…how we see the world, not what the world puts under the Christmas tree for us.
We are so dependent on external conditions. One moment something isn’t right, the next we feel we’re missing something. And we get so angry that this doesn’t get fixed or that doesn’t arrive, because our happiness is so tied to this and that. I’m not saying anything new, but personally, for me, understanding this has reached a whole new level. Perhaps because life has already passed the halfway point—I’m not sure. But now I clearly see how we spend our whole lives chasing and trying to attain everything that can make us happy, and if we don’t get it, we sulk and complain about how unfair life is.
When in reality, it’s not about lacking something for happiness; it’s our habit (I’m not even sure what else to call it) of sulking and complaining. Even if we get everything we’ve dreamt of, we still won’t be happy until the end of our days like idiots. Well, or like non-idiots. It doesn’t matter. It’s no accident—honey lasts only a month. A month or two, and if inside we’re stuck in the habit of complaining, that tar will inevitably seep into the honey, and soon there’ll be no honey left. Any joy will be poisoned, warped, torn apart, and devoured by the brain of someone used to sulking. I’m not giving such a bloody allegory by chance—it’s exactly how it is.
I’m more and more convinced that no external circumstances can turn our life into a fairy tale if our “inner circumstances” are set the other way around. It has to start with ourselves. At any age, even at a very young one. And in adulthood, it really should be the norm, because an adult person should have already figured out such a simple thing: happiness is internal. Happiness is a set of inner preconditions. It’s how we see the world, not what the world puts under the Christmas tree.
And one more thing. Happiness is work. The work of maintaining and developing awareness. Because it’s very easy to slip into a sulking state. And getting out of it is difficult because, in the sulking state, everything looks completely different: the world seems dangerous, aggressive, and harmful. In this state, we just want to pile on more sulking, but that’s a dead-end path. The way out of sulking, realizing that happiness can’t be found outside when you’re in a sulking suit, and, on the contrary, everything turns into a gift if you intend to be happy—that’s the road to take, which, while not always easy (because awareness is work), is joyful to walk.