Happiness depends on the mind

So, happiness depends on the mind, not on external conditions. That’s what we say in Buddhism. All the time!

(Carrying on from this article on developing self-confidence.)

In January, while in NYC, I decided in the spirit of market research for this article to see if I could find happiness in and around Central Park; and then jotted down my findings.

I started in Starbucks, of course. Only second in the queue, I was quickly weighing up the important decision of whether to ask for a flat white with 170 calories or a cappuccino with 140, and whether I was really going to spend over $5 on a coffee in the first place (I was), when I noticed that the woman in the line ahead was ordering 13 drinks. So I gave up. No coffee for me today in Starbucks itself, so I had to search for happiness elsewhere, like in Baldacci’s across the street.

And if I thought Baldacci’s was pricey, it was nothing compared with $3 per minute for a ride in a grimy Pedi cab in the Park, a ride I didn’t take. How demoralizing a job to be a Pedi cab driver, all lined up going nowhere on this wintery day, wealthy women in Lulu yoga pants declining the drivers firmly, almost crossly, “No, we came here to get some exercise!” How many people are stuck in grinding or demoralizing jobs all day long all over the world, if they are in jobs at all? However, although most of the drivers looked dejected, one or two looked like they were having some fun – different minds, different experiences.

I walked past the young pregnant homeless woman, still nursing a cold. I gave her a smoothie. I’ve taken to connecting with her between the apartment and the subway. Some days she looks very sad, today she smiled warmly. She moves me – why is she there? How can I really help her?

How many New Yorks are there? As many as there are New Yorkers? Do the ducks on the lake know they are in Manhattan? Probably not. So do they live in Manhattan, or do they live in Duckhattan?! The quality of the New York life — happy, unhappy, or neutral – depends not on an objective New York but on what is going on in the minds and experiences of the various living beings, which includes the results of their previous actions, or karma.

I, for one, had a lovely time because I was determined to do so, and because there are umpteen opportunities in this city — and indeed wherever there are lots of people — to increase our peaceful minds of love, patience, compassion, and the wisdom realizing impermanence and that everything depends upon the mind. I was also blissed out by a great acrobatic show, though I noticed some onlookers still looked a little distracted and forlorn, and one child was crying.

Taking refuge in peaceful minds

This is of course just one hour in one day in one month in one insignificant person’s lifetime, but I relay it here as an example of how every minute of everyone’s experience, including my own, depends upon the mind. This is why we need to get started in taking refuge in the peace of our own good hearts and kind actions, learning familiarity with positive minds as antidotes to negative ones while we still have the relative freedom to do this, while we are not yet suffocated by suffering.

To embrace this fact — that happiness depends on the mind far more than on external conditions — and to live by it, as opposed to just saying it with our mouth, we need the self-confidence that believes that it is true and that happiness is possible. If we change, if we conquer our delusions.

As explained in this article, we both want to change and yet distrust change, so we self-sabotage. Have you ever binge-watched Netflix or otherwise put off your meditation practice for days, weeks, months, or even years?! I think we hold ourselves back because we have not thought enough about how it is possible for us to change, we don’t really believe it, maybe we don’t even want to believe it as it has too many repercussions on our way of life; and so we give into lazy habits instead.

If we really want to be happy, peaceful minds work. Overcoming delusions works. We need the confidence that knows this — as well as the fact that we can conquer our delusions — so that we can break any vicious cycle of discouragement leading to inaction leading to no results leading to more discouragement. We need consistency in applying peaceful minds every day; and by taking this self-confidence to heart, we can become more steadfastly motivated. Then we get results, which in turn encourages us to keep going, in a virtuous cycle.

Next installment: Overcoming self-doubts.

Over to you. Comments welcome.

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