Are you truly happy?
Are you interested in making other peoples lives better or just helping yourself? One way to be happy is to stop thinking about you and think of other peoples happiness, the main cause of depression isn’t the event which pushed you into it, it was you thinking about you. This isn’t meant to be an inflammatory statement, it is an emotionless fact, the thing with Depression is you can only think of yourself and how terrible you are feeling, and it is a horrible place to be, so get caring about someone or something else as quickly as possible.
Next you have to reinforce your happiness every morning, you could do this via a death awareness meditation... Why would you do this? You do this to create Detachment... You will lose everything at death, even your persona, you cannot hold onto anything and you are going to die so use it to your advantage and start to live.
Ease up on your death grip on all the things we think we own. You can only take one thing with you when you die, your spiritual energy and momentum. So if you believe in rebirth or life after death or your spirit living on you have to create the life now for your next one. You could think of this whole life as practice for the next phase of your spiritual journey, so Get going on living a good life, stop owning people, objects and possessions in the way you think you do... Because you will lose them all in one way or another or lose them by getting just plain sick of it.
Getting happiness
Think of all your mental afflictions as burning coals and you are holding onto this pain for what reason? - You have to Let go, you may have never tried to let go. I know it’s comfortable to suffer or it may be who you think you are or what you think defines you and makes you different. You have to let go of all of this to get happy!
Letting go of plans for they are attachments to pain
So 5 years ago could you imagine that your life was accurately like this now? Every detail as it is? So why should your future be any different? You have to let go of that burning coal also and stop worrying about things in the future and create the happiness you want right now and every now afterwards by being happy and letting go of your mental afflictions or every single negative mindset you have.
Happiness is freedom from all the chains, hot coals or mental afflictions that are holding us down or burning away at us. Be free, start acting free. And if you are free why should you be holding back your wife, husband, partner or kids? Set them free of your chains also and support them in being happy.
Every pain is mentally linked back to an attachment that you are holding onto. If you want to you can trace back to the attachment from the pain, follow where the pain leads and at the end you will find the pain or the burning coal that is the pain.
So the next question is can you let it go? You have to learn to let go of the burning coals if you want freedom and happiness. The paradoxical thing about it is that you are grasping onto things that are un-graspable in the first place! You are holding onto a thing that is burning and harming you but it doesn’t exist, its a hallucination, the only thing you are holding onto is suffering, you keep it there in your mind because it is yours! “It’s My Pain, My Suffering, My Lack of Belief, My Issue with Me” Let it go, if you want to be free let the coals go, trace back from the pain and see what attachment you are holding onto then consciously let it go.
Who do you think you are...
Here is the biggest thing we are holding onto, Our identity, most of us are holding onto an identity of A limited, unhappy, anxious or pained identity, in order to let your identity go you have to die to your old suffering self to be reborn, let the idea of a limited suffering you who could not be happy go. Be empty, the idea of who I was I am letting go, I was attached to an idea of who I was now I am attaching myself to a happy, positive better me. It is no more tangible that the old you but so much more useful than the old one. Start re-identifying yourself - You are not your job, you are not your relationships, the main thing you should be is a happy person - Practice happiness.
So if you want to be free why should you put anyone else in chains? You want freedom and happiness for you, don’t put anyone else in chains, let them be free, if you love them set them free of your chains. By setting the special somebody in your life free that will encourage them to be happier and you will be happier, encourage the one you love to be the best they can be.
What are those chains? My money, My Husband, My Wife, My Plans, My Job, My Possessive Persona etc You have to let them go mentally. There is a joke that has been told through the ages, it goes like this, “If you want to make God laugh, make a plan” All the plans you hold onto are pained attachments, create Goals in life, not the end goal, make them a means to an end.
A little while ago I was told I was deluded for being happy, for living in a world that I created where I believed in myself completely. The person was so upset that I was living this delusional happiness, he wanted me to give it all up and live in the crappy, anxiety riddled, unhappy realm of the masses. I have been there and I choose my world every time. Why was he so angry, it was a direct threat to his egoic world - misery loves company!
So here is the thing, anyone who isn’t in happiness yet can get there, ask yourself what are you practicing being, are you practicing being that limited person? the one who thinks they can’t do this thing, or I am unhappy, anxious, stressed. If this is you well done, you have proved that what you created in your mind comes to fruition - You got what you practiced, so start practicing the other way, start practicing happiness, confidence and you will get this instead.
The problem is people want it right now, you have to practice being good at things before you are expert at them.
Does it require hard work? Yes and you will get it wrong along the way, but keep going, get back on the wagon if you fall and keep practicing, if you give up, you will be back where you were. Keep going and you will eventually create the habit of happiness, confidence and a limitless you.