Happiness can’t be found when we are yearning for new desires.

Luckily, there is a way to be happy.  It involves changing the emphasis of our thinking from what we want to what we have.  Rather than wishing your spouse were different, try thinking about her wonderful qualities.  Instead of complaining about your salary, be grateful that you have a job.  Rather than wishing you were able to take a vacation to Hawaii, think of how much fun you have had close to home.  The list of possibilities is endless!

Each time you notice yourself falling into the “I wish life were different” trap, back off and start over.  Take a breath and remember all that you have to be grateful for.  When you focus not on what you want, but on what you have, you end up getting more of what you want anyway.  If you focus on the good qualities of your spouse, she’ll be more loving.  If you are grateful for your job rather than complaining about it, you’ll do a better job, be more productive, and probably end up getting a raise anyway.  If you focus on ways to enjoy yourself around home rather than than waiting to enjoy yourself in Hawaii, you’ll end up having more fun.  If you ever do get to Hawaii, you’ll be in the habit of enjoying yourself.  And, if by some chance you don’t, you’ll have a great life anyway.

Make a note to yourself to start thinking more about what you have than what you want.  If you do, your life will start appearing much better than before.  For perhaps the first time in your life, you’ll know what it means to feel satisfied.

You’ve asked for lokpal, and lokayukta who are not answerable to the government or judiciary, right? But Anna, if such lokpal, and lokayukta’s or their family members are threatened by some goons, what happens?

Perhaps what you’ve suggested might work for a short while. That too in the cases of clerical cadres, and lower level government officials. In the case of higher officials including corrupt politicians, they just have to send their henchmen across.

It wont be long before the lower level government officials also come up with something that suits them. My mind comes up with this possible way to take bribes.

All lower level staff will pool their monies, and appoint a henchman who would stand at the door of the government office. Only after all bribes are paid, would the poor citizen get to leave the premises, with virtually no evidence, and no recourse to either lokayukta or lokpa. As a punishment for having participated in anti corruption campaign, citizens might even have to pay higher bribes which will be used by the corrupt officials to pay the henchmen.

Well, Anna, did it occur to you that we are increasing employment in the henchmen category? Did you think that you are eventually going to hurt the citizens some more?

Please dont misunderstand me. I have great respect for you Annaji. But you are still in a very idealistic world. Even your followers have not seen this end of the world. Time you recruited some people who have really suffered in the hands of such corrupt people to plug all the loopholes.

And Annaji, should we start fasting everytime we feel our demands are not met so that Parliament bends its knees? There are so many reasons to protest these days. Will we be able to function at all?

Just wondering..

Best regards,

Happiness can come quite easily and is always present in our lives if we only recognize it.
When the question and subject of “what is really happiness” comes up in a conversation many people come up with various reasons on how happiness is created. Some people speculate that happiness is a state of mind. This might be true in some respects that happiness is a main component of our thoughts and feelings. But I propose that happiness is something that we are all innately born with and instantly drawn to it. The human soul’s natural state of being is utter happiness and connected with God, the Earth, and the entire universe simultaneously. The purpose of our lives is to be happy – Dalai Lama.

When you are the state of happiness, you are aligning yourself with the full potential of the universal source of all love and possibilities. Happiness is something not ready made. It comes from your own actions – Dalai Lama. Have self-confidence in your own ability and potential, and create the world you want and need to be happy. Once the soul has left the boundaries of the limitless potential of the spiritual realm and embarks on a journey with the mundane, physical limited existence upon the Earth, it begins again to reacquaint itself with the familiarities of regaining its true existence of finding happiness. Happiness is a direction, not a place  – Sydney J. Harris.

The state of happiness is a feeling derived from love and enjoyment of your own existence and surroundings. Listen to your life. All moments are key moments – Frederick Buechner. Look upon your life as stepping stones to a grander existence that you create from your own experience and hold your head up high to the positive outcomes that are surely to come your way and help facilitate your most precious dreams. Happiness is not something you postpone for the future; it is something you design for the present – Jim Rohn. By your own actions and moods set the theme of the day. Enjoy every part of life’s existence, embrace the sunlight, marvel at the ocean blue, walk amongst nature’s natural beauty, and give love to those you meet.

Having happiness and hope in our hearts opens your mind and imagination to the possibility of miracles happening in your life. Happiness is not an ideal of reason, but of imagination – Immanuel Kant. Like walking on the beach until the sun goes down and your total consciousness is relaxed, free, unworried, uncluttered, filled with natural contentment, and feeling a natural sense of love opens yourself manifesting a powerful faith in all that is good and possible. Love is the greatest refreshment in life – Pablo Picasso. When you are in a state of love and happiness you are recognizing spiritually quality, and experience a profound feeling of intimacy that is immensely beneficial to your whole existence.

Following the path to happiness and experiencing a state of constant happiness one should be mindful of these simple things. We are what we think. What we think, we become. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts, we make the world -Buddha. Celebrate the day, celebrate your life! Live life to the fullest. Listen to the sounds of love and nurture the future with intuitive happiness. Make your dreams come alive, have faith in yourself, and create miracles in your life. The Grand essentials of happiness are: something to do, something to love, and something to hope for - Allan K. Chalmers.

Discovering your own happiness and finding out what makes you happy greatly affects your life in a positive way and imparts to others a gift of shared happiness that is contagious. Happiness is said to be like a kiss that you must share to fully enjoy it. Happiness and love are connected and knows no rules or boundaries. If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun  - Katharine Hepburn. From your heart and soul comes love and happiness that knows no bounds or limits, and manifest offsprings of smiles, hugs, hope, and laughter that are the makings of a wonderful day. Miracles come from the embodiment of happiness and love. For laughter and happiness, smiles and kindness, spillover the present and make the future even more lovable. When happiness comes you are in an existence of pure potentiality and your heart is filled with immeasurable joy.

For more interesting writing by this author:

Time Travel or The Rip Van Winkle Complex
Olivia Munn leaves Attack of the Show
The Consciousness of water
The Art of Smiling
The Power of Healing Music

T.S.Garp © Copyright 2011 All Rights Reserved.

WOW! I hardly expected to rouse such a storm of debate about this topic, when I read about it on the web, but I simply had to write the post, because the ethical issues involved are truly immense, and the possibilities endless for actions that people might take, once the test results are in. OK, right now this is a little far-fetched, because the experimental technology, though proven, is still relatively new, and truly accurate predictions on death dates may be some years away yet.

The pace of change, these days, however, in terms of advances in technology is frighteningly rapid, at times, and who can say for sure that it will not, within a few years, have reached the stage of telling the tested person in what year and month their death will probably occur? Imagine that the person concerned is you, and you want to be remembered in history for a long time. You might have months or years to plan your final actions, meaning they could be as dramatic as you like.

You could commit some unspeakable crime, knowing that you had almost no time left in which to answer for it, or get yourself into a mountain of debt that you would never have any intention of paying off. You could fulfill those boyhood ambitions without fear of reprisal because you would know that time was not really on your side, except in the most perverse sense of all. The questions raised by this news are endless.

If it does, as those announcing it expect, really take off, in terms of uptake, how then will the fact that a large swathe of the population know roughly how much time they have left sit with those who do not? Would anyone be happy going into partnership with someone who was confident of living for another forty years, say, when the other half of the equation had no idea?

Would a man who had been tested really not want his bride-to-be to undergo the test, to make sure they had time to look forward to, and would he call the marriage off if her result was unfavorable? These may seem like stupid questions now, but in a society where the ability to foretell lifespan became the normal thing, then nothing could be done about insurance, business generally or even relationships if the people concerned had not had the test.

That is, I hate to say it, the nightmarish possibility that such tests throw up. Big Brother wanting even more of a handle on the citizens through knowing roughly how long, barring accidents, they should be around for. It is very easy to see that the age test could well become mandatory for every child at puberty, easing the planning burden for pension provision, schools building, housing needs and so on.

WHOA! I hear you all crying out, this is the worst picture you could paint, and surely this simple test, with the obvious medical benefits in research terms, could never be allowed to get so out of hand, surely not?  The problem is that it is a private company starting off the testing process, and the profits lure must be huge, because they propose to offer humanity an answer to a question that has plagued every human on earth since the beginning. WHEN WILL I DIE?

Wisdom may dictate that this testing process, still in the infancy stages, be regardedby everyone with a huge pinch of salt, but the urge to know will override every hint of common sense, and the laboratory involved will be besieged with applicants. I will definitely not be among them, because I really do NOT want to know, and feel truly sorry for those that think they do.

This year people are only buying a few gifts and making the rest . If you are looking for things to make this year for little or no money, here are some great hand-crafted gift ideas for the holidays. One cheap inexpensive gift idea is knitting things like , blankets, pillows, doilies, baby clothes and much more, the possibilities are endless.

Another thing is you can make quilts out of things like old jeans, or material that you have laying around the house. But you can also make things like place mats for the table or a carrying case of a notebook and pen. By sewing and using old material that not stained up you can make some very useful fun things .

For the baker in some of us you can make bake goods and then dress up a coffee can with a cover and put the bake goods in there and give them as gifts . Or if you have some fun Christmas type plates you can decorate them and then gift them as a gift to go with the bake good, either way you do it they are all hits around the holidays .

If you are hungry and you have enough wisdom to begin to meditate on food, somewhere along the line, if you dream long enough, you will forget your hunger. What it means is that you went into the future, borrowed satisfaction and brought it into the present temporarily. Of course, occasionally you will run into the physical and natural challenges that will slap your face and take your dream from you; but it is up to you to ‘slap’ that reality back and collect your dream.

When we are not conscious of the vision, which is what makes a person a leader, there will be no direction. The greatest threat to the survival of the average person is the future. It is the inability to know where to go and what to do today to make tomorrow better. That is why wherever you find a person who has developed the capacity to capture vision for self and others, that person becomes a magnet. Whether in a church, business, family, school, city or nation, he will attract people because people need vision to survive. 

Image via Wikipedia

We all have hopes, dreams; wishes for us to advance onward. It is in our nature to want things, to set goals for the future. So why do we, as a society find it necessary to accept our lives the way they are? Well because we are tricked, the concept of illusion.

We, as people, always feel the immeasurable need to be of use, to have a place, a purpose. We look around at what society has to offer, then at ourselves; we compare the two and see how we can fit in more perfectly than a puzzle piece. No person wants to feel useless, no matter how much he/she says he/she doesn’t care. Knowing this, we might also recognize that most people lie to themselves, so that they can derail from the truth, in search of false existences.

So, to answer the thousand-year-old question, “Why do we accept our lives the way they are?” Well, it’s quite simple, actually. It all has to do with the goals we set. Every person these days has a goal in mind that already has competition – Journalists, authors, college attendants, sports stars, presidents, etc. We are all fooled into believing that there is only one hat in which all of the possibilities already present, and you only get to pick one. In true nature, respectively, the possibilities are endless.

Freedom, especially in this day and age, is an illusion. How so? Life and everyone around it say that you are free to choose, but it isn’t freedom at all if you are stuck with the options only society offers you. Once you put your hand in that hat, you’ve already started stumbling in the wrong direction. The trick here is that there are many hats, and you can mix and match, grab as many as you desire.

Instead of having just one thing to fuel you, have multiple things. You are not limited to one choice. For example, the members of the rock band Disturbed all met in Harvard, they were planning to be lawyers; now, they are one of the most well-recognized rock bands in recent times, but they are still lawyers.

Life sometimes sprouts opportunities right before your very eyes, don’t ignore them, not even the small ones. But I suppose I shouldn’t tell you to wait, because waiting will get you nowhere without luck. You have to individually go out there, against the world, and find what you’re looking for, even if you have no clue as to what it may yet be. Keep an open mind, because the simplest idea, event, or occurrence could land you into life-altering dilemmas.

Things to look out for:

• Randomness
• Interests
• PEOPLE (most important of all)
• Whatever your mind may dream up

Life sometimes presents things in the strangest ways, don’t let them slip by or take them for granted.

Actually, simple and complicated problems almost follow the same approaches. The only major difference is the level of thinking in each step of decision making.

APPROACHES

1) Recognize the problem. Before being able to make a decision, a problem has to be recognized and verified. By this step, the person knows where to start and how to deal with the problem. 

2.) Recognize the possibilities. As one recognizes the problem, the possibilities to solve it will automatically come to awareness. There are times that not all possibilities or choices are being taken consideration especially when under pressure. That is why it is a must not to close mind when trying to make a decision.

3.) Limit the choices. Start to relate the possibilities or alternatives whether they are relevant or not. Make sure to cut down the list and leave those that fit.

4.) Take note of the details. Make sure the important details and/or additional information needed between the problem and solution or choices are completely considered. Let not pass even a minute one into slip that can affect the final decision to make. It’s difficult to go back.

5.) Make the decision. After sorting everything out, make the desired decision which can best solve the problem.

6.) Do it. A decision will only remain in mind as a plan unless taken action. To be able to evaluate whether the decision made is right put it into action and evaluate the result. But remember to accept the consequences of the action taken.

Reminder:

Never make an important decision when depressed, upset, very tired, exhausted, preoccupied, and most of all angry. An attempt to make a decision under these states will only be put to waste and regret.

When you have asked effective questions about your behavior, the answers you receive can be used as premises to make inferences about the origins of your various behaviors. Inferences depend on both the accurate observations of your behaviors and your individual accumulated knowledge of the environment. The available knowledge during the Renaissance was that the Sun orbited the Earth. I wasn’t until the use of empirical evidence followed by effective reasoning that the truth was revealed that the Earth orbited around the Sun. Empirical evidence are facts experienced from conducting an experiment. Reasoning seeks out the cause of observed facts.

If your knowledge of your environment (internal and external) is limited, your ability to effectively utilize reasoning is limited as well. For example, let’s go back to the apple analogy. The apple falls from the tree and hits the ground. Three people view this occurrence. The first says that a ghost plucked the apple from the tree and threw it to the ground. The second says that the stem of the apple gave way from the weight of the apple and it fell, but doesn’t understand why it fell. The third has repeatedly experienced the law of gravity and has seen its results through experience. He agrees with the observation of the second person but has more knowledge of his environment. An effective inference is one that follows from the observation of all of the evidence available and is combined with the existing knowledge of the observer.

If you infer that the reason you react negatively to people that chatter to much comes from your dislike of noise, that could be and emotional reaction to the sound of the chatter. If you have more knowledge about how your emotions are layered, you might begin to investigate the underlying layered emotions that aren’t readily apparent when you react to the noise. When you dig deeper you begin to understand the workings of your own mind. Many people are afraid to do this because they don’t have the knowledge of what they are doing or they are afraid of getting to know themselves better. If you truly want to develop a deeper understanding of yourself, you must educate yourself about the workings of the mind in general and employ techniques to minimize or remove your fears. Recognizing that you are not compelled to react to everything in your environment can help minimize the feelings of false fear. False fears are secondary fears. They are emotional reactions to situations, events or occurrences in your life that are based on what might happen (usually something negative).  To completely remove false fears from your life you must acknowledge and recognize why they are there; to protect you from possible harm. Real fears are initial (primary) fears such as the fear of getting burned. You won’t put your finger in an open flame because you know it will hurt.

A common acronym for fear is False Evidence Appearing Real. This should be correctly said as false conclusions about perceived evidence that create end results that appear real to you. Why does this occur? Because your ego is your survival mechanism and it automatically reacts to anything that possibly threatens its dominance and control over your survival. That’s its job! Your job is to rise above this reaction and reason out what could happen negatively and change your thought patterns to reflect positive outcomes instead of assuming that the negative will automatically happen. Assuming comes from taking too many things for granted and accepting past evidence as being static. If it happened in the past this way, it will always come to the same result. It presumes that if nothing can be perceived that exists to the contrary then it must be true. This universe is an ever-changing universe and to deny its dynamism is foolish at best.

Don’t automatically assume that the worst will happen. The awareness of this is good to allow you to prepare for what the worst possible outcomes could be. If you ultimately expect the best to happen, you will convert positive possibilities into successful probabilities through the Power of Expectation. Primary fears are good because they protect you from possible harm. Secondary fears are not so good because they cause you to second guess your abilities and slip into mediocrity.

Inferences about the origins of your behavior are only accurate when you educate yourself, remove false fears and truly seek to better yourself. Honesty in dealing with your behaviors is paramount to your success in designing a plan that will lift you out of the mire of emotional reaction into the light of mental pro-action. The results will be a better understanding of yourself, a clearer focus on your goals and a sheer determination that will lead to you expecting only the best in your life.

This may all sound a bit of a Pollyanna approach. But I started this attitude at a time when I was struggling with things I had little control over. Determined to stay positive I tried thinking about the good things that had happened each day, no matter how small. It became a bit of a game, a distraction from the mentally draining things life was throwing at me. Sleep came more easily when my mind was positive.

When the end of the year came, it therefore seemed appropriate to do the same, to look back on the positive things. What had I actually achieved? The result was surprising, and I’ve been doing it ever since.

My new life long resolution grew from that decision and I have had the same resolution for about ten years now. It’s magical as it can’t really be broken. And it keeps me focused on getting the best out of life.

You see, my resolution is to do as many new things as I can for the first time in the coming year. This may include going places, meeting people, learning new skills, eating a new food, attempting something out of my comfort zone – the list of possibilities is endless.

What Have I achieved in 2009? I will wait till New Years Eve to write my list and do my reflection. But writing on Triond and being involved in the opening of a brand new coffee espresso bar will be right at the top.

Life can be so much fun when we remain open to new possibilities. Is there something you’ve always wanted to try but keep putting off? Maybe this coming year, 2010, will be the time to try it. Forget about all the reasons why you can’t or shouldn’t do it. Just have a go.

At the same time, remain open to new ideas, try things you’d never usually dream of trying.

In the coming year, why not say to yourself, I’ll try as many new things for the first time as I can. Give yourself an adventure that will last the rest of your life. Embrace life by continuing to learn and grow.

Image via Wikipedia

Other articles I’ve written include:

International Arts Festival, Wellington, New Zealand 2010

2010 – Ten Years Into The New Millennium