NOTE TO SELF: THE TOO-SIMPLE SECRET

Most of us miss the secret behind living a happy life because it is too simple to be noticed.

It is also hidden in a place that most of us would never think to look – inside ourselves.

The secret can be reduced to one word: being.

We call ourselves “human beings” but we are really human doings, constantly busy in mind and body.  Doing, doing, doing.

We fill our lives with noise.   We can’t hear the secret which is silent.

We think that reality is out there but it is really in here.

Enlightenment can happen in a flash.  But, usually, it doesn’t.  It comes in little pops, spread out over time.

There is nothing to be done.  You already are where you want to be.  All that you have to do is to realize that.  All you need to do is to let that seep in.  You just need to allow yourself to be.  Just now, as you are.

Get quiet, breathe. Let go.

GOOD DAYS

Immersed as we are in the familiar routines of ordinary life, it is easy for us to lose the sense of wonder that we had as children.  Each fresh morning is a new birth filled with bright possibilities.

 

I ask myself, will I make my day a rerun of my yesterdays?  Or, will I see, with clean sight, the chances that are open to me?   Will I see the possibilities?

If yesterday was delicious, I might follow a similar path and set up a version of yesterday that I can enjoy today.  But, I don’t need to be locked into a version of yesterday unless I want to be.  I might have commitments like a job or family ties that seen to lay out the skeleton of my day but the flesh of it, the tone of it, the flavor of it, comes out of my attitudes and expectations.  I get to choose those.

It’s all about choice and choice is about thoughts.  One important thing about thoughts is that I can change them.  They are more or less under my control.  I can contradict a bad-feeling thought by internally changing the subject or I can reward a good-feeling thought by paying attention to it and approving of it.  I need to be noticing what I’m feeling/thinking to be able to do this.  The key is attention.  I need to be focused.  That means that I need to be awake to my feelings in the moment. 

It is true that one thought leads to another.  It is also true that any thought will lead to another that is like itself.  I can enjoy an ascending series of good-feeling thoughts or a descending cascade of miseries depending on my starting thought and my reaction to it. That’s my choice.

Every moment can be a new start.

The best place to start is with gratitude.  If I begin my fresh new moment by saying and feeling “thank you” for good things in my life, I will kick off a positive chain reaction.  This attention to good things will allow me to notice other good-feeling opportunities that I can act on to keep my energy flowing in the right direction.

The better it gets, the better it can get.  The opposite is also true.

We are all chain-thinkers.  We run on habit.  If we take the trouble to redirect our thoughts toward good-feeling ones enough times, this pattern will become our habit.

While our best alternative is to be alert, alive and fully present in every moment, the habit of choosing good-feeling thoughts is a pretty good second choice.