlier, even if you get it, you cannot keep it. It will eventually fall through your hands, even if you grip onto it. Do you not see that your problem is wanting life to be a state you associate with status? You want to try and keep a constant thing going, when the only constant thing that happens is change, which your desire is very clearly averse towards.
I can go into more detail on the income thing, for I often harp about automation and the necessity of basic incomes. Do you really think your income can become stable when we can replace 45% of the tasks people do in parts of their vocations? Do you not think such a thing risks depreciation of wages or outright being removed from said vocation if enough of it becomes mechanized? How could you thrive even if what you do avoids such automation but exist in an economy where 1 in 4 people risk losing work, causing a depression and in turn diminished wages? In this particular sense, you are quite literally hanging onto a system that is more prone than not to produce a framework that results in diminishing returns. If you think a larger income will make you happy, you've been born in a potentially dying age for that. This should at least show this being a panacea risks being as fleeting as it actually would be, I hope.
immortald3ath
Member
Start playing World of Warcraft.
SmackDaddy
Member
Op, please teach me how to dougie
Randomizer123454444
Member
For a long time, I had a lot of problems and issues floating around my brain. You know how unsolved issues keep your brain busy? All those issues that linger in the back of your brain? Money-, work-, family-, love-issues etc?
One day, while I was thinking about things, everything just clicked. It felt like everything was suddenly clear, like a missing puzzle piece was put in place. I had finally solved (my) life. Now I know who I am and who I want to be. And I am proud of who I am. I still have problems, but I know how to proceed and I'm fully confident that I can solve them.
As someone who constantly worried about everything, this clarity, and the confidence it gives me, is what makes me feel happy.
One day, while I was thinking about things, everything just clicked. It felt like everything was suddenly clear, like a missing puzzle piece was put in place. I had finally solved (my) life. Now I know who I am and who I want to be. And I am proud of who I am. I still have problems, but I know how to proceed and I'm fully confident that I can solve them.
As someone who constantly worried about everything, this clarity, and the confidence it gives me, is what makes me feel happy.
True Savior
Member
Ok but death is more of a culmination that a disruption. At least probability speaking. I'm not thinking of something that I will hold forever but for a long period of time.
It's not so much a stable career but a stable income. Even a passive one. As for the stress, there's a level of professional responsibility that I am obliged as an Engineer that I very much dislike and want to reject as quick as possible. This is something more related to how i relate myself with others. A stress originated by me but closed in myself is something I endure very easily.
I can't do anything related to the fragility-nature of our life. Nor do i worry too much about it. If it changes , then it changes. But I want to go through those states. No matter how temporary they are. I miss them too much. I agree it has become very much a desire, but it's one I cannot escape until i go through it.
Could you explain this experience a little more in depth? I have no idea if you had a logical epiphany, or what many call a spiritual experience like satori.
And this is the problem. You are letting the thought and longing as a state of what "should be" supercede the state of your life as it is. Hold onto this and you strangle. I had a similar experience, which I can delve into, if you wish.
All I can suggest is to see the futility of chasing such a state, because it cannot be kept. It comes, it goes. Instead of wanting life to come to you on your specific terms, can you instead look at life as it actually is, a state of just things going about? Can you accept life as life and less of life as you project? This may be a key in easing your mental sorrows if you hang onto necessities made in thought.
Wanting things isn't too bad. But turning that want into must creates suffering. I want a society to be peaceful and reasonable, and I suffer when I get caught in my mind demanding the shitbrainededness of it all to change. Try and be in a state of "if it happens, it happens, but if not, then it doesn't." Some call that defeating, but in many ways this is the first step to true "liberation," if we can use that word.
For me, OP, happiness came from a career change. So if you're not happy, I'd say simply try something new. A hobby, a sport, a job, a journey; doesn't really matter. Think Vaas in Far Cry 3, and his rants on the definition of insanity. Also, don't be afraid of doing something new and being unsure of the idea's merits beforehand. Just go do.
Mine's on the 26th. *Fistbump*
Thank you everyone for your comments and thoughts. Foffy your posts have been very helpful, especially on personal suffering and our own internal voice.
what are you doing it all for? do you have a purpose you want to follow? something you want to accomplish?
do you have friends and family you like to be around, rather than just care about? that can be a thing worth living for. experiencing things with people you love. new and exciting things, familiar and comfortable things. mundane things that you wouldn't bat your eye at, yet maybe with someone whose life you really appreciate, you could look at in a different light.
most of the things you listed are just that: things. a job, money, abstaining from certain sensory pleasures, the things you can buy. what do they all mean if you don't really know what your life means or can mean?
i don't know how to be happy, either. i don't even know where to begin with that. but i don't worry about it. because i know it's not something i can flip a switch to turn on. it's something bigger, more complex than questions like this one can answer. but i look at the things i care about and the things i want to do for them, the ways i would like things to be, and i try at some level to fight for them and work towards them in just a small way. even if it means just getting out of bed. i have a reason for doing that.
as miserable as it sounds. i think it's the way to start.
i don't think life is about gaining this or that. you have to enjoy the act of working towards it. to enjoy some part of the struggle. or else you'll always be chasing different, fleeting ends.
idk. good luck.
do you have friends and family you like to be around, rather than just care about? that can be a thing worth living for. experiencing things with people you love. new and exciting things, familiar and comfortable things. mundane things that you wouldn't bat your eye at, yet maybe with someone whose life you really appreciate, you could look at in a different light.
most of the things you listed are just that: things. a job, money, abstaining from certain sensory pleasures, the things you can buy. what do they all mean if you don't really know what your life means or can mean?
i don't know how to be happy, either. i don't even know where to begin with that. but i don't worry about it. because i know it's not something i can flip a switch to turn on. it's something bigger, more complex than questions like this one can answer. but i look at the things i care about and the things i want to do for them, the ways i would like things to be, and i try at some level to fight for them and work towards them in just a small way. even if it means just getting out of bed. i have a reason for doing that.
as miserable as it sounds. i think it's the way to start.
i don't think life is about gaining this or that. you have to enjoy the act of working towards it. to enjoy some part of the struggle. or else you'll always be chasing different, fleeting ends.
idk. good luck.
I'm happy my words were of some help. I sometimes wonder if I am too deep into these topics that I just outright lose people. I know I can't really convey this to friends or family because they don't get it at all. I apologize if anything I said was too confusing for you, and I can try to expand more on what may be miasmic to you.
OP, what you're describing is basically the Buddhist concept of "dukkha", the suffering of being unsatisfied, restless, feeling empty. They created this term that describes the problem of the human condition perfectly.
Modern research as well as decade old asian practices show that you definitely CAN cultivate states of mind that give you more equanimity, peace, compassion and happiness.
As Sakyong Mipham says, you are always in a certain state of mind. If you are feeling bitter and resentful, you are "training and getting better" at being bitter.
In the same way, you can teach your own mind to shift perspective. This isn't "positive thinking" either, or trying to lie two yourself, but the basic realisation that our mind is the canvas on which we color our reality.
This whole school of thought (and more importantly - the practice of it!) of Buddhist techniques has been and still is the biggest shift in my life. It takes time, though, if you want to get more into it you should check out multiple authors and styles and see what fits.
Alan Watts - The Wisdom Of Insecurity
Dean Sluyter - Natural Meditation
Eckhart Tolle - The Power Of Now
Jon Kabat Zinn - Whereever you go, there you are
Those are great authors that all made their own flavor of meditation and mindfulness (Watts being move philosophical and less instructional, Dean Sluyter being the most practical of the bunch).
I also want to add that I'm a very critical person, but the whole mindfulness stuff just makes sense and more and more research proves it. There is zero esoteric nonsense about it, it's really about getting familiar with our mind.
It's an ongoing process, rather similar to something like cognitive behavioral therapy. It's incredibly rewarding, though, but I usually don't really talk about it much because you have to be ready for it.
Modern research as well as decade old asian practices show that you definitely CAN cultivate states of mind that give you more equanimity, peace, compassion and happiness.
As Sakyong Mipham says, you are always in a certain state of mind. If you are feeling bitter and resentful, you are "training and getting better" at being bitter.
In the same way, you can teach your own mind to shift perspective. This isn't "positive thinking" either, or trying to lie two yourself, but the basic realisation that our mind is the canvas on which we color our reality.
This whole school of thought (and more importantly - the practice of it!) of Buddhist techniques has been and still is the biggest shift in my life. It takes time, though, if you want to get more into it you should check out multiple authors and styles and see what fits.
Alan Watts - The Wisdom Of Insecurity
Dean Sluyter - Natural Meditation
Eckhart Tolle - The Power Of Now
Jon Kabat Zinn - Whereever you go, there you are
Those are great authors that all made their own flavor of meditation and mindfulness (Watts being move philosophical and less instructional, Dean Sluyter being the most practical of the bunch).
I also want to add that I'm a very critical person, but the whole mindfulness stuff just makes sense and more and more research proves it. There is zero esoteric nonsense about it, it's really about getting familiar with our mind.
It's an ongoing process, rather similar to something like cognitive behavioral therapy. It's incredibly rewarding, though, but I usually don't really talk about it much because you have to be ready for it.
Seraph_Nicholas
Member
Well, uh...
So, this is probably the worst advice, but have you considered starting drugs? This is assuming you don't have past experience, of course. I'm not saying you should run out and grab some meth fixin's, but I was pretty consistently miserable for the first two decades of my life, and I directly attribute me getting over my selfobsession and pessimism to MDMA, LSD, and weed.
I still smoke regularly, but I haven't done the first two in years. It only took a few times to seriously alter my entire worldview. Done carefully, in extremely judicious amounts, and with a focus on altering yourself permanently instead of just having a good time (though that's grand too, and often unavoidable), I think there's a lot of merit.
As I said before, this is terrible advice for anyone. It is, however, what worked for me.
So, this is probably the worst advice, but have you considered starting drugs? This is assuming you don't have past experience, of course. I'm not saying you should run out and grab some meth fixin's, but I was pretty consistently miserable for the first two decades of my life, and I directly attribute me getting over my selfobsession and pessimism to MDMA, LSD, and weed.
I still smoke regularly, but I haven't done the first two in years. It only took a few times to seriously alter my entire worldview. Done carefully, in extremely judicious amounts, and with a focus on altering yourself permanently instead of just having a good time (though that's grand too, and often unavoidable), I think there's a lot of merit.
As I said before, this is terrible advice for anyone. It is, however, what worked for me.
Totally want to add in I felt the same way about the bolded. I first started with Watts and actually much of his philosophy on meditation and ego, and I thought a lot of it being pure New Age woolness. How is everybody "me"? I'm a seperate self!
The more I played with it, and the more I saw the experiences of that state correlating with science - neurology actually argues against the notion of the self - that the whole thing just became far more digestible and accountable as a state of "what there is." He was probably the most profound person in my experience to articulate nondualism as not just a provable state with data and research, but a state to experience. He was able to paint everything back to that, from politics, to money, to even the ideas of progress. I first "got it" when I did a chanting meditation of his, and when he finished by asking "where were you?" it just dawned on me that this separate outsider that I thought of me was fake as hell. I bursted out laughing, but I guess that's a very Zen response to make.
I've not read Tolle's book, but does he offer a solution on what to do with the now and seeing through the ego? I've listened to many of his talks and he does what Watts does; he cites the illusion as the problem, and peace can be found through that. But that only works for those who can actually see through the illusion of dualism we normally assume as objective. It's kind of that or a powerful experience, typically with psychotropics, and that has a lot of valleys to fall into.
I want to say this is not terrible advice. No way is "the" way, and your way is possible for some. The likes of Ram Dass, Terrence McKenna, and Sam Harris all used drugs to have permanent changes to their nature of self. I can't say if you went so far as to have an ego-death experience, but the three I cite did.
More Fun To Compute
Member
Step 1. Don't worry about being happy just try to do good things and avoid annoying things.
Step 2. ???
Step 3. Maybe you are happy who knows. Don't worry.
Step 2. ???
Step 3. Maybe you are happy who knows. Don't worry.
Randomizer123454444
Member
I'm not a religious or spiritual person, so I'm not sure what people mean with spiritual experiences.
Let's use "I feel ugly" as an example. At one point in life, before I started to exercise and take care of myself, I was very aware that I was considered ugly. Or so I thought people considered me. It affected every single aspect of my life, I was always aware of the fact that I didn't look nice. Every time I went to store, every time I stepped out of the door, every time I talked to someone. It bothered me when I was eating, it bothered me when I was going to sleep and it bothered me when I was just walking somewhere. It was not the primary thought process going on in my mind, it was always there, and I never could truly feel relaxed because of it.
I have solved that particular issue a long time ago, but that is an example of what I'm talking about: I was constantly worrying or feeling bad about something. There was always a problem that I felt pushing me down. For someone else, it might be the fact that he/she is very poor. Or the fact that their love life is not going well. The lingering issue that is always there, unsolved and pushing you down, blocking you.
And then suddenly, none of these issues bother me anymore. The issues are still there, but I'm confident that I can solve them. No, I know I can solve them. For what I felt was the first time in my life, I knew things were going to be ok.
I really don't know how to describe it better. But I think that the reason why people are so eager to deny reality through mental gymnastics is that they want to desperately hang on to that clarity they have about how world works, about their life and what they are going to do. It is such a good feeling that introducing problems that their mind can't solve is something they can't handle. So they deny the problem exists, and truly believe so. To keep the clarity and peace of mind in tact. Perhaps that helps you understand what I mean?
There's your problems. I didn't read past the op. Also significant other could help/deter happiness.
By spiritual, I don't mean some weirdness that Mother Nature spoke to you, but a kind of insight if you will: that it seemed like not even a spec of dust was in the wrong place, and that taste of clarity made the problems of mind just absolutely vanish. A kind of profound feeling and peace and awe, not even aimed at a particular thing. Some call it an "oceanic feeling" when such an experience happens.
You don't specify on what exactly caused the change, so I'm unsure if that sort of experience is the one you had. What was the trigger that caused the change? The experience I've cited is one such way, but if that's not the one you had, what was yours?
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