HAPPINESS WITHOUT REASONS

Everyday there is a different reason for not being happy. Someday, it is because someone hurt us and we keep thinking about it, someday our health is not good. Someday it's simply because we are not in a mood. Someday, it's because a plan of ours didn't work out....and the list goes on and on. Very rarely are we happy.

All these reasons are valid and true. But the question is 'when will there be a day when the mind will offer no reasons to be happy?' Material world is a place of continuous drama and happenings, and the mind knows how to perfectly en-cash on it. Even if all our problems went away, will we be happy? A new set of problems will come or even if there are no further problems, the mind will make one. After all it's expert at it - creating problems where none exists. 

Happiness, joy, peace or love are unconditional, which means that they are not dependent on any conditions. Waiting for the perfect condition to be happy or peaceful is a great trap. One of the keys to happiness is to learn to see these reasons not as reasons but as excuses we give ourselves not to be happy. Our problems are not the real problems, our excuses are the real problems. These excuses are precisely what is coming between us and true joy.

When we say - I can't be happy because of 'so and so reason', is it really that we don't have the power to be happy despite that problem. Let's analyse this. What if someone held a gun on our head and told us, "just be happy, stop cribbing or I will shoot you!"  What will we do? Remember, our reasons are still there as it is. Will we be able to be happy? 100%, we will be happy irrespective of all our reasons. Why? Because our life is at stake.

Two points from this example. 

1. We always have the power to be happy even when we think otherwise.
2. ‎Many times we are not happy because we don't see it as very important or as important as life for us. It's not our number one priority.

Another justification we give ourselves for not being happy is - "if someone else would have been in my situation, he or she would have also been miserable, he or she would have behaved in similar ways." This is not true. There have been many people with more difficult issues and complications than us but who still manage to be happy and peaceful. Srimad Bhagvatam has the example of the devotee-child, Prahlad who was tortured so much by his father but still managed to fully focus on his Bhakti and be perfectly peaceful. We might say "He was from a different Yuga. It was easier for him". But we have contemporary examples of so many people who in spite of great challenges still chose to be happy.

Mind always makes exceptions. It will justify our situation by saying, "I am different, my situation is unique. My problem is unique". Just see we find identity in our problems too. If we feel we are special because of our problems, if we make an identity of our problems, how we will we ever give them up.

Even if all our reasons are valid, the question at the end of the day is do we want to be left with 'valid reasons' or 'happiness'. The ball is in our court...

- Achyut Gopal Das

P.S - This article can also apply to spiritual life or japa in particular. The principles remain the same. Just replace the word 'Happiness' with 'Bhakti' or 'Japa'.