Happiness

Often when asked what they want for themselves, people say they want everyone around them to be happy. It’s a tough call anyways as the outside is never under our control. Also, why would a mind work towards a goal if the prize was to be given away to someone else?!!

It is noble to want happiness for everyone. It’s not a realistic ambition though. The only control that any person has is over the self. Rather than emptying our cache by sharing before replenishing our stores, wouldn’t it be better if we set happiness goals for ourselves and then share from the abundance that we have?

Manya was brought to us by her husband of four years; she had been a bright and vivacious girl but her glow had dimmed in the past couple of years. She didn’t seem happy with anything happening around her.

On pursuing her case history we found that she felt burdened by her responsibilities as a daughter-in-law in a large family. She was supposed to take care of every person’s well being, but she herself felt neglected. In the quest to be a good daughter-in-law she went all out to care for her family early on and set unsustainable standards for herself. As time went on she felt burdened and the task was too onerous and untenable.

Manya needed a bit of rehabilitation in her beliefs and way of thinking. She was able to set her boundaries with herself and went on to a happier life.

It is our own expectations from ourselves that causes the worst unhappiness at times. We set ourselves up for failure by the very height of our expectations, from the self or from others. Expecting excellence from ourselves at the cost of happiness is the worst torture we can put ourselves through.

Our beliefs, our talents, our capabilities are to be used towards making a good life for ourselves. Anything that makes us unhappy would only bring disease to the mind and body.

Imagine a child running a race and putting hard effort into it to come first; then the prize being handed over to someone else who’s been watching the race from the front row. Would the child want to ever run a race again, or make an effort to excel at anything?

We don’t realise it but we put ourselves through that disappointment all the time when we work for other people’s happiness. We may lie to ourselves that their happiness makes everything worth it, but it soon begins to pall and the joy soon goes out of the doing.

The people who come to us for help with any complaint; it is our job to get to the root of their problem and resolve it from there, while taking care of the fruits of their labour, educating them about their beliefs and rearranging them wherever necessary.