DailyHappyLiving.com

gopimenon November 21st, 2009

For the past several months, I have been sharing the philosophy that each one of us can make Happiness a Habit – by remaining aware of our feelings at all times and by controlling our thoughts, thus activating happy feelings!

So by now you regular readers know that you can make happy living a reality in spite of the circumstances, environment or other people.

That in itself is already a great achievement, since the majority of the people in this world are still struggling with the idea that ‘their happiness is based on outer circumstances and other people’ and not on their own choice.  They keep complaining about external things like:

• he/she makes me angry,
• my spouse doesn’t understand me,
• that road-hog makes me lose my temper,
• my boss makes me sick,
• the loss of a dear one makes me depressed,
• etc. etc.

They have not yet realized that it is always a choice they themselves make as to whether to get angry, or upset or sad or miserable.

But you, dear readers have already learnt that ‘no matter what the event, or circumstance; how we respond (not react) is always our own choice!’ You have learned to make happiness a habit!

While that is a great first step to happy living, there is a problem associated with ‘being habitually happy’ – namely, the lack of motivation to achieve!  I explored this idea a little in an earlier post ‘The Problem With Being Happy‘.  When we are habitually happy, we feel calm and at ease and lazy in a nice way and have no motivation to do anything much!

So how does a habitually happy person, get motivated to achieve anything new or exciting?

That is the subject of the Second Phase in Daily Happy Living – How to Increase Your Happiness!

Anyone can increase his/her happiness by using what I call ‘Happiness Enhancers’.

As explained in the above mentioned post,  Happiness Enhancers are anything that add to or increase our present state of happiness.

Examples of Happiness Enhancers are:

1. Having a Major Purpose in Life
2. Setting and Achieving Goals
3. Building Wealth
4. Building Health and Fitness
5. Having a Hobby (physical – such as tennis, football etc. or mental – such as chess, crossword, sudoku etc.)
6. Being Entertained by Others (music, novels, operas, dramas, movies, TV etc)
7. By Entertaining Others
8. & Many, Many More ….

But one of the best ways to increase your happiness is to find our your passion (purpose) and go after it with your whole heart and soul, expecting to succeed in your venture.  Remember my saying “Man Proposes, God Endorses!”   Because that is the truth!

The Creator would have to be stupid to first give you a passion or purpose or talent and then try to make sure you fail!  If ‘Man Proposes, God Disposes’ is true; what hope is there for mankind?  What can we puny humans do against the might of the Creator?  We are bound to fail!

Hence, know for certain that if God has given us a special talent or passion or purpose, it is for us to work on it, to excel at it and thus provide the world with the fruits of our special talent!  The Creator is not a sadistic dictator finding pleasure at our failures and our misery.  If we think of God as a parent, then we know that the Creator finds joy in each of us exploiting our talents to the fullest and achieving incredible goals and not in ensuring that we fail!

In my next post we will discuss this vital point on Purpose & Motivation which can lead to increased happiness.

To be continued….

• Motivation , happiness , happy living , unhappiness
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gopimenon November 9th, 2009

Hi There,

In an earlier post I wrote about ‘How to Forgive Strangers & Acquaintances’.  Today I will discuss ‘How to Forgive Family & Close Friends’

It is easier to forgive strangers and acquaintances, because we may not see them again or only see them again very rarely!  Hence there are less chances of being reminded about the hurt or anger.

However with family members and close friends, it is quite different.   We cannot avoid seeing them or interacting with them on a daily basis.   Hence the incident that caused the hurt or anger will keep coming back into our minds, every time we see them.

Also our expectations of family and friends are higher – we expect them to understand us and feel for us, much more so than we would expect from any others.  So we end up feeling greater hurt and disappointment.

The key here is ‘expectation’ – it is because we expect a certain behavior or a specific reaction from our family, that when we don’t get that behavior or reaction, we feel betrayed and are truly hurt!

So the solution to this problem is ‘acceptance’ and ‘love’ – unconditional acceptance and love!  The word ‘unconditional’ is very important when it comes to family.  If we love and accept the family member unconditionally, then we find it easier to forgive him or her.

The first 2 steps in forgiving a family member is similar to that for forgiving a stranger, namely:

1. To remember that when we decide to forgive someone, we are actually thinking of ourselves (our own well being) – not that of the other person!  In a way it can be considered a ‘selfish’ act – one that benefits us more.
2. To remember that by nursing thoughts of anger and hurt within our own minds, we are poisoning our own selves – physically (by the excess hormones we generate), mentally (by our thinking) and emotionally (by our negative feelings).

The extra step we need to take when forgiving a member of the family or close friend is learning to ‘accept them unconditionally’!   If we are judgmental about our spouse or other family member, then we are bound to react to them, based on our assumption of their motives.  We will not be able to respond fairly to their actions – because we will always be inferring ulterior motives to their actions.

The other thing is that when we hold some form of judgment about another person, we will be sending out different vibrations than if we were totally unconditional. 

For example, if I think my wife is ‘non-supportive’ then whatever she says, does or does not do (however innocently) will be viewed by me from the viewpoint of her being non-supportive.  And it is easy to find fault when we focus on the perceived faults. 

Thus there is no way I can forgive her – unless and until I practice non-judgment and unconditional acceptance of her!  I have to see her as a good loving person, with some faults or quirks, just as each one of us are with our own quirks and foibles and faults!

When I can come to this place of self-acceptance and acceptance of my spouse as ‘perfect at her own level of evolution’, then it will become much easier for me to forgive her when she does things that I do not expect and upsets me.

What I have found in real life is that when we begin to practice unconditional love and acceptance, we will experience less and less situations that upset or hurt us!

When we begin to feel unconditional love for others, they can sense it and they will automatically respond to those positive vibrations, and will begin to act in ways to reciprocate your love and acceptance! Thus they will often say or do things that please you and not upset you!

In another post I shall share some practical methods I use to help me forgive others and practice happy living on a daily basis! See you soon.

• anger , happiness , happy living , self acceptance
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gopimenon November 1st, 2009

Hi There,

Last week I wrote the first part of ‘How To Forgive Someone’.   Today I intended to write Part 2 of that post ‘How to Forgive Family & Close Friends’  but I have to postpone this to the next week because of a problem a reader brought up to my attention.

The Problem: “Your blog tells us that in order to be Happy, we should control our Mind!  But exactly how do I do that?  I find it so difficult to let go of my anger and vengeful feelings as well as fear feelings!  I would be grateful if you could tell me whether you use any special tools to help control your mind.”

My Answer:

Thank you dear reader for your question!

I get the same question from my wife!  “How exactly can I change the thoughts that I allow to dwell in my mind?  I can’t help but react to people who annoy me, or upset me or hurt me with negative emotions of anger, hurt and revenge!  So how can I forgive?”

The only way we can change our normal thought patterns is by being aware and by repetition!  Repetition is how we became the way we are.  As children when we react in one way that has helped us to solve a problem once, we tend to repeat the same action!

For example if we found as a child that throwing tantrums or shouting or crying helped us get what we wanted, and we keep repeating it – the subconscious mind accepts it as a successful reaction and makes it a habit!  So that  even though we are adults now, we still tend to get angry, raise our voices, frown, cry or whatever else worked for us once and has become ingrained in our mind as a HABIT!  I’m sure we can see examples of this everyday, whether at home or in the workplace!

Just like learning to drive a car has become a habit, our reactions to certain stimuli have also become habitual.   Of course it is difficult to change an ingrained habit!   It is not that our Intention is weak, but the Habit is too strong!  By repetition over years of reacting in a certain way, we have created ‘highways in our mind’ along which our thoughts keep traveling when we come across a certain stimulus!   Thus we need help when we want to create new better pathways in our mind.

This is where Technology can help!  You see that the problem with trying to change habitual thinking is that we are going about it the hard way – via the Conscious Mind (when our thoughts are in the Beta wave range).  We can find some small success with the Conscious Mind, by using constant repetition over a long period of time – perhaps months or even years! Continue Reading »

• anger , fear , happiness , happy living
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