Thought..........!

Wisdom23

I think we can beat around the bush all we like but we have to admit all we want is happiness. In this day and age it seems harder and harder to achieve. We are given such a wide range of options in all areas of life, career, what to have for tea etc i am sure you get my drift. So surely it would be easier to be given an option or pick from a smaller selection and just learn to love it ? What are your opinions on this thought?

Tosh

Find something and try it. Mine was booze; I loved it. It didn't matter what was going on, if I had booze, I was okay. I used to think that if I lived in a box, as long as I had plenty of drink, I'd be happy.

Unfortunately I ended up miserable.

Women were another thing that I tried. I'm not a quick learner, and again, I ended up miserable.

Am I happy now? Well, yes, ish, but my concept of happiness has changed from one of euphoria (which is what I thought was happiness) to one that is just peaceful. I guess the absence of suffering is happiness.

NomaDBuddha

Everyone wants what they think is happiness, and some end up miserable and depressed when the thought of happiness just doesn't match what reality has to offer them. To be honest, life gives you some 'smaller selection' things that you mentioned, but the choice can bring either happiness or damnation.
Yes, you might learn to love that one choice ( a bad one ), but will it really bring true happiness ?

Jeffrey

The wish to be happy solid gold, but the things we try to fill that whole are what we renounce in the path of renunciation. The soft spot that wants to be happy is bodhicitta, but the object of craving in a dualistic way only brings more craving and loss, gain, pleasure, pain, etc..

Shak

It's been my experience that trying to find happiness in careers, alcohol, mindless consumerism, etc are all dead end pursuits. It took having children for me to realize the joy in the small aspects of everyday life. I could care less if my cell phone is 2 years old, or if my friend drives an Audi home to his McMansion after a long day at a great job that makes him miserable. I'll drive my Mazda home to my family,help my wife cook diner and enjoy watching my kids eat. What more could I ask for. We'll, if I could get my 11 year old to empty the trash...

vinlyn

Shak said:

It's been my experience that trying to find happiness in careers, alcohol, mindless consumerism, etc are all dead end pursuits. It took having children for me to realize the joy in the small aspects of everyday life. I could care less if my cell phone is 2 years old, or if my friend drives an Audi home to his McMansion after a long day at a great job that makes him miserable. I'll drive my Mazda home to my family,help my wife cook diner and enjoy watching my kids eat. What more could I ask for. We'll, if I could get my 11 year old to empty the trash...

To each his own. I found happiness in my career. But not in my love life. But it shouldn't have been one or the other. It my own fault.

Jeffrey

The rollercoaster of love. A cigarette. A beer when stressed. A pat on the back.

These things are not wrong. Our minds have the craving. The objects are fine.

Shak

I hear you. I had a career that I thought would make me happy, but instead nearly wrecked my marriage. I now have a job that I like, but am happy to leave at 5:00, less money, and a better family life. I'd like to think I'm making less mistakes and enjoying life more. At least that's my perception of reality right now.

vinlyn

Shak said:

I hear you. I had a career that I thought would make me happy, but instead nearly wrecked my marriage. I now have a job that I like, but am happy to leave at 5:00, less money, and a better family life. I'd like to think I'm making less mistakes and enjoying life more. At least that's my perception of reality right now.

Interesting. Thanks for posting that.

lobster

I think we can beat around the bush all we like but we have to admit all we want is happiness.

Part of the USA constitution and part of the fledgling UK 'Ministry of Happiness' (OK they only have a statistical evaluation - for now).

How to be happy? Don't know about you but dharma leads to permanent happiness, thus do I know. Anyway . . .
gotta sit with what I laughingly call 'my mind' - don't you just love that? No? Go do something nicer then . . . maybe for someone else . . .

poptart

It's the biggest mistake to think happiness lies outside of us, like the pot of gold under the rainbow. I now think happiness is being fully alive in this moment, whatever is going on.

It used to annoy me when people said one chooses to be happy or not, but now I think I understand it even if I don't always achieve it.

cvalue

Happiness can be a complicated subject if we analyze too much. How about just decide to be happy RIGHT NOW, unconditionally? Don't wait any more. Don't search for it. Don't crave for it.

how

One Roshi I respected was often asking her disciples if they wanted to be happy like a dog asleep in the sun. This was her challenge to the usual view of "happiness" and is perhaps why the term happiness means so little to me.
Firstly because everything changes, that it seems like just another attachment to deal with, because it seems like a heavenly realm which limits ones ability to critique oneself if that critique might turn up anything unhappy, and on and on..
Equanimity and the ability to address the real causes of suffering, means more to me.

Vastmind

how said:

.... happy like a dog asleep in the sun.......

Quote of the week.

Jeffrey

There is a natural feeling in mind. The #samboghaya is perceived by a bodhisattva as a bliss body. Even though we are fettered we can still feel a blocked view of the samboghakaya and that shines through in moments in our lives such as love or accepting a trouble and a relieved feeling.

#samboghakaya: is one of the bodies of Buddha in the Mahayana tradition.