Everyone wants to be happy. To have their kids be happy. For their mates to be happy. To be happy themselves.
We are running around, all of us, searching for happiness.
I remember when I first heard the Dali Lama speak in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
It made sense that the first question he was asked was, “How can we really find happiness?”
The whole group of several hundred of us leaned in, we all wanted to know what his holiness had to say.
The Dali Lama sat, all the while smiling, with his gentle omnipresent smile.
“Happiness”, he softly said, and I will never forget, “is a habit.”
“It does not come from anything else.”
“Sustained happiness comes from sustained habits.”
“Habits that promote happiness.”
“Habits we create through discipline.”
“A disciplined mind, through diet, exercise, and self-speak, trains our brain to be happy.”
“Happy does not come from outside, from missions planned, goals reached, houses bought, soul mates found, love or things.”
“A happy brain is a disciplined brain.”
His holiness let this sink in.
“Choose happiness.”
“Keep choosing it.”
“Over and over again.”
“Then”, he smiled, “you will earn it.”
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Please share with us how you discipline your brain to be calmly happy.
How do you earn happiness rather than find it?
What works for you?
What works against you?
Happier people make happier countries.
Happier countries make less war.
Happy Matters!
But it’s not about buying it or finding it.
I would love to know what all you out there do, to achieve, and earn happier minds and lives.
Much happiness your way!
Dr. B.
Yes to self-care! For me, greater joy has come from giving up trying to control life to make myself happy. If we let go of perceptions that create negative energies inside, we realize we no longer need life to conform to what we think will make us happy, because we have joy from within that builds by just experiencing this wondrous world.
Quote by Rumi via Michael Singer: “Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.”
Smiling.