happiness – Page 2 – Time Travel Rescue

Why music?

Who loves music? It seems everyone does. I know I do!

I just attended a symphony concert. The first piece of music felt like the dreams of a summer afternoon. Fragmented. Ethereal. The second, watching the ocean from above refracting sunlight. And the third a meditation under a moonlit night and crashing waves. * (links below)

All my cells still shake from the concert. The concert hall is my temple. Where I commune with the Universe.

The sound! The Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra conjured what felt like a magnetic field with a golden halo. The field synchronized with me, enveloped me.

Music is kinetic. Directed energy.

The sound waves literally vibrate all our cells and penetrate our entire body. Not just through our ears. The vibrations, in a sense, merge with us, as explained here:

https://indianapublicmedia.org/amomentofscience/physics-sound-waves-feel-music.php

Unlike paintings and sculptures, for example, that reach our inner world through sight, music can stir our soul through sound and vibration.

Maybe that’s why music is so important in mythology. Perhaps, a sacred art.

What kind of music moves you? Have you lost track of time, forgotten who and where you were, remembered a special time in your life, set sorrow and tears free, entered altered consciousness, and/or simply come ALIVE?

Have you seen how music can resurrect the memories and joys of dementia patients, literally transporting them to happier days? Music is a time machine.

Then keep listening, singing, and dancing! That’s what we are here to do. An important purpose of life is to come alive by doing what makes us feel alive. It’s no idle leisure. The good energy you generate, the good vibes, help raise our collective consciousness and improve the world we live in.

* The music from this evening…

Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun

Daphnis et Chloé

Scheherazade

Mother and Father

I now think of “mother” as a state of being, not limited by a formal or biological connection. I have a mother. And I also have a Mother, the sum of my mother, aunts, grandmothers, and more. A powerful force in the universe, a loving and nurturing maternal energy.

Some of those who grew up not feeling fully accepted and loved might have been surrounded by love, actually. Along with the mother, other loved ones nurtured, protected, accepted, and loved them as a collective maternal presence. More powerful and loving together than any individual mother can be.

If we didn’t realize that, we might have underappreciated a great fortune of our lives. Some of us might have even spent years feeling lacking, unworthy, incomplete, and rejected while being completely enveloped by love.

I now think of “father” similarly. A protective, loving force with a tender side. Tough and maybe almost impossible to be completely fulfilled by one person all the time. So, let us think about, and feel, the love from our father, uncles, grandfathers, other family and even friends, and consider the possibility that the fatherly, paternal protective force we needed might have always been there, and will always be.

And may be, just may be, WE can nurture, accept, and love ourselves with that warm material glow. We can also provide, protect and love ourselves with that tough and tender paternal energy. In that sense, we become a part of the love that completes ourselves, we literally become the love that starts our healing.

Thank you for reading. 🙂

Release guilt

Do you want to feel happier? Are you willing to do what it takes to be happier? If you are, then start releasing guilt. Let it go. Learn to release it.

Here, the words guilt and feeling guilty aren’t legal or technical. They simply mean blaming yourself for something that has already happened, regardless of whether you’re actually responsible, or even whether you were there.

The human condition

We have so many ways of blaming ourselves and feelings badly. We blame ourselves for things we did or didn’t do, and for things we said or didn’t say.

Some of us even blame ourselves for things that we know aren’t our fault. For example, how many children blame themselves for their parents’ divorce or anything else that happened at home? How many continue to do so even after reaching adulthood and learning that it’s not their fault? The may know, intellectually or logically, it’s not their fault, but they still feel or believe it’s their fault.

It’s not your fault because hurt feelings you experienced, witnessed, or even caused come from fear, which leads to insecurity or even anger on one or both sides. They don’t reflect either or both people’s true selves. There wasn’t anything wrong with you. We’ll talk about this more in future posts. But in any case:

The human condition has made the urge to blame very strong.

But what happens when we blame ourselves? Have we often or ever felt better from blaming ourselves? Not from my experience.

Feeling worse seems to be the only result of self-blaming. Feeling worse is the opposite of your desire of becoming happier.

If guilty feelings come from blaming ourselves, and self-blame seems to always make us feel worse, the why do we keep doing the thing that makes us feel worse? Remember that:

We are the thinkers of our thoughts. No one else can think them. Blame is a thought. So we, not the external world, generated the blame. This self-generated action always seems to make us feeling worse.

How can we become happier by doing something that always makes us feel worse? If you choose to be happy, and you commit to do what it takes to be happy, then you must try blaming yourself less.

The futility of self loathing

Plus, blaming ourselves and feeling worse about the past does nothing to improve the situation.

When we blame, we judge ourselves harshly now for something that happened before. What happened can’t be changed. Only our feeling about it can.

Our feelings about, and understanding of, the past are the only things that we can change about the past.

So blaming ourselves seems to be a total waste of time too! The act of blaming not only makes us feel worse but also wastes the time and energy spent on blaming!

Why keep doing something like that?

Do this instead:

What if we blame ourselves less, and use the freed up time and energy to do something to improve things in the future?

Falling out with a lifelong friend because of a big argument and the things you both said? Accept the fallout. Blame yourself less for the things you said. Now you know that blaming can only make you feel worse.

Blaming won’t take those words back. Blaming yourself takes time and energy away from making things right, from simply relaxing, and otherwise enjoying life. Blaming is a waste of time. Why do something that’s a waste of time?

Instead of blaming, think about what can you do now or in the future to repair or resurrect your friendship. The only thing we can change about the past is our feelings about the past. But we can do things now and in the future to make things better. Neither of you can take back what was said. But you can stop blaming yourself for what you said, apologize and do things differently in the future if needed, and start forgiving your friend for what he or she said.

And if there’s nothing to be done about that situation or relationship, then think about how you can improve other situations or relationships. Indeed, it’s better to do almost anything else. Even doing nothing is better than blaming ourselves and feeling guilty.

Redirect your thoughts this way to feel better instantly …

Although external circumstances and people can seem to cause our unhappiness, the truth is that it’s entirely our own thoughts that make us so.

As mentioned in an earlier post,

Nothing and no one can think the thoughts in our heads. We are the only person in the universe who can think our own thoughts.

This is liberating. If our own thoughts create unhappiness, then our own thoughts likewise can create happiness.

The thought that something is lacking in our lives makes us unhappy: the lack of money, recognition, status, relationships, and a thousand other things that other people seem to have more of.

The more we ruminate on what we lack, the unhappier we get.

And when we finally get what we want, happiness often seems fleeting. A big promotion that we’ve worked on for years? How long does it take before we feel lacking unless we get the next? A big salary bump? How long do we feel underpaid again? For how long does that shiny new car make us happy?

A general sense of unease and dissatisfaction pervades much of our lives. Always seeking, plotting, getting, all for a brief moment of respite.

Is real happiness fleeting? If what we thought would make us happy is temporary and illusory, then can it true that what we thought we lacked also wasn’t the true source of our unhappy condition?

If that’s true, then perhaps …

The more we think about what we have, the happier we become.

Instead of perpetually seeking, what if we redirected our thoughts to what we can be giving? Here’s one of the best advice / life philosophy I’ve ever heard:

The meaning of life is to discover our gift and give it to the world.
– Mr. Dave Bechtel

What if we focused our thoughts on finding our unique talents and using them in service of others? Instead of worrying about what’s missing, what if we think about what we have in our lives, and create ideas about how to share them with others? How about focusing on how fortunate we are?

What is YOUR gift and how can you share it with the world?

Happy New Year! May you continue to be blessed and find ways to share your blessing. May all the good you share with the world come back tenfold to make your life even better.

An antidote for resentment

Resentment, the bitter feeling of being treated unfairly, of being wronged, can persist and ruin an entire month, year, or even a lifetime – – not of the alleged or actual wrongdoer but of the person resenting. So as the old adage goes:

Resentment is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. Even if they did, you’re still poisoned.

It casts a dark cloud over how we see the world. Because one can ruminate on resentment incessantly, it can often dominate our inner world, rob us of precious moments, and distort our life experience.

We can resent all sorts of things, from being cut off in traffic to being passed over for a promotion to feeling unloved or unappreciated.

It’s hard to stop resenting because, as far as I can tell, resentment always feels justified by the person doing the resenting. The person resenting always feels he or she is right to do so.

On the other hand, resentment always seems to produce unhappiness. Has anyone ever felt better, more relaxed, by resenting something or someone? Resentment and happiness don’t mix, they don’t coexist.

Do we want to be right, and keep resenting, or be happy? If you choose happiness, then here are some preliminary thoughts:

Acknowledge the resentment. Honor your feelings. Talk to a trusted friend or family to get it out of your system. Talk to the person you resent, if a productive talk is possible. If not, write a letter to that person and get all your thoughts off your chest. Then burn the letter.
Decide that resentment hurts us more than anyone else. Know that resentment poisons our soul.
Choose happiness over poison.
Decide to release the poison.

If you choose happiness over, and let go of, poison, then here are a few possible antidotes:

1. Remember that it’s not personal

People do and say things because of what’s going inside of them, not because of you. People act in accordance with the level of their awareness. Hurtful words and actions come from fear, insecurity, and things about that person we simply know nothing about. They are not about us. We’re not responsible for someone else’s fear, insecurity, and what we don’t know about. Even if they said or did things to you, it’s still not about you.

2. Try “reverse empathy”

Have YOU ever done or said things to someone that you resent being said or done to you? I have. I’ve said and done hurtful things out of my own anger and stress (see above) and mistakes (I thought one thing, reality was another).

Have you ever hurt someone when you didn’t mean to? I’ve hurt someone’s feelings. Many times. But I have rarely, hopefully never, done and said things out of sheer malice, out of an intent to hurt someone. I may not even realize that I’ve hurt someone.

I’d like to be forgiven for my words and actions, and I really, really hope that I’ve not caused someone to be hurt and resentful. For this reason, “reverse empathy” helps me, which for me means putting the people I resent into my shoes.

In addition, as much as we feel right to be resenting, the person who we resent may feel right – and even mean well toward us – in doing and saying whatever it is that we resent. Everyone’s different, thinks differently, and may experience and interpret the same event totally differently.

3. Release the resentment to enjoy your life more

A life that’s filled with love and happiness can seem like a total bummer if we spend time resenting rather than living.

I used to resent a handful of events in early childhood. The stuff we talk to psychiatrists about. I felt sorry for my life because of those events, but I now see that they make up less than 1% of my total life experience. What about the more than 99% when life ranged from normal to awesome, when I was literally surrounded by love?

For this reason, a strong antidote for resentment may be gratitude. But we may have to stop resenting, at least momentarily, to see the things to be grateful for.

If we fixate on the events and people we resent, we lose the totality of our life experience. Our life, our experience of life, is literally what we think about. We may forget all the joy we actually experienced and, worse yet, we may be blinded by resentment to all the life’s joy we can be experiencing NOW.

4. Remember that life isn’t fair, and it’s okay

The sense of unfairness seems to be the foundation of resentment. For example, a child resents being punished for a sibling’s deeds, or an ambitious professional who resents a pay-cut while the (obviously less talented and comes in later) dude next cubicle gets promoted.

Life has no obligation to be “fair”. The Universe may be friendly to us, but it can’t ensure that every interaction is felt fair to everyone involved.

Plus, while we remember the times when life seems unfair to us, what about the times when life gave us an advantage, put us ahead of someone else?

Has life ever favored us over someone else? Has life been “unfair” to someone else to our benefit?

Remember that one time you got yelled at by Mom for the mess that your sister Jenny made? What about all the times that Jenny had to listen to Mom rave about you in front of others?

5. Transcend

Resentment comes from pain. They seem to go together. But pain can be our best friend. Pain can pinpoint the part of us that still needs healing.

What does our pain tell us about ourselves? What is our pain trying to teach us? Without pain, how would we know where to start healing ourselves?

Let our pain be the lighthouse of our spiritual journey. Figure out what hurts, and WHY we hurt. Heal the source so that we no longer suffer from someone’s words and actions. Release the resentment, heal the pain, and reveal what’s underneath: infinite joy, love, and our true, eternal and spiritual self.

Be the creator of your life (YOU)

“Identify with the actor, not the character.”
– Srikumar Rao

If life is a movie, would you rather be a character in it, or the actor?

Character

A character’s story is written. A character may be acted upon by forces outside his or her control. The character’s story ends when the movie ends, or if the character dies. The character cannot change his or her fate.

The character is in a way completely passive, set in stone by how the actor plays it. Many characters in movies, other than the heroines and heroes, are at the mercy of their circumstances. They might even seem powerless victims.

If you had to be the character, then how about being the hero or heroine of your life? If your life is Forrest Gump, would you want to be Forrest, Jenny, Momma, or Lieutenant Dan?

But some don’t see themselves as the hero or heroine of their lives. They might not see themselves as Maverick in Top Gun, or Hermione in Harry Potter. Some might identify with an extra, out of the limelight, or maybe a victim. Bullied or ignored by other characters.

It’s your life. It’s mine. If we had to be a character, at least choose the character we become. Be the Hermione or Forrest of our life. Fulfill our potential.

Actor

The actor has more freedom. The actor can interpret and effectively create the character. The actor lives on when the movie ends, the actor survives even if the character dies. If the actor plays the character well, she may win an Oscar and go on to better roles.

We can be the actor instead of the character in our lives.

If we “play” our role well in this lifetime, our prizes may include peace and joy within, plus true happiness for ourselves and others. (see The First Step). And when the time comes for us to depart this life, we leave without regret, with nothing weighing on our heart, with nothing but love and gratitude.

And if you believe that our true self is more than this physical body, is spiritual and eternal, then you know that you will return for future roles to continue learning and growing your soul.

And even if you didn’t do so well this round, it’s okay because you can return and eventually become a superstar. Even Keanu Reeves of Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure became the legendary actor in The Matrix, Speed, Constantine, Point Break, among others.

Indeed.

Creator

The actor still follows the script and the director, right? The actor interprets the character but changes neither his fate nor the storyline.

How would you like to be the writer, director, and actor of your life? For example, Bradley Cooper, who cowrote, coproduced, directed, sang, and played Jackson Maine in A Star is Born. Too heavy a story? How about Greta Gerwig in Lady Bird, Tom Hanks in That Thing You Do, or Ben Stiller in Zoolander?

They wrote, directed, and acted in their own films. They created their own stories, brought their vision to life, and interpreted the characters they dreamed up.

What life would you create? How would the story go, starting today? How would you want to feel when this story ends? How would you play THE lead character of your story?

Need some inspiration to start? The Hero’s Journey may be a good template:

“A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are there encountered and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man.”
– Joseph Campbell
The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1949)

YOU and I can be the hero of our life’s journey. We don’t need to limit ourselves to any character. We can create the life that we want.

* Special thanks to Kelly S. Walden, friend and counselor, for introducing me to The Hero’s Journey.

More information about The Hero’s Journey:

A Practical Guide to Joseph Campbell and the Hero’s Journey

We live in The Matrix, Part I

The Matrix tells the story of humanity tricked into thinking that they live in a vast computer-generated virtual reality that is created by satient machines. The virtual world is set in late 20th century. The main character, a hacker named Neo, took the Red Pill in order to see the world as it truly is.

The Matrix is a modern day cave allegory of Plato. We see the world, and ourselves, based on information that comes through our senses, not necessarily reality. The prisoners in Plato’s allegory thought the world contained only the shadows projected onto the wall that faced them because they’re chained and the shadows were the only things they ever saw.

In a sense we also live in The Matrix, although not necessarily in the same way as presented in the film. Instead of a virtual reality made from ones and zeros, our Matrix is constructed, at least in a major way, from the bundles of beliefs and ideas that govern how we move through, perceive, and experience life, both internally and externally.

Many assumptions disguise themselves as beliefs and are experienced as personal knowledge. These disguised assumptions often take the form of “should” statements. For example, many of us believe that in order to be a valuable person, we should get a good job, which means we should get a good degree from a good school. We also believe that we should have a romantic relationship, marriage, mortgage, kids, etc. at various milestones. All these beliefs determine what we do, don’t do, say, and don’t say, and pretty much create the lives that each person experiences.

Most of these beliefs lie deep in our subconscious that we may not even recognize their presence. Yet they run our lives and pretty much determine how happy or unhappy we are. These beliefs determine our perceived reality, just like the simulated reality world in The Matrix.

Our beliefs comprise our reality, our life, and our world.

Our work of life is to become aware of those beliefs, evaluate them, and release (let go of) or reprogram them if they are illusory. When we release or reprogram our false beliefs, we see the world as it truly is, not seen through a distorted lense. That’s like taking the Red Pill in The Matrix.

Except that in our case, taking the Red Pill wakes us up, sets us free, and gives us bliss. Whereas taking the Red Pill in the movie put Neo in a post-apocalyptic world.

For example, I used to believe strongly, or rather I used to KNOW that I needed to be all those things to be valued as a person, for example having a college degree, getting a highly respectable job, and climbing the corporate ladder.

Although I’m very blessed and happy to have my degree, my work, and professional achievements, I now see that the connection between my value or sufficiency as a human being and all the things I thought I needed to obtain or achieve is just my belief and the society’s. But the belief or assumption about that connection has completely shaped my life and how I value myself.

I now wish to release the connection between my personal worth and material or professional achievements. The new belief I want to instill is that I am good enough and I deserve love, simply because I exist. Relying on external circumstances to demonstrate my worth, as a very wise person pointed out, would subject me to their whims and fluctuations, which can be unreliable and unstable.

And so are you. You are valued, and you are enough, simply because you exist.

This new belief might evolve into that I’m happy and content just because I exist, and it doesn’t even matter whether I’m “valuable”, “good”, or “enough.” I don’t mean to suggest that I’m quitting my job to wander the world. Although I love my job and I am grateful for my life situations, I don’t need to define my self worth with them.

What are the beliefs that may be running your life? Can you imagine how your life would differ if you released the connection between your self worth and these bundles of beliefs?

The first step

You decide!

First, decide to be happy. Ready? And if you decide to be happy, then be willing to do what it takes to be happy, okay?

What’s happiness?

Everyone thinks they want to be happy. But what’s “happiness”? When I was 5, happiness meant holidays with cousins. Later on, happiness came from video games, first dates, passing the CPA exam, getting a new job, finding love, and making partner. None of them provided lasting happiness. Perhaps because they all came from the outside.

Someday, happiness may also mean another long term romantic relationship, marriage, and children. Maybe they will prove more durable and consistent than the other forms of possible happiness!

What if we looked for happiness within? What if, deep down inside, we ARE happiness? What if happiness means contentment, the absence of desire, the desire for things to be different?

That’s true happiness. Contentment is a state of mind, so happiness is a state of mind that requires nothing to change. Nothing other than being present.

What does it take to be happy?

Decide that it’s only found within. Give up searching outside.
Decide that YOU have the power and responsibility to give happiness to yourself and others.
Redefine happiness so that it can happen easily and frequently.

Who decides what happiness means, for YOU?

Do you want to decide when to be happy, or do you want someone else to decide for you? “I decide!!” Easy question. Of course we want to decide our own happiness ourselves, not someone else.

But if we decide to be in charge of our own happiness, then why did we give an external force, be it money, fame, status, or even another person the power to make us happy or unhappy? Why forgo happiness until the next promotion? Why let another person decide if we’re happy or not, by feeling unhappy when they’re not in our lives? We SAY we want happiness, but we DO things that make us unhappy.

Do you want to be happy all the time or once in a while? Do you want to make it easy for yourself to be happy, or hard?

“All the time!!” Says everyone, I assume. Of course I want to be happy all the time, every day if possible. Maybe you do too. But how often did we feel happy? If we want to be happy everyday, then we need to be happy WITH everyday. We need to be okay with everything that happens.

What does happiness mean to you?

If we’re only happy when we have that car, promotion, new house, then we make ourselves unhappy until then. If we get upset when it rains on a Saturday morning, then we make ourselves unhappy until the sun comes out.

Accept the things that we fear. If we fear poverty, illness, and disgrace, then imagine that we’re poor, sick, and humiliated and BE OKAY with it. Although many would say impossible to achieve, wouldn’t it be nice to be happy unconditionally, needing nothing and no one? Accept what you and I fear, in order to free ourselves.

What do you need to be happy? Your requirements of happiness?

In a way, we’ve decided what happiness means, whether we know it or not. We decided that we’d be happy ONLY IF this and that happens. We’d be happy if we got that promotion. If we married that amazing person. If we moved to that beautiful house. If we prevailed over our imagined rivals.

When we identify or create the conditions needed to find happiness, we make ourselves suffer, i.e., unhappy, until all those conditions are met. And if one or more conditions is outside your control (e.g., winning the Nobel prize, or Jenny texting you back), then even if you did everything within your power, your happiness may still never arrive.

When will all the conditions for our happiness be met? Why make ourselves suffer until then?

Redefine happiness so you can feel happier

I want happiness as often as possible. I hope you do too! In fact, I want to be happiness itself! Why wait? Start now and stay happy.

Conditional yes, but lower the conditions! One day, let’s be happy for no reason. Unconditionally. Until then, I might still need something or someone to help me. Maybe you do too. But that’s okay! Let’s try making the conditions as easily achieved as possible.

Redefine happiness? To be happy all the time requires making it easier to be happy. Lower the threshold of what it takes to be happy. So, if you defined happy to mean “marrying that one and only soulmate for me out of nearly 8 billion” or “winning that Olympic gold”, then you might feel empty until that happens. That’s a HIGH threshold. Plus it’s largely outside our control.

The higher the threshold of happiness, the unhappier we become

For this reason, a high threshold or definition of happiness, requiring a high standard and high risk of failure, not in our control, does not seem an efficient or promising way to happiness.

Defining happiness this way almost guarantees misery.

There’s nothing wrong with wanting an Olympic gold, or finding a one-in-a-multibillion soulmate. In fact, magic comes from those wishes becoming true. But the question is whether you want to NEED those things to be happy. Or said differently, are you willing to be unhappy until those happen? Are you willing to be UNHAPPY until you find your true love out of almost 8 billion? How about looking for your one true love AND be happy at the same time, while enjoying your life journey?

Create our own happiness!

If we defined being happy to mean “learning, growing, and serving the world,” then we’re much likelier to be happy. Each element: learning, growing, and serving, can mostly or totally be in our control. If we defined happiness to include learning and growing, then it’s in our control to learn and grow, and bring happiness closer to ourselves.

If you defined happiness to also include serving the world, then you can serve the world and bring happiness even closer.

So YOU can be in charge of bringing happiness to yourself, and lessening your stress, based on how YOU define happiness.

And guess what? You are the only person in the world who can define happiness for you. No one else can. They can give you ideas, but they cannot think a single thought in YOUR head, let alone deciding what happiness means, and when it comes, for you.

What does happiness mean for you?