Path to Happiness
|
|
|
VISIONVision is like memory but applied to the future. Usually it is created deliberately by the imagination yet on occasion, albeit rarely, a person can receive a picture from the future without using the conscious mind to make it up. In olden days, mystics and saints were celebrated for the latter type although today the former is usually what is meant. The word itself implies that the sense of sight is central, and for the majority of people that is probably the case because we generally favour sight over the other senses. It is totally reasonable however for anyone to ‘see’ their preferred future as an auditory exercise. One imagines that composers have a ‘vision’ for a piece of music based on auditory and kinaesthetic senses – they might know what they want it to feel like as well as the sound of it. Chefs might be more concerned with the gustatory aspects of their forward planning – and that’s what this is, a plan. Envisioning is planning, and in particular it is detailed expecting.
|
|
Enthusiasm is VitalityWhenever life is dull and unfulfilling then it lacks vision. The general condition of life is that entropy surreptitiously robs every situation of its vitality, so we are constantly being drawn by this towards the boredom and pointlessness of life without meaningful involvements. Unless we reaffirm our enthusiasm, then we lose spirit, we ‘die off’ gradually and become part of the unthinking mass of dispirited folk that tend to see themselves as powerless victims. Yet with vision, we are questing, we are willing to explore and overcome. And this is lively; it is exciting.
|
|
Detailed, Optimistic ExpectationA good vision – good in the sense that it serves the visionary well – is optimistic yet realistic, both overarching and detailed, is consistent with the visions of others, is inspiring and is expressed in form. The form can be pictures, words or indeed even numbers. A surprising fact about accountants is that they generally have an exemplary ability to envision. The most frequent application of the principle of visionary projection may well be the ‘cash flow forecast’, which an accountant prepares for the bank in order to secure a loan. From the document, the bank manager will get an immediate picture of the client’s vision in overview and in detail. The detail establishes the workability of the proposal, to show how it all fits together realistically. When we see that businesses and banks use this principle of detailed visioning, then we know that it must work because otherwise they wouldn’t use it. They may not fully grasp how it works, but they do know that it does. So let’s look at how it does work.
|
|
We Need to be RealisticWhat happens to the mind in building a vision is essentially two-fold. One aspect is the overview. In this, the mind has to place its stake in the future by making a claim that aligns with others’ claims. Most of the near future is identical to most of the near past in that we have cosmic and local terms of reference that are reliable, because they do not change. The sun rises every day and Market Day is Wednesday. Any vision that ignores this will fail. Yet certain aspects of the past can evolve, and will evolve in accordance with somebody’s vision. For example typically nowadays we have goat’s cheese and olives on sale on Wednesday afternoons. That fact began when someone’s idea became a vision.
The second aspect is to test the vision for reasonableness by constructing the details. If the production cost of goat’s cheese points to a selling price way above customers’ expectations or ability to pay, then on the face of it the vision is no good. Or if the vision is to produce wine, sunbathe and do scuba diving and barbeques, enjoying top quality Guinness and Irish folk music every night in an authentic pub, then there will be an issue of reasonableness. Where in the world would that be possible? |
|
Vision Shapes the MindAs we look at these two sides and construct a reasonable detailed, inspiring vision, then the mind goes through a particular process. The mind is shaped by this process – it takes on the shape of the vision. Then all of our perceptions are modified to align with this vision-shaped mind. This changes what we look for, and therefore also what we see. As we look for ways to realise the vision, we see opportunity where previously we did not. It is because we are seeking that we find. Somehow the banker understands that a mind shaped by the cash flow forecast is likely to bring the outer world into conformity with the plan.
|
|
Acting Consistently with the VisionOf course the overview comes first. Perhaps I see myself as a successful doctor living in a nice well-located house with a happy, healthy family, recognised as a competent specialist by my interesting circle of friends, some of whom I have known since childhood. The detail then follows – I must keep in touch with specific school friends, go to a medical university, be open to relationship, and willing to work hard for many years at low wages. A vision without such detail and realism is little more than fantasy. Increasing the level of detail – I want a green house and a redheaded wife – tends to add to the likelihood and swiftness of achievement.
|
|
The Vision QuestIf we find ourselves at a loss to find a vision that stimulates us to look at these details, then we may benefit from something akin to a Vision Quest. This is a specific term that describes a Native American practice whereby under guidance a seeker endures hardship and with the help of meditation or drugs opens up the mind to receive an inspiring motivation for their life direction.
|
|
Evolution and EntropyThe currents of life are many and powerful. The two general tendencies that battle each other are the twin forces of evolution and entropy, and all of us are stretched out between them. Other forces are all expressions of these two, and they are numerous. There are forces of Nature, geopolitical realities, collective imperatives and the personal ambitions of billions of people. If we allow ourselves to drift within these oceanic currents of change then we will get carried away and end up as the result of someone else’s cause. Whereas with vision, we have our own little boat to ride the waves, and it has its own tiller to direct our path – and, to some extent at least, this takes us where we want to be.
Our life is ours, no-one else’s. That it is we who write the story of our own lives is not negotiable, we must, and no-one else could. We can write the story so that we are powerless and boring if we choose to do so. Alternatively we can do our very best to realise a unique and enjoyable, creative way to express who we are and what we like. For this we need more than a vision though, we must bring it into form. |
INTENTION
|
Overcoming DifficultiesIn life, some of what we need or enjoy simply comes to us without effort, other things we attract consciously. This shows how the power of yin operates – we want and hope. But intention is yang – we claim and overcome. If necessary, we will struggle, we will persuade, we will cajole, we may even clash, but we will not depend upon or expect luck or favours. By our clear focus and impressive will, against the odds and until the job’s done, to the exclusion of other matters, we intend to succeed.
Until it becomes clear and compelling, a vision moves through various chapters in its story. Perhaps we see a fictional character whose qualities we admire, or a place, or an occupation. Perhaps we meet a person who has successfully created their lives the way we would like ours to be, or perhaps we have nursed a dream since early childhood. Our ideas about what might occur for us are also shaped by commentary from parents and others. This visioning procedure is vague and extenuated over time, even to the extent that we may not know how to answer honestly if asked what we hope the future holds for us. |
|
Intention Knows What it WantsYet all this changes in the instant that intention occurs; it must. Intention must know its goal. So in one sense, intention is the crystallisation of vision. This proves to be the more challenging aspect for many – they can achieve so much as long as they know what is required, but lack the punch to crystallise their own vision into intention. So they end up serving the ambition of another. Whom should we serve? We can happily serve our own inspired vision, or even that of another person. Or, lacking a spiritual dimension we might need to call our hopes not vision but ambition and serve that instead, probably having our success measured by money and titles. To serve the ambition of another person though – this is poor substitute and rather soul destroying. We shouldn’t have to work just for the money; if we trust then money will come to us when we are doing what we are enthusiastically moved to do.
|
|
Expect Things to ChangeFollowing this instant, when our own intention has been recognised as the master of what is to come, different behaviours become apparent. This master can be rather pushy, is always on the case and quick to seize opportunity. It becomes more serious with an announcement, when our intention is made known. Firstly we are likely to tell our partner – if not then why not? – and afterwards our committed path is revealed to a wider circle, then even the public. After this we realise that we are truly engaged; we have chosen to invest our freedom in this way. Some aspects of life must now change. We will talk to different people, go to other places and generally rework life patterns so that they support our new direction. Probably we will need a budget too.
|
|
Harnessing Uncommitted EnergyIn every moment there is uncommitted energy, an infinite range of opportunity that responds to whatever forces are momentarily active. If you ask someone ‘will you please do this for me’, there is a real chance that they will. If you do not ask then the chances are much less, probably in fact close to no chance at all. Your question acts upon their uncommitted energy and triggers an outcome, one that furthers your dream of what you want to take place. This way of being is very opportunistic and assertive. The affirmation we live by is that each scenario, each moment and each person is an aspect of the means of manifestation.
We notice that the application of vision is moment-by-moment, notwithstanding the existence of a bigger, overall conceptual statement of intention. The more detailed is the plan, the easier it is to make small things serve the big thing. In other words, if we really know exactly what we want then we have no ambiguity in making all the little choices and requests that will bring accomplishment. |
|
Popularity is not GuaranteedThose who are like this as a way of being tend to stand out. They are by no means always popular, they tend to leave the rest behind in the shadows feeling envious or inadequate. Successful businessmen, executives, politicians, sportswomen, performers and top musicians are all examples. Anyone who gets to the top or even near the top has learned how to move clear vision into intention. Yet there are plenty of others – whoever is reliably able to convert a problem into a solution really. It is experienced early on in school examinations, which test us as much for our power of intention as our knowledge.
|
|
The Power of MindWe do so much to secure our lives. We have family protocols, insurance policies and savings, and we lock doors and keep guard dogs; some even believe that owning a gun makes them safer. Perhaps some of this helps – but really! – it seems rather fear-based doesn’t it? The most powerful tool we have, that which protects us more often and more effectively than a Rottweiler, is the mind. If we can shape the mind, train it to be obedient to the will, then none of these security practices and devices are required. There is extraordinary power in the focused mind.
|
|
How to Project Your VisionLet’s try a visualisation: every cell of the physical body lines up north and south like iron filings responding to a magnet, every feeling and every thought is entirely excluded from consciousness except one intention, and we stoke up our passionate enthusiasm, absolutely convinced that we have the power and the right to achieve our clear purpose. Imagine this concentrated into the smallest point in the third eye, then projected into the world as a laser beam. It is this that projects the story of our vision into the world of form.
|
|
COLLABORATIONFrom one perspective, this is so profound and complex that it is not even easy to understand the question itself, let alone the answer. And yet it is central to whether we live with disappointment or happiness. One helpful realisation is that there could never be individual identity without others to be different from; we are who we are in relation to others. Therefore, as others change so do we, and so the whole matter of identity is ephemeral – we are exactly who we are only for now and only with this person.
|
|
Who am I?From another perspective this question’s overarching importance gives us the simple answer to every other – the answer to every single question is the very answer to this one, who am I? Am I a person who is willing to suffer pain or significant inconvenience to stand for a principle? Am I a person who wants another cup of coffee now? The beauty of it lies in that nobody cares what the answer is except us – not from the highest perspective. There is no right or wrong answer; in every moment we may freely choose who to be, although of course there are always consequences.
Optimal choice is rather less what we do, and more with whom we do it. Since we are shaped by our interactions with others it is important to choose them wisely. This is the reverse of what is commonplace. Most people end up with a certain circle of associates as a by-product of pursuing a goal. We might enjoy numbers and end up fiddling tax returns for unprincipled businessmen to get rich; we might love art and spend our lives in the company of those manipulative types who use our creative designs to sell something horrible for Big Pharma or the tobacco industry. In both cases our goal is to secure a livelihood, yet so often the price we have to pay for that is to be moulded in our thoughts and attitudes by unloving influences. |
|
We Take on the Qualities of the People around UsThis is not acceptable for true seekers. If we quest for happiness, then we must practise happiness. Being in the company of unloving people because they pay us is not a strategy that promotes happiness. If in pursuit of our goals we are obliged to collaborate with those we disapprove of, then either the goals or the strategy is false. We absorb the qualities from those we associate with. If the boss is an angry, impatient bully, we may well go home and be just like that with our beloveds, perhaps not on day one, but over the years bit by bit these qualities will creep into our personality. It could be in the reverse sense in that we bring the resentful, long-suffering, bullied version into our home life rather than the bullying version.
It is better to become more aware of what qualities we can notice in a person before engaging with them in any involvement. Sadly many couples have little idea about the truth of the person that they are sharing their life with until the glister of the courtship and honeymoon periods proves not to be gold. Being sexy and fun is lovely on a Friday night – but how is this useful on Monday morning, or at 4 am when the baby is still crying? Naturally we will have to deal with people who are walking a shady path and will come across attractive people with very unattractive qualities. Partial exclusion or total refusal to engage with them may be required. Or at least, let them not intrude upon the deepest centre of self nor corrupt what is precious to us! As a general rule, a few key indicators are enough to determine whether a person is likely to move us towards or away from our purpose of self-discovery, and its resultant happiness. For example we could choose kindness, honesty and sensitivity, and have nobody routinely in our lives except people who themselves hold these qualities as life principles. |
|
Marrying up our VisionHowever ardent may be our intention, no vision can possibly be realised unless it is married up with the visions of others. Having another cup of coffee is collaborating with the visions of a vast number of people from the Sumatran coffee picker saving to buy her daughter her first pair of shoes, to the successful cafe owner who hopes to sell his business for a profit on which he can retire comfortably. The secret to having our dreams come true is to marry it up with others’ dreams. Then a team of people is created whose collective power is immeasurably greater than ours alone; alone we are actually quite powerless. The trick to entering a mutually helpful collaboration lies in two abilities.
|
|
Negotiation is CommunicationThe first thing is to become very clear about what we want to happen next. This clarity comes out of the vision and intention stages of Questing. Certain aspects of this are emphatically required, some are preferred but not essential, and some are irrelevant. What is required must by definition be nonnegotiable, a deal breaker, what is irrelevant should be ignored, and what remains is the area for negotiation.
The second ability is negotiation, or shall we call it communication? Depth communication is always a negotiation of sorts. Our method is to act assertively upon the other in order that we hold true to purpose, and yet also having sensitivity to try to attract their full and enthusiastic willingness to fulfil our requirements. Being sensitive, to their inner state as well as their outer demands, is much likelier to win cooperation and will also set the mood. Collaboration in the mood of enthusiasm and harmony is both more effective and more enjoyable. |
|
Blending Harmonious VisionsChildren learn early on how best to negotiate. First you soften then you ask politely and repeatedly. The softening has to do with forming rapport, developing empathy and so charming the other person. A charm is a spell. Being charming is a powerful tool of persuasion and employed by most successful people. It has the effect of softening the resistance of the other to make them more biddable. However, the key to collaboration lies mainly in the operation of the word Please. When we ask the right person, in the right way, at the right time, and we use this word, then invariably things move in our direction. What is truly wonderful is when two people want exactly the same thing, when each is asking the other for what they both want. When, through this process of empathy and clarity, collaboration is the blending of two mutually harmonious visions, then a special energetic condition arises, called synergy. Then the whole is a dimension greater than the sum of the parts and as if by magic, things work really well.
|
|
Negotiating the Terms of our Love AffairWhen the collaboration is sexual partnership the same principles apply. Your vision and mine have to become substantively married. The umbrella of love, fidelity, honesty, trust, openness, sharing and caring is often assumed, perhaps legitimately. Yet the detailed interpretation of how to reconcile these rather angelic qualities with earthy realities will always eventually cause friction, then we will rub and chafe until something shifts. The issue will be one of three types – nonnegotiable, negotiable or irrelevant to your happiness.
If before entering committed relationship we would talk about our boundaries and preferences, we could avoid many of the clashes. But if we do clash – then we try to remember that emotional outbursts are just that. And they are not effective to resolve issues in the long term. What works is negotiation. This necessarily means surrendering something we want a little in order to protect something we want a lot. Yet under no circumstances whatever should we go against our principles. Those are nonnegotiable. |
|
FAITHFaith can be seen as identical to self-confidence. This interpretation, linking faith with self-confidence, is liberating. We no longer feel the same religious duty to God. Instead we claim full responsibility for our own lives, accepting the gift of free will, and leave God to its proper place in the Universe as Unknowable Prime Cause and Most Fascinated Caring Observer. We are not parented by a loving but stern Finger Wagger in the Sky who booms out loud on Sunday, and sighs accusingly as we plummet into the Nether Regions when the time comes to shift off this mortal coil. These old fashioned images of a man with a white beard were marketing devices of early churchmen to claim their place in society, encouraging uneducated poor folk to project their superstitions, hopes and fears onto the images. A stern father with the power to send you to Hell was what they came up with.
|
|
Develop Faith by Trusting FaithFaith evolves in us the more we trust in it; this begins in childhood and reaches greater maturity as our life experiences validate our beliefs. The first stage is to trust in our impulses. They are felt in the physical body as unexplained inclinations to do something or go somewhere unexpectedly, and are observable as the normal behaviour of infants. As intelligence awakens we are told what is real, and put our faith in the parents who tell us. At some point we find out that Santa Claus is a fabrication, that our ‘all-powerful’ worldly father has human frailties and faults, and mother is not always soft and kind. This challenges our sense of security and it becomes necessary to think for ourselves, putting faith then in our powers of reasoning. People who have reached this stage are not common. For millennia the processes of religious indoctrination has distorted the way we reason and, because most religions teach rather silly ideas that generally drive out rational analysis, it is an unusually sharp and true mind that can still penetrate through the deceit and illusion to see things as they really are. Even Einstein blinkered himself from seeing the reality of Quantum Mechanics by stubbornly holding to a false belief in religious doctrine.
|
|
Blind Faith is Blindness not FaithLess common still are the ones who have the keen sensitivity needed to have conviction in the heart’s capacity to access the deeper truths that mind cannot hold. And going even beyond that, there is the faith of soul consciousness, a still point of certainty that shines clear and bright, even as the body, mind and heart are faltering with doubt, guiding us to do what needs to be done, in the certain knowledge that all is well and always will be. This is mature faith, it is not blind, nor is it logical, nor is it a compulsion of the body or heart. It arises out of dormancy, awakened by the seeker’s diligent approach to our quest – careful, insightful reflection upon our involvements. This delivers an understanding of how life works, what it all means, and that it simply must be the way it is.
|
|
Remembering Who We Really AreThere is no greater reward than faith, because it is the guardian that holds watch at the gate of the heart. In other words it doesn’t allow anything into the heart that would rob it of joy; strong faith ensures that the default condition of life is joy. We may well take pleasure in the ups and downs of emotional adventures, yet when all comes to rest we settle again into peaceful certainty. This is the soul’s condition before incarnation, and so our return to it is a blessed remembrance; at last we remember who we are!
Questing can now be seen in its full range. Vision, sharpened into focused intention and supported by collaborative involvements, leads us ever towards that place of faith that dissolves the question ‘who am I?’. The question disappears because in faith it really doesn’t matter who I am. How could anything as momentary as individual identity be worth our committed attention when we could instead focus on the sacredness of our faith in the eternal? So we may now correct an earlier belief that our quest is to find God through self-discovery, or even to find self through God-discovery. The question becomes: how to perfect my faith? |
|
How to Perfect FaithSo how do we?
It takes a bit of a rebellious attitude and individual courage to actually see that most people get it all wrong – life’s meaning that is – and that very few care enough to do what is needed to understand what is really happening. A children’s story speaks of the mass hypnosis and collective delusion that allows the general population to see the naked emperor wearing fine clothes. It is the innocent child that speaks up – ‘he has no clothes!’. This first stage – to refute what is self-evidently false – is the beginning of a long journey. This refutation is born as a glimmer of suspicion, perhaps later becoming a decided private opinion but not yet safe to talk about. Then we may spend time with people who have different opinions and beliefs from ours, and study traditional and modern philosophical and spiritual teachings. In this way, hidden within the lies and nonsense of scripture we uncover something golden – we find similarities of teachings across cultures and across the centuries. From this we build a mental model in the form of wisdom and morality, and this shapes our beliefs. As a result we make different types of choices, we walk new paths, learn new ways of behaving and new ways of seeing things. |
|
All You Need is LoveThis alone will not do much to open the heart, which we need open to access the deeper mysteries; for this we need to feel love and express it. Body, mind and heart are all interconnected agencies of perception. The body grasps sensory input, the mind interprets this and calls it reality, and the heart seeks to know the meaning of the experience in the context of its world of love, harmony and beauty. The heart’s teachings are more poetic and inspiring than logical, ‘all you need is love’, and ‘love will find a way’ are expressions of faith rather than intelligence. Not false, but not reliable life instructions either.
|
|
Testing Faith Will Deepen ItThere are no reliable life instructions. Whereas one might think that this revelation is terrifying, it comes hand in hand with its counterpart revelation – that whatever occurs and what could ever occur is only a reflection of our ability and appetite to cope with it creatively. This is exciting, empowering and life-changing.
Faith offers calm certainty; it provides us with serenity in a storm. Only life-turbulence can examine and so improve our ability to demonstrate this fact. In the event of a hurricane, we can enjoy the storm thoroughly until it is time to slip easily into its unmoving centre. We will not master this practice without hurricanes to play with – so why not go looking for a few of them? We must do this if we want to test the courage of our convictions and consciously become an independent agency of Creation. These are metaphorical hurricanes, more properly identified as dire life circumstances or emotional crises. |
|
The Soul Has No IllusionTo bring us to a fuller state of self-realisation, we must open up the channel that allows divine inspiration ready access to influence our thoughts, feelings and decisions so that we guide our own lives with soul awareness. Instead of identifying ourselves as a physical body with a personality and soul, we say ‘I am soul, employing this personality and body for this brief lifetime’. The soul’s perspective is not subject to illusion, what is is seen for what it is. Yet it knows that no-one else could see it the same way and that truth is subjective. The freedom that arises through faith is entirely exhilarating; it is fearless, joyful, innocent and beyond the reach of worldly constraints. Nothing compares to it. In soul consciousness, lacking fear or confusion, our desires are met much more easily, and life can become a playful passage from one delightful surprise to the next.
|
|
QUESTINGQuesting has four aspects:
vision, intention, collaboration and faith and is developed as we learn to master the word Please |
|