How to Be Happy in Life?
10 Tips to Make Joy Your Companion
Sadhguru looks at why joy is our fundamental responsibility and answers the common yet pressing question, “How to be happy in life” while giving us 10 tips towards making this a reality.
When you are fundamentally joyous, when you do not have to do anything to be happy, then every dimension of your life—the way you perceive and express yourself and the world—will change. You will no longer have vested interests because whether you do something or you do not do something, whether you get something or do not get something, whether something happens or does not happen, you will be joyous; your actions will rise to a completely different level.
10 Tools Towards a Happy Life
#1. See that being joyful is your fundamental
responsibility.
The first and most fundamental responsibility for a
human being is to become a joyous being. To be happy
is not the ultimate aspect of life. It is the fundamental
aspect of life. If you are not happy, what else can you do
with your life? Only if you are happy, can other great
possibilities open up.
Whatever you do, it is only your inner quality that you are going to spread. Unless something of true value happens within you, you cannot do anything of tremendous value to the world. So, the first thing you must do is transform yourself into a joyous being.
#2. Realize that joy is your original nature.
It does not matter what you are pursuing in your
life, whether it is business, power, education, or service,
you are doing so because deep inside you is a feeling
that this will bring you happiness. Every action that we
perform springs from an aspiration to be happy, because
it is the original nature. When you were a child
you were simply happy. That is your nature. The source
of joy is within you; you can
take charge of it.
#3. Put things in perspective.
Today morning, did you
see that the sun came up wonderfully
well? The flowers blossomed,
no stars fell down, the
galaxies are functioning very
well. Everything is in order—
but just a worm of a thought
worming through your head
makes you believe it is a bad
day today.
Suffering is happening essentially because most human beings have lost perspective as to what this life is about. Their psychological process has become far larger than the existential process, or to put it bluntly, you’ve made your petty creation far more important than the Creator’s creation. We have missed the complete sense of what it means to be alive. A thought in your head or an emotion determines the nature of your experience right now. And your thought and emotion may have nothing to do even with the limited reality of your life. The whole creation is happening wonderfully well but just one thought or emotion can destroy everything.
#4. See the mind for what it is.
What you call as “my mind” is not yours actually.
You don’t have a mind of your own. Please look at it
carefully. What you call as “my mind” is just society’s
garbage bin. Anyone and everyone who passes by you
stuffs something into your head. If you say, “I don’t like
this person,” you will receive a lot more from that person
than anyone else. If you know how to process and
use it, this garbage is useful. This accumulation of impressions
and information is only useful for survival in
the world. It has got nothing to do with who you are.
#5. Move from psychological to existential.
When we talk about a spiritual process, we are
talking about shifting from psychological to existential.
Life is about the creation that is here, knowing it and
experiencing it the way it is, not distorting it the way
you want. To move into existential reality, you just have
to see that what you think is not important, what you
feel is not important. The mind is just chattering away.
If you think it is important, you will never look beyond
that. But that is a psychological reality. That has
nothing to do with the existential.
Suffering is not showered upon us, it is manufactured. And the manufacturing unit is in your mind. It is time to shut down the manufacturing unit.
#6. Stop pursuing; start expressing.
Today we are seeking happiness so vigorously that
the very life of the planet is being threatened. Don’t be
in pursuit of happiness. Know how to express your
happiness. If you look back at your life, the most
beautiful moments are when you are expressing your
joy, not when you are seeking it.
What you save will never be your quality. What you dispense will be your quality. If you save your joy, at the end of your life they will say, “This horrible creature never even smiled in her life.” But if every day you dispensed your joy and love, people would say, “She was a joyful and loving being.”
#7. Smile!
When you get up in the morning, the first thing you
should do is smile. At whom? No one. Just the fact that
you woke up is not a small thing. So many millions of
people who slept last night did not wake up today,
but you and I woke up. Isn’t it great that you woke up?
So smile. Then look around and if there is someone,
smile at them. For so many people, someone dear to
them did not wake up today. Wow! It’s a great day. Then
go out and take a look at the trees. They didn’t die last
night either.
You may think this is ridiculous, but you will know the reality of it when someone dear to you doesn’t wake up. Don’t wait till then to realize the value of it. You and your loved ones woke up. Smile, at least. Learn to look at a few people lovingly.
#8. Remind yourself to smile!
For many people, it just takes an hour to forget all
this, and pretty soon their reptilian brain wants to bite
someone. So give yourself a dose once an hour—a reminder
of the value of life. If you are very insensitive,
remind yourself every half-hour. You could do it in just
two seconds—“I’m alive, you’re alive. What more?”
#9. Transform what’s within.
The quality of your life is not determined by
clothes, educational qualifications, family background,
or bank balances. The quality of your life depends upon
how peaceful and joyous you are within yourself.
Definitely, somebody who is deprived of the basic needs for survival can be physically miserable. That needs to addressed. For such people, we must take care of those things first. But for most others, their needs are an endless list. You think the man driving the car is happier than the man walking on the street? No. It is not decided by what you have. It depends on how they are that moment.
#10. Stop the comparison with others.
Most people are miserable not because of what
they don’t have. It is simply because they are comparing
themselves with someone else. You are driving a
motorbike, you see somebody in a Mercedes and you
make yourself miserable. For someone on a bicycle, he
sees you on a motorbike. Somebody walking looks at
the bicycle and thinks, “Wow, if I just had that, what I
would have done with my life!” It is a foolish game.
All those people who depend on external situations to be happy will never know true joy in their lives. It is definitely time we look inward and see how to create personal wellbeing. True wellbeing will come to you only if your interiority changes. If you depend on the outside to bring joy to you, you need to understand, the outside never happens 100% the way you want it. When this is the reality, at least this one person—you—must happen the way you want it to be. If you did happen the way you want yourself to be, the very natural choice is joy. That is not something that you have to pursue. If you fall back into your original nature, joyfulness is the only way you will be.
| Sadhguru is a yogi, mystic, and visionary, and a prominent spiritual leader. An author, poet, and internationally renowned speaker, Sadhguru is the founder of Isha Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to human wellbeing. (www.isha.sadhguru.org) |
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