How To Find Happiness
To find happiness is, like many things, something that can be talked about on many levels. It can be confused with fleeting moments of pleasure enjoyed in short bursts like an exotic ice cream.
But in this page I will not tease, or patronise you, with superficial appetisers. I will give you a roadmap to the deepest, most fulfilling type of happiness.
Happiness is like the Olympic Gold Medal for living. Except you're not competing with others and everyone can win.
Just like an Olympic event, it is a challenge. It takes dedication, practice and participation.
Life is a challenge. How else are we to find what we could be, or do, without being stretched?
There are 5 central challenges in life that determine whether we live happily or unhappily. Here they are...
But in this page I will not tease, or patronise you, with superficial appetisers. I will give you a roadmap to the deepest, most fulfilling type of happiness.
Happiness is like the Olympic Gold Medal for living. Except you're not competing with others and everyone can win.
Just like an Olympic event, it is a challenge. It takes dedication, practice and participation.
Life is a challenge. How else are we to find what we could be, or do, without being stretched?
There are 5 central challenges in life that determine whether we live happily or unhappily. Here they are...
Happiness Is...
Happiness is like the Olympic Gold Medal for living. Except you're not competing with others and everyone can win.
Just like an Olympic event, it is a challenge. It takes dedication, practice and participation.
Life is a challenge. How else are we to find what we could be, or do, without being stretched?
Can You Find A Vision That Inspires You To Meaningful Action?
Even If No-One Else Sees It
Nothing happens without a vision to inspire action. Everything from, the building of an empire, to the building of a house starts with a vision.People that are considered to have achieved greatness are those that had some greater cause that literally sucked the resources out of the ether and into where they could see and access them. People like Martin Luther King, Mother Theresa and Gandhi.
Being a visionary means seeing things that either don't yet exist or need fixing. However most of us think too small, aim too low and play too safe. It is by stretching ourselves that we create the space for us to more fully grow into our potential.
It is the size, power and clarity of our vision that determines the level of energy and excitement that we feel and also how many people will join with us to make it happen.
Can You Extend Your Sense Of Self?
Even When Resources Are Scarce
A powerful vision, one that will give you great energy and purpose, must transcend your physical body.You must see yourself connected to something bigger than just your personal self-interest. Martin Luther King saw himself as a part of Black America marching to equality. Mother Theresa saw herself as a conduit for God's love.
If your vision is for things like a better job, more money or more fulfilling relationships, it will not provide enough energy and passion to sustain you and you will lack purpose.
A concern for personal self-interest leads to loneliness, insecurity and fear. Self-interest separates yourself from others and makes you in competition for scarce resources.
We Are All One
Short Talk from J Krishnamurti
Can You Stay True To Your Vision?
Even When Logic Says To Settle For An Easier Time.
I wrote about a concept called the strongest emotion dominates. It is sometimes easier to understand with more obvious references. Essentially the idea is that whenever two people argue, one drags the other into their emotional state.So Joe is happily bumbling along, while Andy is raging. Andy's raging and seeks an outlet for his anger by venting it on Joe. Now whoever is most strongly attached to their emotional state will dominate this interaction.
If Joe refuses to take Andy seriously and doesn't get sucked into the fight, he'll dominate. Eventually he'll either storm off to find someone else to pick a fight with or he'll give in laugh and snap out of his mood.
What usually happens is that Joe will feel aggrieved, start to defend himself, get sucked into the argument and end up angry. In this case Andy's clinging to his anger made his the stronger emotion and so dominated.
This doesn't just happen between people though. It happens between you and Life. Life will test you.
Not because God needs to know if you are good or bad, but because it needs to stretch you. How valued would an Olympic medal or a Nobel Prize be if they gave them out to anyone who asked for one?
Do you really believe your vision is worth fighting for?
Can You Use Conflict To Grow?
Even When You Just Want Punch Someone
There's a phenomenon Psychologist's call 'Groupthink'.Essentially the finding is that a group of people too similar make bad decisions. Because they see the world in much the same way, they can't overlook things that aren't important to them, they fail to factor in responses of people unlike them.
James Surowiecki in his book, 'The Wisdom of Crowds' explains how important diversity is. Because no one person has all the information, or can calculate all the responses and permutations, the more people involved the more accurate a judgment can be.
However once we invest our ego's into a view or belief we take other views as an attack on our own.
So this is why people waste hours of their lives trying to convert others to their religion.
Or why people get so heated up about political issues and so on.
Yet this is just the emotional equivalent of two stags butting heads. It doesn't get either side anywhere. One might become the dominant one - for a while anyway - but both get hurt.
The real secret to happiness lies in a skill I call Sculpting that enables you to transcend conflict. What does this mean?
Every idea has some seed of value, however small. If we use the friction of two opposing ideas we can shave off the rough edges to reveal the essence of an idea.
Sculpting is the process when opposing sides honestly seek, not to boost their own egos, but to find the best solution.
This means being open to honestly explore all aspects of both ideas. In doing so they'll, step by step, cut away the false premises and mistaken perceptions that cloud their judgments.
Then by combining the essence of the two ideas into one you achieve a higher level of consciousness.
Can You Maintain Your Trust And Believe In Your Free Will?
Even When It Doesn't Seem True
The key to being able to Sculpt your way through conflict depends on trusting and believing that there is a solution and that you can find that solution.When we believe that fate has dealt us a bad hand. Or that our circumstances mean that we can't do X. We lose our freedom to choose our own life. And when we believe that we are not free, we take the downward spiral into a lower level of consciousness.
This in turn makes us feel less free and less able to take charge of our life.
What would be the point in trying if we can't make a difference?
Which makes us give up on our vision and so our lives seem less purposeful.
The Secret To Life Is...
The ability to know that you choose your thoughts.
Once your thoughts run away with you, you do become the victim of an insane, capricious and uncaring world.
Don't let the tail wag the dog!
Here's my favorite link:
What's Limiting Your Happiness?
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Find Happiness on Amazon
Paradigm Changing Books
To find happiness, you need to tweak your Operating System. The way that you do this is by finding bugs and glitches in the system.
Once you uncover and update these your Operating System is more effective and so in every area of your life, you are more effective and happier.
Once you uncover and update these your Operating System is more effective and so in every area of your life, you are more effective and happier.
A Course in Miracles: Combined Volume
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A Course of Love: The Complete Course
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Total Freedom: The Essential Krishnamurti
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Ask and It Is Given: Learning to Manifest Your Desires
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Freedom from the Known
Amazon Price: $10.07 (as of 12/01/2009)
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- Rob_McPhillips Rob_McPhillips Mar 26, 2009 @ 4:42 am
- Thanks Addys, Rich and Jacqueline.
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- Addys Addys Oct 18, 2008 @ 10:22 pm
- awesomee just awesomee :D
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- richgerman richgerman Aug 12, 2008 @ 9:45 am
- Very informative lens!
You might want to check out my lens on how to live a truly wealthy life.
Rich
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- jacquelinestone jacquelinestone Jun 16, 2008 @ 5:56 pm
- Rob, I love your attitude. You have good information here and its well-presented. 5*
Glad to have you in Empowerment & Enlightenment.
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- Cruisersel Cruisersel Mar 7, 2008 @ 7:58 am
- There is so much to learn on this site so I'll have to return to read more of these articles. Excellent articles, beautiful site. Ron, you're a pro at this, one of these days, I hope to have my lenses looking half as good.
Sel
http://millionairesmoneyclub.com/millionaires
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- Rob_McPhillips Rob_McPhillips Feb 8, 2008 @ 4:27 pm
- Hi Ron,
I think we all struggle with them. However as we change our belief structures we change our perceptions and so we look at the world differently.
This was originally a much longer article. If it helps you can read the full report at www.livewithoutconflict.com/reports/5challenges.pdf
Briefly though. I meant in challenge 2 that happy people were engaged in a deeply meaningful way with life, they were seeking to make a better world. And the bigger the mission, the happier they were.
In contrast unhappy people tend to be obsessed with their own problems. It all came together when I realized that loneliness and insecurity is the flip side of your personal self interest.
When we define our identity as our physical body, then we immediately separate ourselves from everything and everyone. We lose a connection and sense of belonging.
People like Gandhi & Mother Theresa saw their identity as a nation or as the world. They were part of a bigger whole, connected as one.
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- Ron Ron Feb 7, 2008 @ 5:20 pm
- I like your five challenges. I have a really hard time with all of them. Although, I was wondering if you could expand on the "extend your self worth." What do you mean more by that?
Next Steps To Happiness
Links for further information and training courses to help you live with less stress and more happiness.
- Take The Stress Reduction Challenge
- A free 30 day challenge with coaching and the support of a community to help you resolve one emotionally troubling issue.
- Free Coaching To Happiness
- The starting place for a idea packed training course to coach you to happiness.
by Rob_McPhillips
Rob McPhillips is a researcher into how we can all live more fully, meaningfully and enjoyably.
He shares his findings now at his blog;
http://livew... (more)
He shares his findings now at his blog;
http://livew... (more)
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