True Happiness is Within You
by Donna Thomson
"The foolish man seeks happiness in the distance, the wise grows it under his feet."
- James Oppenheim
True happiness cannot be sought outside of yourself - not in your relationships with others, the groups you belong to, or in the things around you. Unless you can stand alone in your own shadow and feel happiness from within, true happiness may always elude you for external things come and go like the tide. The only 'constant' in your life is you. Love you, admire you, value you and be happy to be you.
Why do we seek happiness from outside of ourselves?
From His Holiness The Dalai Lama: "Consider the following. We humans are social beings. We come into the world as the result of others' actions. We survive here in dependence on others. Whether we like it or not, there is hardly a moment of our lives when we do not benefit from others' activities. For this reason it is hardly surprising that most of our happiness arises in the context of our relationships with others."
So we learn from a young age to rely on others rather than on ourselves. If we rely on others for our food, shelter and other needs, why not happiness? Well happiness of course does come from many things and our social relationships and other external factors can bring us much joy, but many of us have not connected with ourselves as we have connected with others. The negative side is that placing all of your happiness in the hands of others will lead to a lot of pain and disappointment throughout your life.
No matter how much you love a partner, a child, or a friend, you cannot make your happiness conditional upon them. Why? Because you will have certain expectations of others and when those expectations aren't met, you may feel hurt, betrayed, misunderstood, taken for grated, invalidated, confused and so on. You see, everyone is individual. We have each grown to develop our own sets of values, beliefs, attitudes and ways of looking at the world. Our views may not be (and are unlikely to be) exactly the same as our loved ones. However, we often expect those loved ones to know what we want from them.
Expectations of Others
When someone else's actions don't live up to your expectations you are let down. Often the other person won't even realise they've done something to cause you pain because they don't know your expectations unless you have explicitly shared them. Often we don't even realise our own expectations until we feel someone has hurt or disappointed us. For example, you may unconsciously expect your partner to show their love in a particular way such as saying "I love you" regularly and when this doesn't happen you start to wonder if they truly care for you. You may feel unacknowledged and unloved. However your partner may feel that they are showing their love through their actions. You have one belief while your partner has another. Is there a lack of love? No. While you let your feelings build into a stressful negative state within you, your partner would probably be very surprised to know you feel that way.
It's unrealistic to expect another person to know what's in your head - your values, beliefs and expectations. Thinking "Well they should know!" is not good enough, yet most of us would have thought this of someone else at some stage (you're nodding aren't you!). Put yourself in the other person's shoes. They see you become sad, angry, unresponsive to them, or upset and don't know what they've done, or if it's even them who has made you unhappy. This leads to negative feelings from both sides and possibly arguments that could be avoided through open communication.
What are your expectations of yourself?
Rather than looking to others for your needs, begin by looking within yourself. When you feel a sense of disappointment in someone, use it as an opportunity to analyse your own expectations. The only person who should truly be able to disappoint you is yourself - when you are not being true to yourself in some way. You can take that disappointment and turn it into a positive - a pledge; an action that you can take to better yourself.
Analyse why you are disappointed or hurt. You may find your initial thoughts or statements begin with "Because he did..." or "Because she didn't...". Now look deeper to the true reason for your disappointment. Such statements will start with "Because I expected...", "Because I wanted..." or "Because I thought he/she should...".
Control
You truly only ever have control over yourself and realising this can save you a lot of pain. Of course you can be disappointed in others but you have no control over their actions and reactions. You can share the reasons for your disappointment but you cannot expect the other person or situation to change because the other person has free will. If positive changes or a compromise is achieved then that is great, but if nothing changes or it doesn't change for what you feel is the 'best', you must be content that these things are out of your hands. Trying to control others will only bring you pain.
Empowering Yourself
"Happiness belongs to the self-sufficient"
- Aristotle
When you realise that you are responsible for your thinking and expectations, you will start to see that you've placed much of your happiness in the hands of others. You can now take your power back by recognising that you have the choice to react to something either negatively or positively. By making your happiness conditional upon another person, you hand your power over to them. You feel a 'victim' whenever things don't go as you want or expect. In doing this, you set yourself up for pain, but you can now turn this around and instead set yourself up for happiness - if you choose.
Communicating Your Feelings
Reacting positively to a situation would normally cause you distress may first involve openly sharing your feelings - remember this should be your true expectations starting with "I" rather than a 'blame statement' starting with "you". So share your "I" statements and feelings, along with your expectations and how you would prefer the situation to be handled better in the future.
Communicating the issue effectively might go like this: "I felt hurt when you forgot our anniversary because I felt you didn't value me enough to acknowledge a day that celebrates our love and commitment to each other." Such a statement covers what the other person did that affected you, how you feel about it and why. It provides the other person with the information they need to respond appropriately, as opposed to going quiet and internalising the situation, feeling that the other person should 'know' what's wrong and why. Just as ineffective are 'blame statements' such as "You don't love me anymore!" or "You never remember our anniversaries!"
You may get an explanation or response that you are satisfied with or you may not. The key is to not 'expect' a particular outcome. What happens next is up to you. You can choose to wallow in negative feelings which may further damage a relationship, or you can try to place a positive spin on the situation. Perhaps you can find your happiness in the fact that you've done your part in dealing with the situation by getting your issue out into the open. Realise that it may not be an issue to the other person, but ideally you will work together to reach a compromise. You can also decide to be happy for the other person and the pain they show you because it helps you to grow. There are always choices and different ways of looking at the same thing.
It puts things into perspective when you resign yourself to the fact that people do make mistakes – they forget things, they don't think things through properly, they don't always consider how others may be affected by their actions, they can act selfishly at times, and so on. We are all humans and we are 'designed' to make mistakes as they are our greatest opportunities to learn.
True Inner Happiness is a Lesson
"All seasons are beautiful for the person who carries happiness within."
- Horace Friess
If you take all of the above information to heart, you will understand that you can take charge of your own happiness. You can use the pain others bring you to learn more about yourself. You choose how you perceive and react to pain. If you are ready to take charge of your life and take responsibility for your own happiness, a whole new world will open up to you - a much brighter and more fulfilling world full of deeper respect for the universe, yourself and others in your life.
One final thought to conclude: Maybe we should stop seeking happiness in someone else and start sharing happiness with others.