The Happiness Blog:

So you want to be happy?

Copyright (c) Jim Byrne, 21st August, 2010

It has been said that human beings are not wired up by nature to want to be happy, but rather to be competitive, and to enjoy defeating others.  In Cognitive Emotive Narrative Therapy (CENT) we say this is only half the story.  The Bad Wolf side of human nature is wired up in this way.  However, the Good Wolf side of human nature, which is also inborn in every baby, is wired up to be loving, prosocial and happy.  The problem for humans in this and all previous eras (known to us today) is that the Bad Wolf has come to dominate human society and human culture.

However, as Seneca said:

"No (wo)man can live happily who regards him/herself alone, who turns everything to his/her own advantage.  Thou must live for another if thou wishes to live for thyself".

The split nature of humanity is unchangeable.  We will always and only be split in this way, between following a set of virtues, and following a set of vices.  It does not matter if you become the most enlightened and the most holy person on the planet, you will continue to be tempted to behave badly. (Look at paedophile Catholic priests, and the bishops and cardinals who covered for them, for example).  All we humans can do is to make this commitment:

I will live my life from the Good Wolf side of my nature, and I will starve and shrink my Bad Wolf side.

Next we need to figure out how to do that.  The basic answer is this:

1. Identify the vices which tempt you, and which you currently engage in, and decide to give them up. 

2. Identify the virtues that would make your life a shining example to others, and decide to teach yourself to live from those virtues.

Next, all you have to do is train yourself, over and over and over again, day after day after day, to the end of your life, to stick to your virtues and shun the appeal of your former vices.

Perhaps you are attracted to engaging in anger and rage?  Perhaps you are prone to engage in self-pity?  Or laziness?  Perhaps you are overly self-indulgent?  Perhaps you are selfish and anti-social?  Perhaps you spend your time promoting inequality at the expense of the great mass of human beings?  (This is a popular pastime among the most immoral individuals and groups on the planet at the moment.  They love it!)  See the Equality Trust, at: http://www.equalitytrust.co.uk. 

What would it take to give up these vices, one at a time?  For example:

What would it take to change your response to frustration and difficulty from one of anger to one of acceptance?  How about the virtue of fortitude?  You could tell yourself:

If that's the way it is, that's the way it is.  And those people who frustrate me are not bad people.  Some of them don't even know I exist.  And the others are sleepwalking through their lives.  If I stick to feeling loving towards all people and the world, I will get a better outcome.

If you are selfish and greedy, and/or you promote inequality in the world, remind yourself every hour that you were born to die; that you cannot store up anything for you, for in reality you are a mere phantom, passing through a nightmare of your own making.  You are a hungry ghost, trying to eat golden leaves.

And remember what William Inge said:

"The happiest people seem to be those who are producing something; the bored people are those who are consuming much and producing nothing".

So find out how to be pro-socially productive, and make a meaningful contribution to the lives of others.  (Not a sugary drink or confection that is going to promote bad health in its consumers; but a wholesome contribution to the wellbeing of others).

Which headstone would you prefer upon you death?

"S/he figured out how to be cunning enough to become stinking rich?"

Or:

"S/he made a huge difference to the lives of other people, and reduced misery and inequality in the world by a measurable amount".

In the process of changing yourself from Bad to Good Wolf, you will discover a form of happiness that you previously could not even have suspected is available to humans:  The happiness of being the Good Wolf, as an act of intention, despite all temptations to stray; and the happiness of returning to your rightful place as one of many equally valuable berries on the bush of life.  (Please excuse my mixed metaphors! The truth is that all language is metaphorical; and you are too complex a being to be definable by a single metaphor! )

Try growing your Good Wolf and shrinking your Bad Wolf, and see what happens to your happiness level.  You'll be pleasantly surprised.  Vice is a source of huge misery.

Best wishes,

Jim

Dr Jim Byrne
ABC Coaching and Counselling Services

Jim's email address

Postscript: If you want to be happier, remember: Every night before you go to bed, make a list of three things you are grateful for from that day.  It might be something you got; something you gave; something you saw or heard; or something (bad) that did not happen!  Choose one of those three items and go to bed determined to dream about it. 

And remember to smile!

Postscript: Please take a look at the Institute for CENT.***

Also, the e-book on CENT: Therapy after Ellis, Berne, Freud and the Buddha: The birth of CENT.***

PPS: Please leave a comment below: (‘Comments').

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The Happiness Blog:

Further along the road to happiness

Copyright (c) Jim Byrne, 16th August, 2010

I am sorry for the delay in posting this week's Happiness blog.  I have been away for a wonderful 9 day holiday - a veritable Grand Tour, with Renata - seeing friends and relations.  I now feel ready for another tough year.  But perhaps this one won't be so tough.  I choose to believe that things are getting better in my life in general.

How to choose happiness

Last week I talked about choosing happiness.  I gave some quotes that should be helpful.  However, some readers might ask: How am I to choose happiness?  What specifically should I do?

At the simplest level, you could begin to affirm, silently in your mind: I choose happiness; I choose happiness; I choose happiness.  You could do this over and over again at the beginning, middle and end of each day.  That will help to focus your mind on what you want - happiness - and also alert you to wake up when you are doing things that are making you unhappy, such as picking an unnecessary fight with a friend or colleague.

At a deeper level, you could commit yourself to two virtues:

Love, and:

Gratitude.

Love is the core of the Good Wolf state of being, just as Hatred is the core of the Bad Wolf state of being.  The Good Wolf lives in a perpetual state of happiness, serenity, and, sometimes, bliss.  The Bad Wolf lives in a perpetual state of hostile misery, anxious misery and/or depressive misery.

So choosing to be happy also involves choosing to grow your Good Wolf state, and to shrink (or starve) your Bad Wolf state.  Switching from thoughts/feelings of hatred to thoughts/feelings of love will move you right into the core of the Good Wolf.

Gratitude is a fairly central virtue of the Good Wolf, adjacent to Love.  Gratitude is an acknowledgement that (1) I do not run the universe, and (2) the universe serves me well, most of the time.  And for the goodness of the universe, I should be grateful.  Also, the central people in my life serve me well, and for this I should be grateful.

So try this: Affirm the following:

I choose to be loving and grateful; I choose to be loving and grateful; I choose to be loving and grateful. 

Do this over and over again, at the beginning, middle and end of each day.

And make a serious commitment to give up anger, hatred, hostility, revenge, resentment, bitterness, bile, self indulgent depression, unnecessarily cowardly anxiety, and so on.  These are all manifestations of the Bad Wolf, and the Bad Wolf can never be happy.

So choose happiness.  Affirm this choice. And build on this by choosing to act from Love and Gratitude.  And give up anger, hatred, self indulgent depression, and unnecessarily timid anxiety.

You are a creative force in the world.  Nobody is coming on a white charger to rescue you.  You have all the power that is needed to become a faucet of love and kindness in the world.  Develop this potential and you will be endlessly happy.  This does not mean you will not have occasional upsets or frustrations, difficulties etc.  But your default position will be one of calm, serene happiness.

Best wishes,

Jim

Dr Jim Byrne

The Happiness Blog:

The royal road to happiness

Copyright (c) Jim Byrne, 4^th/6^th August, 2010

Choose happiness

Last week I talked about our ability - (all other things being equal) - to choose happiness.  This idea is well summed up in the following quote from Abraham Lincoln:

"Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be".

Of course, external events are linked to excited happiness; but calm, serene happiness is more to do with your mental attitudes towards life, including your preference:

(a) Do you want to operate from the (happiness inducing) Good Wolf side of your nature - which is loving, charitable, giving and good.  Or:

(b) Do you insist upon operating from the (unhappiness inducing) Bad Wolf side of your nature - which is angry, hateful, mean, grasping, taking and bad.

Live a good life

If you live a morally good life, you will tend to be pretty automatically happy much of the time.  Here is how George Sand expressed it:

"One is happy as a result of one's own efforts, once one knows the necessary ingredients of happiness - simple tastes, a certain degree of courage, self-denial to a point, love of work, and above all, a clear conscience.  Happiness is no vague dream".

Develop self discipline

If you cannot, or will not, develop self discipline, and a moral compass, then you will never be happy.  Why is this?  For the reason given by J.M. Barrie:

"The secret of happiness is not in doing what one likes, but in liking what one has to do".

Or, as Plekhanov said: "Freedom is the recognition of necessity". 

Happiness is the reward that we reap from living a good life, within the context of choosing to be happy, and of spreading happiness, facilitated by self discipline.  Or as Antoine de Saint-Exupery expressed it:

"If you want to understand the meaning of happiness, you must see it as a reward and not as a goal".

Conclusion

That's all for this week.  I will write again on Saturday 14^th August.

Best wishes,

Jim
Dr Jim Byrne
ABC Coaching and Counselling Services
jim.byrne@abc-counselling.com

See the first of the One Page Solutions, here...on depression.

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