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Happiness
Some people believe that achieving happiness is the purpose of
life, yet the pursuit of happiness often leads to unhappiness.
This is because happiness is actually a consequence of a
different life purpose - the pursuit of evolving our souls in
our ability to love ourselves and others.
When achieving happiness is your goal, you might pursue this in
three different ways:
1) You might pursue momentary pleasure, believing that your
happiness is the same as pleasure. When this is your belief, you
might pursue happiness through substances such as alcohol,
drugs, nicotine, or food. Or you might pursue happiness through
activities such as sex, spending or gambling.
2) If you believe that your happiness is attached to money and
the outcome of things regarding money, you might pursue control
over outcomes through spending most of your time working, as
well as accumulating and managing money.
3) If you believe that your happiness is attached to people, you
might pursue control over getting love, approval, attention,
admiration, or acknowledgement.
While momentary pleasure feels good, it is just momentary. Which
means that you need to keep on doing whatever you believe will
bring you happiness, over and over. This is what creates
addictions - the pursuit of what you believe will avoid pain and
bring pleasure. The problem is that none of these pursuits bring
deep and abiding happiness, because their affects are always
momentary.
True happiness is not the result of DOING, but of a way of
BEING. Rather than being a result of the momentary pleasures of
the outside world, it is the result of your intention to evolve
daily as a loving human being.
What does this mean?
This means that ongoing happiness is the result of choosing the
spiritual path of kindness, compassion, understanding, and
acceptance.
Yet it is not enough to express kindness and compassion toward
others. Many have tried this and still end up feeling empty and
angry when the deep happiness they desire continues to elude
them.
The path toward happiness sarts with opening to learning about
what is most loving and
compassionate toward YOURSELF. You can
have all the things that people believe will bring happiness -
money, a good relationship, a family, work you enjoy - yet if
you are critical and judgmental toward yourself instead of
accepting and compassionate with yourself, you will not feel
happy.
Imagine a child who seemingly has everything - tons of toys, the
best schools, great vacations, lots of friends. But imagine that
this child has parents who ignore him or her, or who are very
critical, judgmental and controlling of him or her. This child
will not be happy, no matter how many external things he or she
has.
Imagine that this child is you - the feelings within you. How
are you treating this child? How do you treat your feelings? Do
you ignore your feelings and cover them over with substance or
process addictions? Are you judgmental of yourself, constantly
telling yourself that you are not good enough, that you are
inadequate in some way?
Ignoring yourself or judging yourself will always lead to
unhappiness, so matter how much you have in the external world
or how loving you are to others. Until you decide to start
treating yourself the way you want others to treat you, deep and
abiding happiness will elude you. As long as you are treating
yourself the way your parents may have treated you or
themselves, you will continue to feel the emptiness and
aloneness that comes from self-abandonment.
If you want to experience true happiness, then start to pay
attention to your own feelings with a deep desire to learn about
what you are doing or not doing that is causing your pain and
unhappiness. Happiness will be the natural consequence of your
willingness to take full, 100% responsibility for your own
feelings, and learn about and take action regarding what truly
brings you joy,
About the author:
Margaret Paul, Ph.D., best-selling author of eight books,
including "Do I Have To Give Up Me To Be Loved By You" and
co-creator of the powerful Inner Bonding healing process. Learn
Inner Bonding now! Visit her web site for a FREE Inner Bonding
course: http://www.innerbonding.com or email her at
mailto:margaret@innerbonding.com. Phone Sessions.
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