Disregarding the Pursuit of Happiness to Your Peril

You lead a busy life. You probably have a job, a family,
hobbies, relatives, community activities, and many more that
I can't even imagine. You pursue lots of stuff.



You can easily get caught up in all these pursuits and think
you are aiming at being happy. I mean you do all these
things, keep all your commitments, make more appointments,
because you think this is what it means to be happy. "I must
be on the road to happiness, I have all this to do."

But you are not happy. You may even be miserable - the
farthest thing from happy. What's wrong?

You have gotten caught up in the pursuit of your pursuits.
You have left no room for happiness. Please don't mistake
me. I find nothing wrong with pursuing legitimate and
positive goals, keeping relationships vibrant and
participating in a healthy community. But these can keep you
from your ultimate goal - happiness.

Of course there are only so many hours in a day and only so
many days in a week, etc. What you do with them is entirely
up to you.

But if you really want to be deeply and constantly happy,
you must slow down a little, at least, and find time for
happiness. The choice is yours as it always is. You are
leading a good life now. Do you want it to be even better by
having a great and consistent sense of well-being?

Then you need to do something different. Yes, that's
obvious, but are you going to do something different or did
you just want to point out to me that it is obvious? You
actually have to pursue happiness.

So, that may mean you will have to give something else up.
In order to have the sense of well-being that you want,
sometimes called happiness, you actually have to do
something that leads to that well-being. For example, you
will need to set aside time to meditate. Meditation entails,
in one form or another, time out from other pursuits to
quiet your mind and spirit. To empty your mind. To think
about nothing. To make contact with the All There Is.

You can see, I'm sure, that this entails letting go of
something lesser in order to gain something greater. What is
lesser is for you to determine, not me for you. But you see
this is a deliberate choice you need to make.

Suppose I am going on a trip and I can have only one
suitcase. Everything I need for that trip must, must, fit in
that one bag. I am going to a place where I cannot buy
anything I might have left behind when leaving for the
journey.

I must pack very carefully. The bag will only hold so much.


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"People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel." - Maya Angelou

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