Vivek shoved open the front door to his home. His head hung low, his shoulders drooped. His body was dripping wet from head to toe. It had been the worst imaginable day. First, he had been fired from his job. By afternoon, his things were packed up and he had been escorted out of the building in shame. To make matters worse, he found his car had been stolen. After reporting the theft, he started to walk home when the clouds burst open and unleashed a rain storm. As his body got drenched, his mind was consumed with a relentless swirl of painful emotions. He felt sick in the pit of his stomach.
As he stepped inside the living room, Tanya, his ten-year old niece ran up to him. She smiled gleefully and hugged his leg.
She looked up at him with soft eyes, “Will you play with me?”
Now, this is Vivek’s test, his moment of truth. Will he shoo his niece away, go to his room and continue to stay upset about his disastrous day? Or will he, despite his personal crisis, return Tanya’s hug and smile, and spend time playing with her?
Each of us faces similar tests every day. This example introduces the premise of this piece, which is about the art of practicing happiness. Anyone can be happy when things are going well, but it is an art form to be happy when circumstances are not the way we wish them to be.
Think about all the things you want in life. It may be to have a fulfilling career, to earn a lot of money, to find a perfect relationship, to keep a healthy body, and so on. If we examine these goals more closely, we will see that we want these things because we believe they will make us happy. Thus, happiness is the goal of all goals, the thing that underlies all our other desires. Everything we do revolves around the pursuit of happiness. The career, the money, the relationships, the health are all ways we think will lead us to happiness.
So, if we agree that happiness is the central goal that drives us all, then the question arises what is happiness and how do we get it? Most people equate happiness with feeling good. In our daily life, our emotions are driven by events that happen. If we get that job offer, we feel excited, otherwise we feel disappointed. If our dream girl says yes to us, we feel delighted, but if the response is negative, then we feel dejected. This sort of conditional happiness is circumstantial and fleeting. Even if we get exactly what we wanted, we only feel good for a while and then the feeling passes. It is an elusive, never-ending pleasure-seeking quest that we get stuck on.
I would like to suggest that happiness is not merely feeling good based on some circumstance that is transient. Happiness is the ability developed over time to radiate positive energy regardless of our external circumstances or internal emotions. It is a skill that we can train ourselves to develop.
I once attended a talk given by a spiritual master. During the Q & A session at the end, I asked him this: How do we make ourselves happy when everything is going wrong and we feel sad or angry inside?
His answer was simple: We cannot force ourselves to feel happy at any time. Feelings change all the time and are not under our direct control. The only thing in our control is our actions. We cannot will ourselves to feel happy, but we can will ourselves to smile, to laugh, to act happy. Research shows that when people are happy, they smile and laugh a lot, which is obvious. But, research also shows that when people smile and laugh a lot, they become happy. We must act happy and the feeling will follow.
This isn’t to say that we should deny or suppress our feelings. We should fully acknowledge what emotional states we are experiencing. Then, we should let these feelings be, and radiate positive energy anyways. Much like the soldier acts courageous as he picks up his fallen comrade and carries him across the battlefield, despite feeling terrified inside. Much like the shy young boy walks across the dance floor and acts confident as he asks a girl to dance, despite feeling nervous inside.
In the opening example, Vivek can hug and play with Tanya, while still being aware of his disappointment at losing his job and his car. He can take the necessary actions to get a new job and subsequently a new car later. But at that moment, he can still act as though he is happy, despite his emotions. This is the only unconditional, lasting happiness that is fully within our capacity to achieve.
This ability to act happy, to radiate positive energy can be difficult at times. Just like any other skill, like swimming or driving or cooking, it takes time and practice to learn. We can start to practice happiness by a simple exercise: At random times during the day, stop and ask yourself: Am I radiating positive energy? Take a few deep breaths and slow things down. Acknowledge your current thoughts and emotions. Let go of them. Then, act happy. Smile. Laugh, if you can think of something funny. Better yet, make others laugh with you.
The best thing about happiness is that it is contagious. When we smile and laugh, others around us tend to get infected and join in. Happiness passes from person to person more rapidly than any other condition.
To act happy is to do whatever it is that we would do if we were feeling happy. Smiling and laughing are two common behaviors. Other behaviors to indicate happiness include singing a song, or dancing or eating or playing or talking non-stop. To practice happiness, we must behave in a manner as if we were happy, after being aware of what we feel at that moment.
For me, the best way to practice happiness is to develop a sense of humor. I think that all living beings no matter how big or small, good-looking or ugly, intelligent or dumb, basically just want to laugh. When people laugh, they are closest to their natural selves. A person who has the ability to laugh at anything, especially at himself, never ceases to be amused. When we watch comedy movies and the protagonists get into all kinds of sticky situations, we find it funny. We would benefit a lot if we manage to look at our own lives as just a movie. And when trouble comes, we should see the funny side, and laugh at ourselves and at the situation we find ourselves in. I believe laughter is the key that unlocks the door to happiness.
Another way to think about this is say you knew that you had a terminal illness and had little time left to live. Would you waste precious time feeling angry or sad or would you enjoy what time you have left? Well, the fact is that you do have a terminal condition. We all do. It’s called birth. And we have limited time left in this world. We must enjoy every moment of it.
Happiness is a moment-to-moment practice. Life is a series of moments. At every moment, we have the potential to radiate positive energy into the world. Happiness is not something we get from life, but something we bring to life. So, be happy now, without reason.
