Is Happiness A Scam?
We keep hearing all the time that “Less is more” or “It’s So Simple to Be Happy and So Difficult to Be Simple.”
Is it really so difficult to be simple? It is!
After all, it’s completely opposed to what we are taught all our lives — at school, at home, at work. We spend years learning that in order to have a certain identity, get a certain status it’s imperative to study, get skills, set goals, and work towards achieving those goals. Attaining our goals will deliver us to the ‘supposed state of happiness.’ So we work doggedly, get a job, accumulate possessions, get into a relationship, only to discover this formula doesn’t always work. It doesn’t always add up.
“Happiness resides not in possessions, and not in gold, happiness dwells in the soul”.
-Democritus
Pursuing happiness is one of our God-given rights, so why is it so elusive?
It takes quite an effort, and willpower, to unlearn all that we strive hard to learn all our lives. To understand that being happy is not so difficult afterall. To understand that to simplify our life we just need to identify the essentials and eliminate the rest. If something doesn’t add to our life, it doesn’t belong to us. To make a choice about what’s important and let go of all the remaining.
The hard part however is to get our priorities clear. To tune in to our inner voice, listen to it, to resonate with it. To have the courage to follow our heart. Sometimes, to be truly happy we have to leave everything behind and start again from zero. At other times, it may mean some real inner work to heal wounds, fix frustrations and find new motivation. There will always be obstacles in the way — something to be gotten through first, some unfinished business, debts to be paid, dues to be cleared. But that’s life, a continuous journey. So, wherein fits happiness? Happiness is a mindset for our journey, not somewhere we have to end up. It is not a destination.
Coming back to our original question - "Is happiness a scam?"; "Is the pursuit of happiness a hoax?"
The pursuit of happiness is only a hoax if we search for meaningless happiness. Happiness can be our constant companion if we allow it to be. All we need to do is - find our purpose, pursue it, and watch happiness take permanent root in our hearts.
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