Do Worry, Be Happy
Who all do you want to make happy?
If you want to make just yourself happy then you are a self-driven and self-motivated person. You could be a businessman, an egotistic executive, a formidable military man or even a murderer. In spiritual terms you are a ‘rock’ or mineral living for only yourself.
If you want to make your family happy then you are a better version of the above because of your love for your child and your partner. You are a ‘plant.’
If you want to make your boss, your team or your community happy then you are a ‘human’. This is the level that many people exist at and that’s how, by and large, the world functions.
However if your circle is bigger and you want to make larger groups of people happy through your compassion, efforts and kindness then you are a rare person. You help strangers, are kind to animals, ‘feel’ for people you don’t know and have a really big heart. This I’m going to call an ‘angel.’
Finally if you want to make the entire world happy — if your circle of compassion and consciousness extends above and beyond, then you are a ‘God head.’
These are the rarest of people — some like Mother Teresa, Gautam Buddha, Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King we know. Others we don’t — because they work quietly changing one heart, one life at a time.
Now let’s flip this around.
Who or what makes you happy?
If your circle is the world at large, and everything in it, and everyone you know makes you happy then you’ll probably find happiness very hard to come by. An earthquake on the other side of the world that kills thousands can disturb you. Your cricket team crashing out in a tournament can plunge you
into depression. A college mate who gets a job you’ve been trying for can shake you up badly.
And a circle closer home, of course, can be a daily pendulum. A fight with your wife. Your son failing an exam. Your mother falling sick. Every week or every day there will be something to shake you.
But if the only person that makes you happy is you yourself then your circle is inviolate. Your own effort is what matters. Your peace is inside you? You are your own best friend. You control your own happiness.
There are two ways to resolve these opposing circles.
The first is Dharma —doing what you have to do without expectation of return emotion or reward. This concept is one of the few found in Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism. Your Dharma is to help and care for as many people as possible, not for any expectation of return but as a sacred duty. Outside you spread happiness, inside your joy comes from gratitude and compassion.
The second is understanding the difference between Happiness and Joy. The emotion that comes and goes like the rainbow is Happiness. That which stays deep in your core like the sun anchoring the universe is Joy.
So, spread Happiness.
But live in Joy!
