The common belief is that wealth, fame, success, youth, and beauty are essential for happiness. However, psychologists and researchers are now shifting their focus from analyzing unhappiness to studying happiness. They are exploring what truly makes people happy and how to achieve it.
Researchers have discovered that happiness is not what most people believe it to be. Surprisingly, factors such as money, age, gender, health, race, education, employment, and geography have minimal effects on overall life satisfaction. It may seem startling, but circumstances have little to do with happiness.
The tendency to compare ourselves with others against unrealistic standards worsens the problem and fuels unhappiness. We often strive to keep up with others because we believe they are happier than we are, but in reality, they probably aren’t. The misperception that they are happier than us creates real unhappiness where none existed before.
Advertisers take advantage of our tendency to compare ourselves with others who appear to be better off and happier than us. They bombard us with images of people with extravagant lifestyles, gorgeous bodies, harmonious families, and elegant possessions, which awaken our envy and enlarge our circle of comparisons. This manufactured unhappiness is used as a motivator to get us to purchase the “missing” ingredient of our happiness.
Many people believe that they would be happier if they had fewer problems or that once they solve the problem they are currently facing, happiness will follow. However, this is not the case. New problems arise in an unending procession, and we barely have a chance to catch our breath before new challenges confront us.
This way of thinking equates problems with unhappiness, but it is impossible to establish a problem-free life for any significant length of time. Buddhism teaches that this is not possible.
Sustainable happiness is not the absence of problems. As Nichiren writes, “Though worldly troubles may arise, never let them disturb you. No one can avoid problems, not even sages or worthies.” Everyone has problems, yet some people with enormous problems are happy, while others with every advantage are miserable.
Buddhism describes life as an accumulation of sufferings arising within the eternal cycle of birth, aging, sickness, and death. Other kinds of sufferings, such as losing a loved one, depression, being fired from a job, living in poverty within an affluent society, and experiencing the barriers of race and ethnicity, add to suffering and anguish.
It recognizes that life is full of problems, and this outlook has begun to permeate Western culture. Understanding that life means difficulty liberates us from seeing problems and suffering as signs of our inadequacies. Thus, we find happiness in the midst of problems rather than in their absence. The reason many people are unhappy is due to delusion, believing the myths propagated by our culture about happiness.
Nichiren believed that the only difference between a Buddha and a common mortal is that the latter is deluded while the former is enlightened. Human beings fail to understand the true nature of happiness, which makes it difficult to find. To achieve lasting happiness, we need to know what it is, what it is not, and have a practical method for attaining it. Nichiren explained the practice that enables us to construct indestructible happiness.
Summary of Myths about happiness
– Wealth, fame, success, youth, and beauty are critical components of being happy.
– Differences among people that we take as significant indicators of happiness (such as money, age, gender, health, race, education, employment, and geography) have a significant effect on overall satisfaction in life.
– We would be happier if we had fewer problems or that once the problem we are immediately facing is resolved, happiness will result.
– The reason for unhappiness is the belief in the predominant myths that our culture propagates about happiness.
Reference
Excerpts from ; THE BUDDHA IN YOUR MIRROR
Practical Buddhism and the Search for Self: By;Woody Hochswender, Greg Martin & Ted Morino Foreword by Herbie Hancock
The Buddha in Your Mirror Practical Buddhism and the Search for Self by Greg Martin, Ted Morino, Woody Hochswender (z-lib.or.pdfDownload
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