:::THE HAPPINESS PRACTICE SERIES::: PART 3
:::PART 3: A good person:::
What do you think makes a happy person? I think I have the answer. Hear me out.
A friend of mine asked me this question back in September I think, and since then I've been thinking about it. What makes a happy person? And how can one be happy while living a normal life, and doing all those things we all need to do that often are not prone to making us happy. I'm talking about compromising left and right, making money, being a good friend, daughter, wife or mother, saying no to things, saying yes to things, etc. You know what I mean. Because it seems that if we don't choose to have a simple life, of being a monk and meditating on a beautiful Tibetan hill, all else involves lots of compromising and struggling to stay above water.
I've been reflecting on this question nearly every free moment. I realize as I'm writing this that the above question has been hovering in my mind effortlessly in my subconscious on my way to the grocery store, walking my dog, on my way driving my kids to school, before a meeting, in the subway, or folding laundry.
I bet you've thought about this too, like we all do. What makes people happy. And more importantly, what makes ME happy?
In my 20s, I remember telling my mom that I didn't know what career I wanted - but the one requirement was to have a job where I was allowed to listen to music and maybe dance (as a freelancer, I now have that job - my office is my kitchen, and my lunch breaks often are dance breaks).
Four years ago, at the beginning of my happiness awakening journey, I thought the answer to being happy was to have a creative, fun job, rather than the corporate type of job that I've always had. When I started interviewing creative people, I started to see that there is more to happiness than creativity. Not all creative people were happy people. But all creative people had one thing in common - they were more likely to be more satisfied with their lives, because they followed what they felt was a strong calling, or passion towards their work. Using creativity and being passionate about choice of work was a massive piece of the puzzle I felt, but it wasn't all.
Other times I thought being happy meant to not have a job at all, to travel abroad, to be free. But that wouldn't be sustainable, and probably at some point everyone needs to settle down. I thought I could be happy if I lived somewhere sunny, by the beach.
When I interviewed bar owners or other types of business owners, I noticed another piece - that the more entrepreneurial, self-driven, free to decide what to do every day, the more satisfied people were. But still - there was more to a happy person than being a creative, free, entrepreneur.
As I continued to interview people of other professions like doctors, teachers, even a priest I talked to in Romania, I noticed another common thread - serving others, giving back, was another huge piece of the puzzle. At that point, I thought that was it. Maslow's hierarchy of needs had at one point culminated to giving back. Joseph Campbell, the mentor I wish I got to meet, also talked about the Hero's journey being about finding your purpose, and returning home to share learnings with people.
The happiness research I embarked on back in 2014 when I quit my full time job and took a year off was on one hand a rational, intellectual pursuit, and on the other hand, was and is all about my personal self discovery, and is a life long process for all of us really. It's the ultimate goal. It's what unites us. We all want it. The trouble is, we don't directly go after it, because we don't know what we're after in specific terms. Are we after a creative job? A life in the sun, in a hut by the beach? A life of entrepreneurship and freedom? A life of giving back? All of the above? At the same time? At different times?
Why do we have so much trouble figuring out how to be happy? Perhaps because we're not taught by our parents, or in school. Indeed we're taught to go after high grades, high paychecks, power, to follow rules to move ahead, to keep a low profile and to not stir things, to tell little lies and even big lies especially in a work context. I was raised this way, and with the best of intentions, by my fearless mom.
There is a lot of literature and science around mindfulness, spirituality, connections, and how to live a good life. I have read and will continue to read what my brothers and sisters in spirit write, and am so grateful for all the research and movement towards raising awareness of the importance of happiness. Reading has unveiled for me the complexity of happiness. And yet it still left me wonder - what makes a happy person?
A book I read last year started to inch in and helped me feel real progress in my understanding of happiness. In Designing your life, Bill Burnett and Dave Evans talked about a concept I had intuitively reflected on for ages. It is the idea that happiness is about alignment between our inner values with our outer actions. Not so different than the Aristotle's, Buddha's, or Jesus' approach. Think good thoughts, have good actions. But there was something more tangilble in that book that gave me an ah-ha moment - the idea of COHERENCE in our arc of life, and our day to day life.
I recently listened to an interview with Matthieu Ricard, the French scientist turned monk, and had a true breakthrough (love the sound of that, it rhymes!) in my understanding of happiness. I had heard him interviewed before, and read some of his beautiful thinking. Why is it, he asked, that some brilliant, accomplished, rich people are mean, grumpy, and unhappy? People who are at the top of their game, are philanthropists, and are free to do what they want, are still not nice, kind people.
As he says, when the apple is ripe, it'll just fall in your hand, effortlessly. It finally clicked.
Here is what I came to realize - and it's very simple - being a happy person is being a good person. Regardless of what type of job we do or where we live.
That means being **good** inside, being good to ourself; being good to our loved ones, to our colleagues, to our neighbors, to our kids, to our parents, to our community. It's something so simple and so intuitive, isn't it? We all know how to be good. What's not intuitive, and this still puzzles me, is that it's hardest to be good to our own self.
So today I invite you to a simple exercise. Reflect on what it means to be **a good person**. What does that look like for you?
:: WEEK 3 MANTRA ::
For those inclined to practice a mantra, here is a reflection for this week
... I fully open myself to the goodness in me. I put all my energy into welcoming the good in me and in others. I do not need to solve all my problems through overthinking or chasing dreams. I acknowledge what I do not yet know. In my heart I do know how to be a good person. I will express the best that I have within me with everything that I do and say...
Sending goodness your way!
