The Ultimate Happiness

The purpose of life is the expansion of happiness. Happiness is the goal of
every other goal. Most people are under the impression that happiness comes
from becoming successful, accumulating wealth, being healthy, and having
good relationships. There is certainly enormous social pressure to believe that
these accomplishments are the same as achieving happiness. However, this is
a mistake. Success, wealth, good health, and nurturing relationships are
byproducts of happiness, not the cause.
When you are happy, you are more likely to make choices that lead to all
these things. The reverse isn’t true. Everyone has observed people who are
deeply unhappy even after they have attained incredible wealth and success.
Good health can be taken for granted and abused. And even the happiest
family can find its happiness ruined by a sudden crisis. Unhappy people are
not successful, and no amount of money and achievement will change the
equation.

So let’s shift our gaze beyond external indications to inner happiness,
which we all want to attain and yet which remains elusive. In the last few
years psychologists and brain researchers have undertaken the first serious
research on happiness. Previously, the field of psychology was almost entirely
focused on treating unhappiness, much the way internal medicine is based on
treating disease. But just as interest in wellness and prevention has
dramatically risen in recent years, so has interest in happiness.
Surprisingly, one of the most controversial topics in this new field of
positive psychology is whether human beings are actually meant to be happy.
Perhaps we are all pursuing an illusion, a fantasy fueled by occasional
moments of happiness that can never turn into a permanent state. Or perhaps
some people are genetically predisposed to be happy, and they will be the
lucky few who escape what the rest of us experience, which is a kind of lowlevel
contentment at best. Some experts contend that happiness occurs by
chance, an emotional surprise that quickly comes and goes, like a surprise
birthday party, leaving no permanent change once the event is over.
Leading researchers in the new field of positive psychology, in particular
professors Sonja Lyubomirsky, Ed Diener, and Martin Seligman, came up
with what they call the happiness formula. These researchers found three
specific factors that could be quantified in a simple equation:
H = S + C + V
OR
HAPPINESS = SET POINT + CONDITIONS OF LIVING + VOLUNTARY ACTIVITIES

Since this is one of the leading theories of happiness, we’ll explore it before
showing that there is a better way to reach the goal. Although it helps point
the way, the happiness formula doesn’t go deep enough to uncover the real
secret of happiness.
The first factor, S, is the brain’s set point, which determines how naturally
happy you are. Unhappy people have a brain mechanism that interprets
situations as problems. Happy people, on the other hand, have a brain
mechanism that interprets the very same situations as opportunities. So the
“glass half full, glass half empty” phenomenon is rooted in the brain, and is
“set” in a way that doesn’t vary much over time. According to the researchers,
a person’s set point is responsible for something like 40 percent of the
experience of happiness. Apparently, this set point is partly genetic. If your
parents were unhappy, you have a higher likelihood of being unhappy as well.
But there are also childhood influences to take into account.
Children’s brains have neurons that mirror the brains of adults in their
surroundings. These so-called mirror neurons are responsible for the way
children learn new behaviors, so the theory goes. As they develop, young
children don’t have to imitate their parents in order to learn something new;
they only have to observe them, and certain brain cells will fire in a way that
mirrors the activity. For example, a baby being weaned from breast-feeding
watches how her parents eat. As they reach for food and put it into their
mouths, certain areas of their brains light up. Simply watching this activity
leads the same areas to light up in the infant’s brain. In this way the newly
forming infant brain learns a new behavior without ever having to go through
trial and error alone.

This model has already been tested in monkeys and theoretically extended
to humans. It provides a physical explanation for something as mysterious as
empathy, the ability to feel what someone else is feeling. Some people have
this ability; others don’t. A few saintly individuals have so much empathy that
they can hardly bear it when someone else is suffering. Research with MRIs
and CAT scans suggests that brain function plays a major role in empathy. A
child’s neurons mirror the emotions of adults around him, leading the child to
actually feel what his parents feel. So if a youngster is surrounded by unhappy
adults, his nervous system will be programmed for unhappiness, even before
he has any cause for unhappiness himself.
Why doesn’t every child learn empathy? Because brain development is
wildly complex and never the same for two babies. When we were infants, all
kinds of brain functions were being programmed at the same time, and for
some of us, empathy was only assigned a minor role. This is a troubling
inequality, and it extends to happiness. When you see the brain has a set point
for happiness, traceable either to genetics or childhood influences, it’s all too
easy to conclude that nothing can be done about it. However, this would be a
mistake, because neither the brain nor your genes are fixed structures; instead,
they are in process every minute of your life, constantly changing and
evolving. You are still being influenced at the genetic level by new
experiences. Every choice you make sends chemical signals coursing through
your brain, including the choice to be happy, and each signal helps to shape
the brain from year to year.
In the overall picture, research has shown that the brain’s set point can be
changed by the following:

Drugs that act as mood elevators, which work only in the short term and have
side effects.

Cognitive therapy, which changes the brain by helping us change our
limiting beliefs. We all tell ourselves stories in our heads that provoke
unhappiness. Repeating the same negative belief over and over (“I am a
victim,” “I am unloved,” “Life isn’t fair, something’s wrong with me,” etc.)
creates neural pathways that reinforce negativity by turning it into a habitual
way of thinking. Such beliefs can be replaced with others that are not simply
more positive, but are a better match with reality (I may have been a victim in
the past but I don’t have to remain that way; I can find love if I choose better
places to look for it, etc.). In treating patients whose lives are dominated by
negative beliefs, psychologists have found that altering really fundamental
beliefs can be as effective in changing brain chemistry as prescribing drugs.
Meditation, which alters the brain in many positive ways. The physical
effects of sitting quietly and going inward are amazingly extensive. It took a
long time to unravel the puzzle. Researchers had to work against the Western
assumption that meditation was mystical or at best a kind of religious
practice. Now we realize that it activates the prefrontal cortex—the seat of
higher thinking—and stimulates the release of neurotransmitters, including
dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, and brain opiates. Each of these naturally
occurring brain chemicals has been linked to different aspects of happiness.
Dopamine is an antidepressant; serotonin is associated with increased selfesteem;
oxytocin is now believed to be the pleasure hormone (its levels also
elevate during sexual arousal); opiates are the body’s painkillers, which also
provide the exhilaration associated with runner’s high. It should be obvious,
then, that meditation, by creating higher levels of these neurotransmitters, is a
more effective way of changing the brain’s set point for happiness. No single
drug can simultaneously choreograph the coordinated release of all these
chemicals.

The second factor in the happiness formula is C, or conditions of living.
Because we all want to improve our quality of life, we take it for granted that
moving from bad conditions to good ones will make us happier. But
apparently this factor accounts for only 7 to 12 percent of the total happiness
experience. If you win the lottery, for example, at first you will be ecstatically
happy. But by the end of one year you will have returned to your baseline
level of happiness or unhappiness. After five years almost all lottery winners
report that the experience has actually made their lives worse. Experts on
stress have coined the term “eustress,” to describe the stress caused by
intensely pleasurable experiences. We all think we’d like to experience this,
yet the body cannot tell the difference between eustress and distress. Either
one can trigger the stress reaction. If you don’t adapt well to stress, good
experiences can be just as taxing as bad ones to your heart, endocrine system,
and other vital organs and systems.

Much like happy events, tragic circumstances, such as a death in the family,
a bitter divorce, or a catastrophe such as becoming totally paralyzed after a
spinal injury, do not significantly influence a person’s level of happiness in
the long term. People have a remarkable ability to adapt to outer
circumstances. As Darwin said, the most important factor in survival is
neither intelligence nor strength but adaptability. Emotional resilience, the
ability to bounce back after something bad happens, is also one of the
strongest indicators for who will live to be one hundred. Bad things happen to
everyone, but being able to adapt afterward is a valuable trait that we come by
naturally. Our remarkable ability to adapt explains why living conditions
score so low as indicators of overall happiness.
Almost 50 percent of the happiness formula depends on the third factor, V,
or voluntary activities—the things we choose to do every day. What kind of
choice makes us happy? One kind is based on personal pleasure, but
surprisingly, researchers did not find that these were the most significant.
Increasing your personal pleasure by eating a good meal, drinking
champagne, having sex, going to a movie, and so on will bring a temporary
kind of happiness, for a few hours or at most a day or two. Instant
gratification is followed by rapid fall-off.
Another kind of choice promotes creative expression or the happiness of
another person. In both cases a deeper level of the self is being accessed.
According to researchers, making other people happy proves to be a fast track
to happiness, and its effect is long lasting. Turning to creative expression to
make yourself happy can also generate positive results that last a lifetime.
This, in a nutshell, is what current research tells us. However, knowing the
happiness formula doesn’t guarantee true or lasting happiness. Only the third
factor, V, reaches into the inner life of a person, opening the door to the only
place where I believe we can truly find the secret of happiness. Let’s see what
lies beyond the door. What we find will also answer the most important
question: Are humans capable of being truly, lastingly happy?

Eastern wisdom traditions point out that life inevitably contains suffering,
which comes in many forms, including accidents, misfortune, aging, illness,
and death. This implies that the pessimists are right when they claim that
lasting happiness is an illusion. Human beings in particular suffer as the result
of memory and imagination. We carry inside us the wounds of the past and
imagine that the future will bring more pain. Other creatures are not burdened
by worry over old age, decrepitude, and death. They don’t hold on to the past,
nursing grievances and resentment.
Animals do have memory. If you kick a dog, it will remember the
experience and may snarl at you if it encounters you ten years later. But
unlike a human being, a kicked dog won’t plan for ten years how to get even.
Our capacity to suffer makes us seek a way out. Therefore, for millions of
people, today is planned around escaping yesterday’s pain and avoiding pain
tomorrow.
Instead of trying to escape suffering, Eastern wisdom traditions set about
diagnosing suffering the way a physician diagnoses disease. In the Vedic and
Buddhist traditions of ancient India, five main causes were linked to suffering
and the unhappiness it causes.

1. Not knowing your true identity

2. Clinging to the idea of permanence in a world that is inherently
impermanent

3. Fear of change

4. Identifying with the socially induced hallucination called the ego

5. Fear of death

Life has changed tremendously over the centuries, but these sources of
suffering have not, so until we solve them, even the most powerful drugs, the
most loving upbringing, and the most selfless efforts to make others happy
won’t really work. The happiness formula doesn’t address the real ills of
human existence, which we all experience. To be alive is to fear change, cling
to the ego and its false promises, and fear the arrival of death. We ponder in
confusion the most simple, basic question: Who am I?
Fortunately, it isn’t necessary to wrestle with five causes of suffering. They
are all contained in the first: ignorance of your true identity. Once you
experience who you really are, all suffering will come to an end. This is, of
course, a huge promise, but it has endured for at least three thousand years,
waiting for each new generation to discover it. Every discovery is new and
depends on the individual. By nature we are all interested in ourselves. If you
take that interest and go deep inside, you can each find the place where your
true self resides, and then the secret of happiness will unfold.
Your true identity lies in a core consciousness beyond the mind, intellect,
and ego. When you look beyond your limited self—the “I” that struggles to
find peace, love, and fulfillment in life—you are on the path to your true
identity. We are all connected to the source of creation. Ancient sages have
left us a beautiful image for this: a shrine in the heart that hides a small candle
whose flame is eternal. When you have found that flame, you have found
enlightenment, and then the darkness of doubt, anger, fear, and ignorance are
dispelled.

Who you are transcends space, time, and cause-and-effect. Your core
consciousness is immortal. If you know yourself at this level, you will never
suffer again. Many people equate enlightenment with detachment, a remote
state of isolation that seems frightening, because they assume that the
comforts of everyday life must be sacrificed. If forced to choose between
enlightenment and personal pleasure, they will always choose the latter. But
knowing your true identity doesn’t isolate you or detach you from the
fulfillment of everyday life. On the contrary, this is where you discover the
wellspring of all fulfillment.

At the source we discover a connection that binds us all. The real you is
transpersonal, meaning that it extends beyond the boundaries of your personal
self. Transpersonal doesn’t mean “impersonal,” however, which is another
thing people fear when they think of enlightenment. Once again, the opposite
is true. As an inspiring Indian spiritual teacher once put it, “My love radiates
like light from a bonfire. It is focused on none and denied to none.” If you
value love, peace, and fulfillment, finding your true identity expands those
things manyfold.

Fortunately, knowing your real self is not difficult. It’s what nature
intended for us. Once you find the path, one step follows the next without
stress and strain. A small grain of trust is needed at the beginning. In Western
society few of us are raised to believe that the only permanent cure for
unhappiness is enlightenment, but you can experience the truth of this
yourself. Even the early steps on the path remove some suffering, often
dramatically.

From where you sit at this moment, reading this page, enlightenment may
sound like a daunting and remote prospect, but in the following pages I will
provide seven keys to guide you on your journey. Since what works best is
always simple, natural, and effortless, let me offer you a single idea that is
tremendously powerful.

In the world of constant change, there is something that doesn’t change.
This simple thought describes the goal of all seeking. If you focus on your
breath, you can feel it rise and fall. If you focus on your thoughts, you can
observe them come and go as well. Every function in your body ebbs and
flows, and in fact, the whole world works the same way.
Where does this waxing and waning come from? Where is the nonchange
that makes change possible? It must exist. Without the calm ocean, you
couldn’t have waves. Without a quiet mind, you couldn’t have thoughts.
Without a so-called ground state, a domain of infinite potential for matter and
energy, physics tells us that there could be no universe.

Observing that all change is based on nonchange is tremendously
important. It points up that your existence, which is enmeshed in change,
must be rooted in a deeper state of being that never changes. You have a
source, the ground state. Think of anything you can observe—a tree, a sunset,
the moon at night, or a distant star. You, the observer, and the thing you
observe will one day pass away. Both are caught up in impermanence. But the
underlying ground state doesn’t come and go; it remains the same.

Enlightenment simply consists of finding a way to reach this ground state.
Having found it, you naturally identify with it. You are able to say, “This is
the true me.” That’s all there is to enlightenment, which means the secret to
happiness is in your hands. The seven keys to happiness could also be called
the seven keys to enlightenment. They consist of simple, everyday things to
consider and do. No drastic change in lifestyle is required. You don’t have to
tell anyone else that you are on the path to enlightenment. But others will
observe that you are becoming happier and more fulfilled.

The process that leads to enlightenment is gradual and requires patience,
but fortunately the very act of seeking it yields fruit right here and now. Any
step you take toward your core consciousness—your ground state, your true
self—obliterates some causes of unhappiness in your life. At the same time,
the innate happiness that is your birthright will blossom. Thus you are on a
twofold path: to eliminate darkness and to bring on the light.