Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 115-minute teaching, Ven Jamyang explores contentment—the third of the sixteen guidelines for happiness—by investigating the paradox at the heart of attachment: why satisfaction eludes us even when we get what we want. He traces the cycle through pleasure, frustration, and hollow gratification, then guides practitioners to recognize what contentment actually feels like—a balanced, present-moment well-being distinct from excitement. He addresses the fear that practicing contentment leads to passivity, shows how it transforms relationships from constant demand to harmony, and offers concrete techniques: meditation to observe the driven energy underlying most actions, gratitude practices, and recognizing that real happiness comes from freedom from neediness, not external circumstance. Central to the teaching is the dialogue with the audience, grounding these insights in lived experience.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 2009 03 09 16 guidelines – contentment.mp3
UUID: 642d7dda-908a-49a4-9394-ffd5c08c734a
Teacher: Ven Jamyang
Collection: 16 guidelines for life june (Ven Jamyang)
Date: 2009-03-09
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 114.9 minutes
Words: ~13,869
Welcome everybody for coming through the cold to Buddha House. My name is Jamyang, for those who are here tonight for the first time. At the moment we’re talking on a Monday night about the sixteen guidelines for a happy life. All, what we call all sentient beings, all beings who have mind want to be happy. human beings, animals and we all want to be free of suffering.
There is not one human being that we can find that says, But I actually like suffering. I prefer to have suffering. Go on. So that is something that we share with everybody. But somehow we also share with everybody that we are somehow not satisfied with the happiness that we find.
Somehow we are striving for something and we just can’t manage or we seem not to be able to manage it. If you then look around and you see many happy people you think something must be wrong with me that everybody’s happy and I just can’t find it. Or you see people you know you think oh if I would have a better job or if I would have a nicer car or if I would have a better relationship then I would be happy because you see people with a nice car being happy and people with a nice relationship being happy yourself and then you’re still unhappy and you think what’s wrong with me, I’m still unhappy, I have all this and I’m still unhappy. And actually you know there is a lot wrong with us and at the same time there’s nothing wrong with us. What we experience is exactly the same as everybody else.
It’s just that some people have a little bit more doses of unhappiness in their life and some have a little bit bigger doses of happiness in their life due to, in Buddhism we would say karma, but maybe we would say how their mind functions. And if we are able to see how we can change the function of our own mind we can also create more circumstances where we experience more happiness. So that is what we’re trying to do with the sixteen guidelines. The sixteen guidelines talk about and you can see that on the sheet that you just got. You can see that there are four groups of four guidelines.
And the first group is how we think, which is also called the power of the mind. And we are talking two weeks ago we talked about the quality of humility and last week about patience and this week we’re going to talk about contentment. Next week delight. How we think is on the basis of every action that we do. If I meet somebody and I have this feeling like I don’t like this person and then that person is really rude to me, then the thoughts come up, Yeah, I knew this person was going to be rude because when I saw him for the first time I already thought and then we create all these negative thoughts.
What we do when we do that, we actually fuel our anger and that makes our even feel more miserable than we already were. So if we could say, know, Oh this is just a person that I don’t feel happy with or I feel a little bit unpleasant, and that’s it. Then you do not fuel your anger. But we have constantly thoughts in our mind that fuel either our anger or our aversion to something that happens to us or that fuels our attachment to something. Oh, I really like that.
I wish I had some more from that. How can I get it? And what if I would do this and this and this and this in order to get that? We have these two sets of minds. One is the wanting mind and one is the not wanting mind.
We are happy if we have what we want and if we have nothing that we do not want. Then we say, No, I’m happy. That’s what we strive for all the time. The moment we cannot cannot get what we want, we get angry. The moment we get something that we don’t want, we get angry.
Right? So we’re constantly striving to have to if I have this this this I’m going to be happy. Both the wanting mind, although that gives us pleasure, it never gives us real pleasure, does it? It gives us a pleasure that is at the same time not completely satisfied. It’s like an empty hollow pleasure.
You know, if I eat chocolate there is a nice feeling, but at the same time it never really satisfies me because at a certain point I need more chocolate. There is always the tendency, Oh, I need it again. I need it again. And then when it’s gone, I start feeling empty again and then I need it again. So that chocolate, that what we think makes us happy, that what we want in order to feel happy, is never giving us the real satisfaction that we want.
True. The So somehow getting what we do not want doesn’t make us happy. Getting what we want gives us pleasure but doesn’t give us the real happiness that we want. So either way we go, we’re still not happy in a way we would like it to be. True?
So that’s a little bit frustrating and somehow we have no other tool than this. These are the only tools we know to be happy, to strive for it, I want something or I do not want something. And if I can manage that, I should be happy. And when we manage it we notice I’m actually not happy, still not happy. Something must be wrong with me.
What we’re doing in the sixteen guidelines is looking in how do we want things, what are we striving for and is that really going to bring us happiness or not? If we talk about contentment as today, where does contentment, what does it have to do with? Peacefulness? Being happy with what you have. This has got a got a whole night.
You don’t have? Not being attached. You said happy with what you have? What did you say to them? Peacefulness, yes.
Contentment. When you have everything you want. Is that how you feel or how you think if you have? Is this how you see other people find contentment if they have what they want? But you must observe that somehow.
Somehow. Because this is what we’re doing. Oh, they are content when they have what they want and I’m not content. So what else do I need in order to be content? So you observe this in people and then you mirror yourself in this.
And this is how it looks like, isn’t it? So how do you see how contentment from your own side? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
But the moments that you find contentment, how would you describe contentment? Even if you have had in the past, know, a long time ago, you had some moments of contentment. How did that feel like? Yeah. So joy.
Joy. When there is joy, is contentment. Yeah. Yeah. Joy.
Balance. You all you guys know the answers. Right? So if you feel when I’m I feel balanced, I am content. That’s what I wanna know.
When are you content? How does it feel like for you? Balanced. When when I feel loved and better. Uh-huh.
But is feeling loved being content? Feeling loved being content? You need to be loved in order to feel content but how does the contentment feel like? You can’t answer. Emotional balance?
Control or balance? I mean, I don’t know. At the moment, my mind, I’m absolutely not in control of my mind, but sometimes my mind feels balanced. Sorry? Calm mind.
When those particular emotions aren’t racing to the forefront. Being in a present moment With appreciation. Good. Yeah, when we talk about a happy life, it’s like it is not happiness in the sense of exciting happiness, you know. It’s it’s about a balanced happiness.
It’s about a feeling feeling of well-being. It’s about satisfaction. So if you feel sad, you can feel also that having sense of well-being that can be at the same time. Yeah, it depends on your sadness. So if this is contentment, how many minutes a day do we spend in this state of mind?
Not Not You find it in meditation? So if we are not abiding in the state of mind, where are we? Discontent. How does that look like? Confused?
Is that, so if I want to hear something that is really the opposite so that we can put a finger on it, Oh, if this is in my mind I can practice contentment and I know that that feeling will go away and this feeling will surface, that disharmony. What do we do with our mind when we notice disharmony or when we We think about the future? Yeah, worry. About future? Future.
Do we worry about the past or do we try to change the past when we’re not happy? Rationalize worry about future grief about the past that we didn’t have. That’s it. We do that a lot, Or if I would just have said this or if I would not have done that. And then we repeat that again and again and again and again.
It’s like almost we try to fix it. We try to get it back and if we fix it then everything will be better. We do that all the time. Know and if we can see but it doesn’t matter how I think about it, I can never fix this. We can come back to the present because that’s the only place where we actually can be.
What about future grief about the past? You call So who’s producing? Yeah. So who’s you? Where is it coming from?
Do you believe we’re just the body? Or do you think the mind is something different than the body? Yeah. But do you think the mind is the same as the body or do you think the mind is something different than the body? Do you think the mind is the same as the brain or is it something different from the brain?
What do you think? Yeah. But what do you think? Is the mind the brain or is the mind a different entity from the brain? What do you feel at the moment, you know?
It doesn’t, it’s not right or wrong, it’s just like what do you feel at the moment? But is that something different than your body? Something different than your brain? Is your brain different from the mind? Is your mind different from the brain?
If you I’ll go with like a yes or no answer and I’ll say yes if you do. So is the mind different from the body? Yes, but it also makes It influences the body. They’re communicating with each other Yeah, they influence each other. So how we talk about this, the sixteen guidelines are based on Buddhism.
We don’t talk about Buddhism but it’s based. So I’ll tell you how Buddhism sees the brain and the mind. The body and the mind. You have the physical matter which functions in accord with the law of impermanence, of change, you know. The physical thing is changing all the time.
It comes into existence and it ceases to exist. We know that from science. And then you have the mind which is a different kind of energy than what a body is made of. The body is made out of the You have the wind energy that helps to move things inside, then you have the water energy that makes things fluid, you have the fire that helps to digest and do the burning processes on all levels, and then you have the earth energy that helps to give us some substance in the body, the harder parts in the body. That’s is matter, but it is based on on energy.
Right? If we break the matter down it becomes energy. The mind is a different kind of energy, which means the mind cannot change into the body energy and the body energy cannot change into mind energy. And these two energies they meet at moment of conception and they travel together conception and they travel together until we die and then they separate again. So because they travel together they influence each other.
So when my mind is happy, even when my body is having certain diseases or pains, I do not suffer from that or not so much. And when my body feels very healthy, even if I’m depressed, that can still lift me up because I have such a healthy body. For instance I’m depressed and I go to the gym to get my body in shape that will help to lift my mind up. That these two work together. So if we want to change we can change both sides.
If I want to change how I feel I can work on my body and I can also work on my mind. According to Buddhism the mind is that which experiences and it’s whatever we experience. So everything that I feel, everything that I think, all the emotions that I have, that is all mind. All these experiences is mind. And then there is part of me that feels that I am the Experiencer.
That is also mind. Right? So we can only experience when we have a body that gives, it’s like a, it is like a vehicle but it’s also, it gives us the possibility to experience. Without a body we could not experience what we experience at the moment. We need a body.
But the body is not the experience. Yes, so that’s how we see the mind when we talk about this and when we talk about how we can change things. Yes? What is the thing that I’m able to identify and say, I can say, this is me? Yeah.
That’s a difficult thing. Is that mine? I know. Like, I know. You mean in the terms of soul?
Well, I’m not sure. I can see myself. Who am I? Is that your question? No.
Not who am I? I’m able to recognize that I’m a being. And I I understand you’re talking about mind and bodies. It was separate and they need, but is it the mind that enables me to realize who I am? Yeah.
Mind is awareness. That which is aware is consciousness. But if you’re going to say, is me? Is that your question? Yeah.
Yeah. That’s a very philosophical question. I don’t want to go there. We talk about that on Saturday in Introduction to Buddhism. Yeah, because I’ve been wondering what that is.
We talk about that on Saturday, not this one. Otherwise, we won’t get into the contentment. Lack of contentment, how does it feel like? Uncomfortable. Discomfort.
I call it discomfort. Comfort, Unbearable discomfort. If you feel that something is unbearable what is going on inside you? What is that energy? It’s like a drive?
How does it feel like? But how horrible it’s like So first there is a feeling that you have and then you say, and I feel horrible when I have that feeling. But I want to know that feeling that shows discontentment. Yeah. Stress.
What do you do when you have stress? How do we, what do we do when our mind is stressed? All over the place? Resistance? Part of it.
If we really want something, I want, how does that feel like I want? Because we can’t get it. But how does the one thing feel like? Something is missing? Yeah.
And then we start, we get engaged in action in order to try to get it. How does that feel when we start trying to get something that we want? Obsessive? That feeling driven. It’s quite energizing really.
In a way it feels energizing. If it doesn’t go too far it feels energizing and it’s almost like if we feel that What? How do you call that? You call it energizing. That’s a positive feeling isn’t it?
So this is the adrenaline that goes. This is fight or flight that we live on. But it appears, it presents itself as an energizer. So that is the deception in our mind. Oh, I really like that. And then we go off, you know.
And then when we are going off at a certain point we feel the obsessiveness and the agitation and the frustration and then we realize: Oh I feel actually horrible. But that horrible feeling still doesn’t make us let go of that. Isn’t it? Because we think I’m frustrated because I still didn’t get it. So I keep on trying until I have it.
And then if I have it We’re not anyway. Is this what I was doing this all for? Isn’t it? So we have this habit. It’s like And I think it’s like our attachment for things, I want something that feels like I’m alive, that feels like an energy that I’m alive.
The moment I start to practice contentment it’s almost that we have something in mind but then I’m not living anymore you know. I’m not really alive if I’m just content. It’s such a different energy that here we feel alive and here we feel like you know life is boring and nothing is really happening and no? Normally when you are content and you realize that that what you feel is contentment you do not feel bored. But if you have lived a life on the basis of this and you stop doing that then your life looks like it is boring.
This is like it gives you the drama, it gives you also the purpose of life, it gives you a feeling of who you are and if you stop engaging in that because you want to practice contentment you can have the feeling It’s dull. It’s dull, you know, in my life all the drama is gone. I don’t have any stories to tell anymore. I can’t complain of what I don’t have. I can’t complain about what somebody gave me that I actually didn’t want to.
I can’t tell my stories that I got what I wanted. Know it’s like all my stories are finished. So when you start doing that it can feel like boring and dull and but when you get more in touch with that you actually start to appreciate the value of contentment and then the more you experience contentment then the moment that this comes back you think: Ah, that feels weird, you know, what goes around in my system now, I actually don’t want that.’ And the moment that you can start feeling ‘I do not like this’, you know, then you can really somehow stop following this and and choose to be more on that side. It is addiction. It’s complete addiction.
Complete. We are all addicted. Attachment functions like addiction. And we never have enough, know. We operate like junkies.
And society and commercialism has a lot to do with that. And they help us to develop that system. Just like you go to another country or Thailand or something, you actually, you know, you do feel contentment and you feel, you know, landline, you get that peacefulness and when people don’t have things where they’re still happy and you sort of get into that culture. Then you come back over here and then you go back to that. Yeah.
And it’s almost like it’s very difficult in society to live without this because everybody tells us that if we do not use this system we don’t exist, you know, you’re not important, you won’t be successful because our whole society is only about this. How can and this is what the whole industry wants because only because of the imagine that we all will be content with what we have. What would happen with our economy? Well we can already see that, can’t we? Oh we didn’t really stop because we were content.
No, but the whole thing would just disintegrate as it currently stands. Difficult isn’t it? But if you guys all practice contentment don’t worry about the economy it would not really affect you know. You can all do that without Sorry? It can evolve into something else.
Contentment. With something else? No. That’s true. It also crushed you to discontent because of all the credit that was around and, you know, people wanting too much.
So it can go both ways can’t it? Yes, true. But that whole economy is all based on that energy of wanting at the moment. And we can want other things. But then you create a completely different society, you know.
But sometimes people say, but if I don’t keep on doing that, you know. I was just trying to be smarter than that person who was going to ask the question that we can’t stop doing that because otherwise the economy would fall down. Is being contented also being able to sit down, just say for example, just being able to sit down and get on with what you’re doing instead of always getting up to see what else is happening around or what somebody else What do you think? Well, I don’t know because I don’t think I’ve ever got to contentment really. Uh-huh.
You’re the person who gets up all the time. Well, I suppose. Yeah. I am actually. I’ve had Very difficult things are going on around me just to sit quietly and read.
What happens when you would sit quietly? Well I don’t know because I suppose, well I do sometimes now, I’m practicing that. So you can sit down and you can start observing what happens. And if the attachment energy comes up But is that attachment energy wanting to know what’s going on? Do is you move yourself, isn’t it?
You move yourself to another place that looks more interesting than where you are right now. That is attachment. It’s distracting yourself. So contentment means that you can just be without any need to push anything away or to strive for something. So what you’re describing is that you sit and then you have the tendency to see what is happening over there.
Yes. That is exactly attachment. That impulse is attachment. Is that the mind? Mean this is obvious.
That the mind? One sec. So next time when that comes because if she gets this she will progress very fast. Next time when you sit and that comes up you’re just look at that and you say what’s that? That is attachment or this is how attachment looks like.
Attachment constantly tells us the story there is something better there. I don’t think that, no I just sort of get up and do it. I suppose if I sit quietly I walk with what I’m Yes. Especially when you keep sitting, your mind will tell you. Then your mind starts going around and starts telling you, but going over there is much better than staying here.
And then you get all these reasons why it’s better to get up and do that. That is attachment trying to convince you that you should follow it. So next time you try to sit and you just observe what’s going on, how it feels like and what kind of thoughts are coming in your mind. Can you do that? If you can do it thirty seconds before you get I will do that.
Every moment in our life, most of the moments in our life attachment or aversion arises. Very subtle all the time. You know, the moment that you shift, you know, whatever you’re doing, attachment is behind that. You know, oh, there’s something itching and I scratch and there it’s finished, now I stop and now it’s here, so I start and that’s all attachment for comfort. Something’s agitating, so I have to do something.
Right? And then another part of us is like, oh, you know, my back is getting a little bit sore so I have to change position and find a better place and it’s like part of is aversion and then part of is attachment. You know, I want to get away from the pain and I find a more comfortable place to be.
About listening to your body and maybe you’ll develop a pressure sore in that area if you stay on that spot or you’ll develop a new, you know, neuralgia of your whatever if you stay with your wrist flex. Yeah. That’s what the medical world tells us isn’t it? And me although I’m a physio I do not believe in that. For example I had a friend’s child who had meningococcal in hospital, and his fingers were all going black.
His hands were edematous and flexed below. I’m trying to keep him alive. They weren’t worried about his hands, but then I re positioned those hands so they weren’t in a position of compression and moving back. They started changing so much. Yeah, yeah, that’s good.
That’s good. That’s a very difficult example, know, that’s a very difficult but if you look at disease, and I’ll come back to you Michael, sorry. If you look at disease, where does disease come from? Dis ease, dis ease. Dis ease has to do with that mind that constantly wants something else and doesn’t want what it gets, you know.
The more attachment no I shouldn’t say that disease is an expression of aversion, attachment, ignorance, delusions that we have not used in a, well all delusions we cannot use in a proper way. Delusions are very destructive. Delusions are always about me, me, me. Delusions always make us unhappy. You know, no matter if it’s aversion that goes into anger or pride or jealousy or attachment, delusion always make us unhappy.
And if we we stimulate that constantly. Isn’t it? It’s that is a fuel for life. We believe that if we don’t have delusions we don’t exist. So we keep keep that going.
And if we are balanced disease will not come. But if we are out of balance, for instance we are in a situation where we get too much fat we do not want or we get not enough of what we need, disease can easily come in and manifest in the body. And then there are many diseases that we cannot link to the mind, but it doesn’t mean that it’s not a link to the mind. So if you know that then even when I sit and I meditate an attachment tells me or aversion I have pain in my knees, I really have to change now otherwise and I make a whole story what is going to happen with my knees if I do not change my posture right now. But that story is not necessarily true.
So if you start working with your mind and with your energy all these things that we learn in the western world, in the medical, you know, science, I would debate many of these. You know, and it’s a belief. It’s like because we’re so used to looking for comfort, it’s almost where we have to keep on doing that in order to feel good. But if we know how to unwind that and how to undo that and sometimes sitting through discomfort brings you to a place where you have much more freedom. You know, for instance if you look at I don’t know if I would let my body just degenerate in a way it is doing, you know because we grow older and the body is going to degenerate, that’s a natural process.
According to Buddhism this process comes about due to our delusions. If we would be free of delusions that process could not happen. Well, our body wouldn’t age. Well, look at the lamas. Look at the lamas.
If you look at their skin, you know they have skin of an eighteen year old boys, they do not degenerate because of their state of mind. But so the delusion is what makes us old. If you see somebody who has had a hard life you can see it. Can see it. Hard life means I’ve suffered a lot.
Suffering a lot means I had a lot of things that I didn’t want. I had a lot of things that I needed and that were not there. It means I had a lot of attachment, lot of aversion and a lot of anger and a lot of sadness and a lot of pain and a lot of that makes us old. If I let that process happen and I do nothing we get all more stiff, all get more rigid, we all get more but if I somehow keep moving and keep opening up and keep on going against that there are actually techniques that you can free yourself from these tendencies. Yeah.
And for instance with diet you can get rid of a whole lot of toxins in your body. With moving you can get rid of a whole lot of toxins. And delusions is nothing else than toxins that we constantly create. So with meditation you can get rid of a lot of toxins. You look, so going against a stream, if you look at how many times we do do that in the medical world, I think it can go much further than that we do.
Sometimes we keep on moving with the body and we actually, you know, but it depends on many things. It is hard. No, can’t. No, can’t. No, I’m not asking you that.
No, no, and I think that way. No, no you can’t. Every drug worker walks in. No. I did that when I was a physio but I do run away sometimes.
Michael. You speak the truth. But just something the lady just on the other side of you said.
I think that’s a very beautiful simple example of the mind controlling the body. Yeah. And it happens many times. If you look during the day, how many times do we get up? We don’t even know why, you know.
And just to get up to have a look outside or to move something that is somewhere What? I said I’m often going outside just to stand out there. Yeah. And then you look and then you turn around and you go back in and we don’t know why we do that. But there is a constant following our desire.
We’re our desires because we find that when we get our desires, the feeling of it is so powerful and so beautiful that just overshadows in a beautiful, wonderful way, overshadowing inner contentment and peace. So what’s your question? That, you know, we’re saying that we don’t want this and we don’t want that and because of that perhaps we’re not content and we’re not balanced. But what if when we do get what we want, are so happy.
It just makes us feel so good. So you say I do not want to give that up in order to practice contentment. Feel so good, you know, when this happens in my life, when this is on track. So how long does that, does that, how long does it last? It lasts as long as that situation is happening.
How long is that? It can vary. Between? I’m trying to be candid about my life here. What does that mean?
So I’m Dutch. What does that mean? Say that give me I’m trying to be discreet. Oh, sorry. No.
No. About Only tell want to say. How long can that really last for? Two days, four days, an hour. And then?
And then when you’re not in that situation, And then when you’re not in that situation, what do you feel? It’s not an eleven or a twelve, it’s a three or a two. Uh-huh. So what do you do when you are the two or the three? What do you do?
Read lots of books and you see lots of people and you and strengthen your mind. What how? By looking at other things in life that aren’t based on this particular addiction or this attachment. Yeah. You look for other attachments to go back to your eight, nine, ten level or?
That’s a part of it. Do you look for a way to get out of that whole system of gratification? I’m doing both. Both. You’re still in between like, you know, do I really want to give this up?
No I don’t. No. No that’s what I hear. So you’re saying the pleasure that I get from my attachment is so fantastic. Why would I ever give it up?
Yeah Do other people suffer from the same? We love it isn’t it? When things are going well we feel energized and everything goes and no obstacle, we feel very high. It’s fantastic. Until the wall comes and we hit the wall.
Uh-huh. And then it hurts. And then we can say: Oh, but I don’t care too much about the hurt. At least I had a good time. This board gets more dirty every time and it doesn’t go off anymore.
I’m going to turn it around. You. Moments where the mind will be such a negative thing that you can’t see the positivity in almost anything. Oh isn’t the beach beautiful at the moment? Is it?
Not to me. So why is that? Why do you feel so so What causes that? You haven’t got what you What you wanted? The thing that makes you feel bad.
So if you had contentment what would happen? What would change that? I guess maybe straight off the top of my head it’s a matter of one gaining the ability not to be attached to that thing that makes you feel like that. And I don’t I guess I’m hardly here because I want to know techniques and how to do that. You know the only reason why we keep on looking for happiness the way we are doing is because first of all because we do not know another way of looking for happiness.
Second, these moments of happiness is the only happiness we know. So listening to somebody who says well you actually have to give that up it’s like hey that’s the only thing I have, you you can’t ask that for me. Practicing contentment can feel like I have to give up these fantastic moments. And I say, that’s not necessarily so. When you practice contentment, you can completely enjoy every fantastic moment that you have.
You can bliss out as much as you want. But if the moment doesn’t come because you don’t get what you want, you do not get agitated, frustrated. You are also okay with that. So what you stop doing is the striving to get it. Alright, we believe that the only way that I can get a cup of tea is if I make sure that I have a cup of tea.
And if I don’t do it myself nobody’s going to do it and it will never come naturally to me, right, by itself it won’t come. That’s what we believe. So we keep on chasing whatever we want we keep chasing. But maybe when we are mistaken in believing that we have to produce everything ourselves or we have to go for everything ourselves before it can come to us. Somehow we do not trust that things come naturally to us.
We think we have to work for it. And that might be a completely mistaken idea. True? But then I have to jump into Buddhism to make that clear, you know, and I’m not sure if I should do that tonight. Jamyang, there’s a really good example in life where there’s a person that’s happily married and often attract quite a number of people to them when they’re merit but when they’re single they never got any offers.
And I think that is due to what you’re saying, if you’re content then you will get what you want but you’re not necessarily wanting it. Do you know what I mean? Can be single and they can be looking for the right person and looking looking looking but they don’t find them. But then, three months later they find that person and they get married and they’re happy. They’re not looking anymore.
But all of a sudden people start asking them out on dates. People will often say this, that when they’re in a happy relationship I didn’t find anyone months ago when I was looking, all of sudden I’m in a happy relationship. And all these people are asking me out, they’re flocking around me, what’s going on? I’m getting phone calls from friends that, oh I hate you, how about making offers to them and I think that’s because they’re content and they’re not looking for it and it comes into their life. Laws of attraction when you make an effort, when you do find yourself really making that effort, I’m gonna be happy even though this bugs me.
Sometimes just these things, you call it come or just happen and you go, oh, is that a reward for me striving to be positive about this situation? That’s a very general question but you know I have felt that sometimes. Yeah, and I’m just trying to think if I should go into Buddhism or not. I might put people off. Do I put anybody off when I explain more in accordance with karma as far as I can because it’s not easy.
karma is very subtle so to really understand that I don’t do that. If I’m in a negative mindset then first of all I create negative karma, you know because my actions they are in general not so positive but also I trigger a lot of negative karma that I have created in the past. Somehow delusions trigger negative karma to ripen. You know? So then it’s like one bad thing after the other happens to me and I just can’t get out of it.
If I feel happy, happiness triggers more the ripening of the positive karma. So when I feel happy the delusions are much less in my mind and happiness I do not mean the excitement that we try to generate but really I just feel good about myself, about my life without any particular reason. The delusions are much less and somehow the positive karma ripens easier. If the positive karma ripens then you know everything will just be better. So making sure that you feel happy is like that doesn’t mean that you get everything that you want.
But if you feel happy you don’t have to have. When you feel happy you have everything you want. So just you thinking if I would just have that then I would be happy that is a sign that you’re unhappy. And if you could change your mind then suddenly you do not need to have that anymore. You say oh no, I don’t care about that.
I’m happy already. If we’re happy we have everything that we need. So if we have everything that we need there is no reason to bully other people. There is no reason to be angry with other people. There is no reason why we should be discontent.
There is no reason why should be jealous. We have no reason for the delusions to come. And the delusions make us miserable. And the delusions make that things do not work out the way we would like it to be. So if we can change our state in a happy mind frame then things start naturally to happen the way we want them or would like them.
It’s just that we don’t demand them, we don’t chase for them, they come to us. Know, so we, like we have to wait for that moment. The way we are looking for happiness is we try to get it there, right? If I have that I’m gonna be happy. Which means that we constantly move away from where we are right now.
We think that our happiness is somewhere else even if it is in another moment or even if it is situation than we have in the moment. Right? If we can change that and we can be happy with where we are, we are in the moment. And when we are in the moment we are content. And when we’re in the moment delusions do not arise.
And you think good things come if you make the effort to be in that place then good karma comes our way. It’s the only way that, no I shouldn’t say that. The more we can be in that happy frame of mind the less needy we feel. So we just don’t need anything. But then if you can go to that state where you really do not need anything and then I mean sincerely do not need anything, things appear naturally.
You know in the West we do not have to be afraid that we will die of hunger somehow. Somehow the food is always there. But still we worry when we lose a job, we do not have enough money, how we believe I do not have it. So there is a lot of you know it sounds very simple. If you’re just happy then everything happens and if you’re unhappy nothing happens but to change the mind is very very very difficult.
And if you look into the guidelines and you think about even just practicing contentment we have seen how the mind is tricky with us and it’s telling us other stories than reality really is. And we are used to that mind and we are not used to the other mind that we can generate. Know so the mind is constantly telling us oh no no you really need to do this in order to be happy. You know and when you start practicing contentment you first feel this restlessness coming up which feels very uncomfortable and you think yeah but that doesn’t make me happy you know. So you have to learn how to sit through that discomfort that will come in the beginning not always but can come in the beginning that you have to sit through before you really arrive in the value that gives you happiness, before you arrive in the contentment.
Which means that you have to postpone your happiness and we want happiness now, know, we cannot bear any discomfort. That means that if we would just use our intuition or our instinctive nature then we would not be able to change because our instinctive nature just wants instant happiness and it cannot wait. Only when our rational mind can see, Ah yes, I understand this and I can see that it works like that and now with that understanding I have to bear that discomfort when I keep sitting instead of getting up all the time. Alright and then in these moments you try to work with your mind and then you will see that the mind starts to change and the moment you start to taste the contentment then it’s like wow this is really nice, wow, oh you know it’s like I can’t stop doing, how nice is that? Because doing is tiring.
It’s like we’re constant, as if somebody’s hunting us all the time. We have to keep running all the time. And we can never stop and rest because when we stop and rest I don’t know what would happen. You get told you’re lazy? You get depressed and upset.
You get depressed and upset? What happens when we stop running? I get sick or exhausted. You get sick of exhausted. You’re going to feel how tired you are from the running.
Everything you’re running from suddenly appears. And everything that you’re running appears. All of stops and does things up. Is that a truth or is that a thought? Is that a fear?
No I think it does because if you’re continually busy doing things it’s never I think it’s when you suddenly stop or straight away. You have to confront certain things that you ran away from before. Yeah. So keeping busy is an avoidance is what you’re saying. Keeping moving.
Yeah, can be an avoidance of confronting certain things. Wow. I suppose not being satisfied with what you have is the opposite to contentment as well, isn’t it? Yeah, not being satisfied with what you have, that’s discontentment. And that’s the nature of our attachment.
You know, no matter what we get, we will not be satisfied. It’s also the nature of our body, you know. What makes us today happy? Our body is constantly changing. And happiness is a feeling.
A feeling that comes and goes, you know. So I’m sitting and when I sit like this at the moment I feel happy. But that happiness is a feeling and it depends on many many different things. It depends on who I see, it depends on where I sit and how I feel how I feel in the sense of how I feel in my body. But my body is impermanent and if I keep sitting like this at a certain point my back starts hurting so my happiness will go down.
Because I perceive happiness and unhappiness in a body that’s constantly changing these feelings will constantly change with it. And what makes me today happy doesn’t necessarily make me tomorrow happy. The ice cream today can taste really good and tomorrow it makes me sick. We don’t know. Yes, and then there is another question.
Then what do we do when we stop? What do we do with life? I’ve got stopped now. Now what’s going to make me happy? But if you know that the running itself is what makes you unhappy, then the stopping would mean that the moment you stop, when we meditate it’s like stopping then first the mind starts to unwind you know because when we run we wind up ourselves constantly isn’t it?
And then we get tired so then when we stop we first have to unwind and that can feel as a relief it can feel very uncomfortable because somehow we like that feeling of constantly tightening ourselves up. So that can feel unpleasant or restless or and then you go to a place where you do nothing. And then when you do nothing you might be confronted with all these thought, oh now I’m lazy, you know, so or now I’m useless or whatever, I don’t know, I do not want to blame our parents but as children we have been given all kinds of names when we would go to the place where we just are. So this comes up and that will give you doubt. Oh now I’m this and now I’m that.
If you believe that you start running again. Being the nuns taught me. And and they they say, you know, in the bible, says, man who does not work should not eat. Uh-huh. Know mean?
It’s as simple as that. So what they’re saying To rephrase it, I would rephrase it in a sense that everybody has a contribution to society. Some people, their contribution, you know if you do not want to contribute to society, you know I could say okay, you know, I can agree with that. But I think in a healthy society everybody contributes but not necessarily with working in a sense of physically working or you know I think there are people who just with their presence can help so many beings. They’re also working without the doing.
If you stop doing and you start and in the not doing you observe your mind and you observe what is going on and you for instance say that if I understand how my mind works I know that at the moment how my mind works it makes me unhappy. So and I want to be happy and I’m observing my mind because I want to be happy. But also when I’m more happy I can be a better person to others and if I understand my own mind better I can maybe understand other people better and because of that I can be more skillful and I can be more loving and kind and you know. If you stop doing with that motivation that stop doing will naturally lead to happiness. I don’t know, I was a very strong doer so I’m trying to think back like how was that when I stopped?
It drove me mad that I stopped. I was expecting you to say if you do that you will be happy, but then right at the very end you said the opposite. What did I say? If you stop doing, no you will be happy. Stop doing will lead to happiness.
Yeah. It can in that context. Yeah. What did you hear me say? I’m sorry, I thought you said that if you observe your mind mind and you may be in control of my mind, I will become more happy, therefore I will be able to deal with people better, I will become more skillful with my mind, Therefore, I will be a better person.
I will spread joy. And I thought that at the very end you said the opposite. And that makes you unhappy? No. No.
If I did I’m sorry that shouldn’t have come out of my mouth. No, what I said is I tried to think about how that happened in my mind because my mind was very like this and sometimes the stillness and the unwinding for me was terror, that was absolute terror. You know and sitting on my cushion it’s like It cuts like this all the time. At the same time I knew that if I kept doing that and I would look back I could see that my mind improved, you know, but it was very very unpleasant to do. Because I really enjoy if things go really well and, you know, setting a goal and achieving that and it’s Being busy.
Being busy, yeah, well I think it’s slowly changing, but yes, I like it. You know, and I can feel the addiction behind it. And if I don’t keep on doing this then it’s almost like I’m not alive. Stop doing that feels like I won’t exist anymore or nobody appreciates me anymore or nobody needs me anymore or nobody. All these fears that we have that keep us going they will surface and you have to look at all of them and say: Is that really true?
Is that really true? And then you say: Well I see it’s not true. But then your whole instinct starts telling you, but it is true. We have many messages like that that say, no you can’t do that. But what you’re doing is that if you look at what is happiness in the mind, you have the mind and the mind is like space and then in the mind all kinds of things can arise.
All other illusions arise in the mind. They come up and then they can dissolve again. They come up and they dissolve again. When our disturbing emotions come up like the attachment and the aversion and the pride and also all the good feelings that somehow it’s an agitation of the mind, it’s not a peaceful mind. Agitation, although it can feel as pleasure, it is like an agitation.
Because we can have great excitement which feels like pleasure, we also know the other side when we do not get what we want which is very painful. Because it has a flip side Buddhism doesn’t call the pleasure that comes with excitement real pleasure. It is actually in the nature of suffering. That pleasure is by nature dissatisfactory because there is going to be a point that it changes from pleasure into displeasure. So what is real happiness?
Real happiness is if we are free from that whole tendency of going up and down. If we have a complete freedom from that. If it just doesn’t appear in the mind anymore. Then we feel: Oh my God, freedom. That freedom is like a stable condition which is a happiness, a joy, which has nothing to do with what we have, what we get, what we don’t get.
It has nothing to do with that. It’s because it’s freedom of the temporary things, right? And the temporary pleasures and displeasures are very much connected with the temporary things that we get in our life or do not get in our life. So if we remove that that completely from our mind then it doesn’t matter what appears in front of us because we do not react to that anymore. So it’s like a state of not reacting, so contentment you stop reacting to whatever appears in front of you or to whatever you want.
Then finding that freedom from that addiction, that is what we call real happiness. So do you believe that we are happy when we get freedom from that? Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. Yeah? Yeah, sure it does.
Okay, so you don’t doubt that I’m saying I’m at that point. No, no, no, but you don’t doubt that there is happiness in the mind if we remove that? I think it makes You think there is happiness in the mind? I think that what you’re saying is fine. Possibly.
I’ve yet to prove it myself. I’ve to experience it fully. Hopefully I will. So you can look at for instance at role models, people who do not have strong negative emotions, how they feel like, and how they present themselves. And the book the sixteen Guidelines for a Happy Life’ they describe every guideline with a role model.
And for the contentment they use the role model of Gandhi, Mahatma Gandhi, you know, who was a political leader but he gave up all the status that went with that. And he only wore the, no not wear, he was wearing the cloth, the traditional Indian cloth, Not caring about any, you know, I think once he went to visit the, was it the king in England at that time? And he only wore his Indian cloth and some people said, Oh, you know, but you can’t do that, it really, really is not a good thing to do that with a king. And then he said, But the king is wearing enough for the two of us. You know, so he was like, yeah, that’s his practice.
So he has said things as: There is more to life than increasing its speed. You know, and if you look at how we live, it’s all about how can we produce more in a shorter period of time. We all have to be productive, isn’t it? That’s society’s about we have to be productive. And then we push, push, push and the more we push the more the mind gets uptight.
I think that’s very I mean for myself the busier I am the more uptight I get. I can do a lot but at a cost. And the cost is that we just grow older much faster. That’s right. And there is a lot of stress and restlessness and unhappiness.
So feeling worth without having, without producing anything, that’s a very big issue in our society. It is. So how do we feel good about ourselves without being productive? Productive in the Western, you know, in our cultural sense. Don’t know.
You don’t know? Just have to let go of other people’s, what you perceive as Letting go of expectations? What you see as other people’s expectations. Inner Let’s see what qualities that we need. Inner confidence.
And how do we get that confidence? Let go of expectations. Yeah. What was the question? I don’t know.
What was the question? And we end up feeling good without producing. Yes. The work. How do you have food on the table, doing the shopping, doing the cleaning, you know. And if she doesn’t do that she’s really worthless.
And dad will tell her. But even if she does do it, even if she does not consider it to be very worthless. Worth. Yeah, that’s also a cultural thing. This is true.
You’re gonna pay someone for it. So if mom would be capable of feeling worth in herself, know, then it doesn’t matter if she’s productive or not or what people tell her or not. If she feels she’s worth then it can happen whatever happens she’s alright. So how can we stop that? Every day we get messages, every day.
How can we stop that? Even if you do feel inner confidence in yourself but somebody doesn’t acknowledge it, it just doesn’t feel right even if you have got inner confidence in yourself. So how can you become emotionally in dependence upon other people’s acknowledgement? You don’t have to tell yourself a different sort of fact. Maybe have faith in what you’re doing.
How? Faith in what you’re doing, would that help? If you believe you’re doing the right thing. Yep. So that was my question, how do you do that?
And the answer is having faith in what you’re doing. Sorry, you’re saying that’s your answer? Not mine. Okay, that came from the group. But is it not I’m trying to read it to myself at the moment.
If you drop the expectation of wanting some other person to Acknowledge you? Wouldn’t even acknowledge you, but if you want them to Validate. Val well, perhaps it is the same. But if you want someone else to think that you’re that that that you are are important in in in their life, natural fact or not, Isn’t it that if you start thinking well then if you know how Buddhism goes on about if you see everybody’s being equally important? At one level that’s fine, but with certain people I don’t really want them to think that I’m the most important.
That’s your neediness, But if I didn’t have that neediness I could get to there couldn’t I? Yes, yes, yes. So how can you get rid of that neediness? Because that neediness makes that you want to produce, you know? I’m just trying think, well, is that really real?
No I don’t, I just sit there and say to myself, Buddhism says that everybody has to be equally important, why should I expect so and so to think that I’m more important? So when we practice everybody is equally important what we are trying to do is that in general I feel more important than anybody else. No no no know and let me tell you what because you mix two things up. Think most of us, biggest part of society feels I’m more important than you. My happiness is more important than your happiness.
I’m striving more for my happiness than I strive for your happiness. Is a mind that leads, although it is striving for happiness it actually leads to unhappiness. Because it’s the mind that we just looked into. Yes. You know?
So then in order to counteract that mind, one of the tools is that we say: I am just as important as anybody else. So the happiness of other beings is at least just as important as my happiness, to get ourselves out of that ego. Isn’t that the same with everybody equally important? Yes. Is that what I’m doing?
So then there is another problem that you say I’m very needy and I want to have contact with people and how do I get that when they really like me and I’m really important in their life. So I want to somehow make sure that they find me important. Now on one level that’s what I want but I know that’s incorrect. Yes, yes. I’m just talking about what you want.
But can you see these are two different things? One is that I feel more important than others and what you’re saying is you’re trying to look through the eyes of somebody else and then make sure that you have a place in their life. Yes, yes, yes, but not anymore. I was making that point three minutes ago. Sorry.
I’ll just sit with that, don’t worry. What if you’re more concerned about other people’s happiness and you don’t think that they acknowledge your effort? I’m not talking about one person, I’m talking about a lot of people around you. So they have to acknowledge your effort. Is that the same as this one?
Can you counteract that with this? So in Buddhism it’s why would I be more concerned with the happiness of others? It can wear you out when you just feel you’re living in a world and people are totally oblivious to the effort you’re making for. If you do it with the wrong reasons or with not enough wisdom, yes, you’re right. But the reason why I say other people’s happiness is more important than mine is if for instance I’m working at Buddha House and I want to achieve something and there are some problems and I’m constantly hitting walls and I can’t get there.
My normal reaction is frustration then I get angry then if it still doesn’t help then I might start saying things and because of a nun I have to be quite polite and so maybe I become more manipulative or whatever. But I still keep on trying to get what I want. I suffer from that and the other people suffer from that. If I will be able to give that striving up and say okay what if I look at the whole big picture and think how these people, how I can help them to become happy right now where they are right now. And if I could find that action then how would I feel?
Better and they would feel better. So I’m doing that for me. I’m doing that with wisdom because I know that if I change my attitude into I want this into how can I make it work for everybody I feel better, they feel better? What if everybody in this class just didn’t smile or laugh or say thanks and walked out every night? Doesn’t do anything to me because I love it to be okay with what you’re doing.
It really does. But that has been different in my life, you know. And if people didn’t say: Oh you’re so fantastic I would feel horrible. And I would think: Was that alright? It alright?
Was it alright? You know. I’ve done that. By studying, studying and looking into the mind and learning and training it’s like I have a good night nobody has to tell me that I did a good job, you know? If I tell you that I didn’t do a good job, would I not want to hear that over and again?
That also sometimes happens and then Not that I’m saying that about it. No no no but So if you had said it to me five years ago you have completely crushed. If you said to me now then I say I’m giving the best I can and I know that and I’ve checked everything and I really give the best I can and I’m very happy that I give the best I can. And I’m happy with myself that I do that. So even if a lot people think this is not good enough, then I can’t change that.
Of course, you know you listen and you think like what are they saying and can I do something with that? And you do do that. It’s not that you say oh but I’m doing the best I can I’m not going to listen to them. But if people say I just don’t like what you’re doing and I said so what is it that you don’t like because I want you to be happy. And they say I don’t know I just get a strange feeling and I said what kind of feeling?
Yeah I don’t know but I just don’t like what you’re doing and that’s the only thing they can say. I don’t like what you’re doing. And they cannot express anything else than that. I can’t change it. And I do not like that because I want them to be happy.
But if I check-in myself, if I use all the skills I have and I try to listen and understand and it doesn’t work, then it doesn’t work. But for a long time in my life I would blame it, oh I must do something wrong and I do not know what I’m doing wrong. There was things that I can’t see and everybody sees them except me and you know I’ve had all these stories but I keep checking checking checking checking checking. Is that being content when, because I work in a job, not that you get that where people don’t appreciate you, but I work in an unappreciated job where people are always telling you that the public are always telling you it’s not good enough, it’s not good enough every single And it’s very much thankless. But I know that I’m doing the best I can for people every day with the resources that I have and so I don’t ever go home disheartened because I know that it might not be meeting the needs of everyone there on that particular night because of the sheer volume of people that I’m dealing with but I do my best and I do it with happiness and I do it with love so then I come away thinking well But what you need to do is that you need to fix your own neediness.
I’m needy in hearing praise then when I don’t get it I feel unhappy. So I have to, if I have the need to hear praise I actually feel worthless. So I have to work on looking into that, to what does it make that I feel like that and what kind of beliefs do I hold onto that I think like that. And when I can find the beliefs and can you know beliefs are just beliefs, they are not really true. I can change them.
So when I can change them and can start appreciating myself because I didn’t, you know then the more I do that the less praise I need from others. But we are quite, know the way we are built in our society, we we are not really healing and loving each other. We are constantly undermining and damaging and, you know, so it takes a while to fix that. But you’ve also got a wider generation that the wider generation that say for example I read an article in the paper, the wider generation are not unhappy or what was it saying that as long as you show gratitude to the Y generation, as long as they feel they have need a sense of fun and as long as they have promotion quickly they won’t leave you as an employer. And I’m thinking, well, wow.
That’s like the Y generation, isn’t it? The whole article on me. Which is the You What is the Y generation? Generation of thirty year olds down and then it turns into the X generation. Think a lot of people expect praise for things.
Oh yeah, yeah yeah we all have that. Also being acknowledged. We need that very strongly. And well we talked about humility and I think needing that acknowledgement has to do with pride with pride is quite a subtle emotion and to see that, you know, it’s very very difficult. What if you don’t I work with socially isolated elderly people and I don’t necessarily I don’t like them to say you’ve done a good job, but if I do something and I can see they’re generally happy, I’ve made a whole difference in their day.
On like a, all my colleagues call me up, old lady buzz. Is that the same sort of gratification that I do? If they become happy with what you’re doing and you feel happy because of that, that is, I don’t know. You want them to be happy and then they are happy, that is your gratification, that they are happy. But that is not asking for praise.
No, no, no. Win win situation. Yeah. And it feels good. If you’re giving your best and you really know you are, really striving for harmony and peace and love and somebody’s just rejecting it, you’ve got to say what’s wrong with that person.
There’s something wrong with that person. You can say that for yourself. Maybe that’s not what they mean. Know, know you can also say, oh the karma is not there, you know that we can cherish or What did you say? Need at that moment.
I can assume that we’re doing our best for someone. I think sometimes we think we need this so we’ll give that to them, but maybe it’s not what they need. And so maybe we need to understand what they need. Maybe they’ll say look, you know, just as an example, you’re giving me love but I need space. And so you say, well, do you need?
And I say, just need some space. Oh, okay. Well, that’s what I’ll do. And then that might be contributing to their happiness. And if you feel really centered and confident and you do not have a need to give out whatever unless it is asked for, wait until another person somehow or you can offer but if the person says no, you don’t feel hurt you just leave it.
You respect the person for what they are. Instead of talking about contentment, have you done enough? Let me have a look. So if we have lack of contentment, then that can influence everything that we’re doing, isn’t it? In a very unpleasant way.
We start feeling unpleasant when we lack contentment. If there is a lot of content a lack of contentment and we start grasping, the mind can become cluttered and we can keep on distract distracting ourselves. If you look at our planet and see what lack of contentment does with the planet, you know, it’s like we’re putting our whole life at risk out of lack of contentment. If we look at relationships and we are discontent, what are we doing with what are we asking from the other person? You know the other person is never good enough with what they’re giving us.
That is what our lack of contentment is doing in a relationship. You know it is clouding, it is somehow poisoning the relationship if we have lack of contentment. And the other person is not perfect but if we are content with what we share with the other person then that leads to much more harmony in the relationship than when we are discontent. Isn’t it? And discontentment, discontentment, if spoke about that, if you feel happy, content, you do not need anything.
But if we feel unhappy we need a lot. So if we can somehow shift our mind to a content state then the relationships that we have will become much more harmonious. We do not become content because we get what we want but we are content and then we don’t need anything. Can you see it? Good.
If we are not content we create all these fantasies about how our life would be if we would have whatever. So that means we’re not in the present. We are dreaming, fantasizing. We are not in the real world. And if we have lack of contentment then we can’t solve that.
We might keep on dreaming the rest of our life and we don’t even know what our life has been about. We just know that we never got what we want. If you die with that state of mind you will have to look back at a life that was not good. But if we can change that and we can feel happy with what we have and we can be in the present moment and we can appreciate whatever is there. Then when we would be at the end of our life we can look back and say, Wow, how fantastic!
And it can be exactly the same life. So when we are content there is no need. So maybe if somebody doesn’t give us praise, I don’t know you can either give yourself the praise, you know if you feel like the praise is missing, why is that person not telling me that I’m doing a good job? You can say, Oh I tell myself I’m doing a good job. Or you can connect so well with what you’re doing that you know you’re doing a good job and when you know it, you know, when you’re really connected with it and you have seen it, the need is not there.
So is contentment, is that a weakness or is that a strength? A strength. So how can we connect more with contentment?
Live more in the present moment. Do meditation. Meditation is about being, you know. Meditation is about learning to be in the present moment. Gratitude with what you have.
One time somebody gave me an exercise, I must admit it didn’t last too long but it was a good exercise and he said every time when the negative emotion comes up and you see it, start about thinking about that you appreciate in your life and you change immediately your mindset. I feel anger, what do I appreciate in my life? And then anger is gone. I read a book once called Simple Abundance and it’s a really good book about being appreciative of lots of little things. And if you eat there’s one day and it reminds you to be appreciative of something in your life and there’s three sixty five But it’s one of the one of the days where to keep a journal, and every night, write down five things you appreciate about that day or about your life that day.
And it’s amazing the little things you can come up with if you look. Uh-huh. I caught the bus. I didn’t miss it. Like, I appreciate that because yesterday I missed it.
I was walking in the rain. So today I caught it. So that’s that’s something I appreciated today or, you know, just little things like that. Yeah. And it’s it’s amazing the transformation that takes place when you do that for a couple of months.
You actually feel happier because there is written in black and white five things you had to appreciate. And I guess if you did it the opposite How lucky I am. You keep on saying how lucky I am if this happens to me. Exactly. But we don’t tend to stop and think about those sort of things in life.
No, it takes them for granted that things go well. If we wouldn’t know how many causes and conditions need to come together in order for things to go well, you know, it’s like one thing goes wrong and one condition is missing and things start going wrong. We have these days that we get up and everything goes wrong. It’s like something is missing and no matter what we try it always goes wrong. Usually, the older one will say something back, and they’re not feeling fine.
And then they’ll hit each other. But But she gave up her neediness. Yep. So none of that. So was just beautiful.
So Yeah. We like Fantastic. Yeah. Fantastic. My son as well.
He’s keeping me quite negative. And he go, if something goes wrong in his day, because he starts pressing, I hate this day. Everything’s really bad. And so I’ve I’ve taught him to say, every time that comes into your mind, change it with a positive. Just say, what’s upsetting you?
And then you. It with a positive. So now he says, well, that made me really angry, but I really do like this day. And he’ll he’ll just replace it. And just changing the way you think Uh-huh.
You can see them, think about it, and then smile, and then they go off on a happy note instead of going on a downward spiral. Because kids are so readable more so than adults. And kids immediately get it. If you do these things with kids It’s like a game, isn’t it? It’s just so easy to game.
And they’re so attached to their thoughts and what they believe is their personality or part of their personality. They can just shift it. And then you see if we wouldn’t do that like kids, you know? But that’s cognitive therapy. That’s how you get over depression.
It’s by thinking instead of thinking oh this is bad, this is bad, you can actually change it and think of a positive thing about that situation. Like this happened to me, say for example, you get a flat tire, you go, God, I’m going have fifteen minutes late to work. Because that happened to my husband the other day. He’s cursing and carrying on. I said to him, you just missed the car accident that you were gonna have.
He’s like, what? I’m like, well, you’re gonna have a car accident on the way to work, and you missed out now. You’re fifteen minutes later. You missed the collision. Everything’s great.
You’re so positive! I think I’m not sure if cognitive therapy can do everything, help you to get rid of all the depression and all the discontentment and all the, you know, yes it helps to change your thoughts but sometimes there are deeper, deeper things underlying that need other kind of work. But with children they do not have that deeper stuff, you know, so they are very easy to and sometimes children have deeper stuff and then it can be very difficult to change. But if you see, if they can, it’s fantastic. If you go to schools with the sixteen guidelines you can change the whole education, can change whole Adelaide.
I think that’s what we need to do. So how else? Do we ought to have other techniques to practice contentment? And if you think about finding a still moment where we can just be, where do we find that? Meditation?
Yeah, you have a busy life and a busy job, where do we find the place to practice at? You anywhere. You can do it anywhere. But I just, if we help each other to be creative with that, you know, you can get ideas and think, oh, yeah. I can do that and I can do that.
What do you do? Pray? Uh-huh. Mhmm. And during the day, what do you do during the day? While you wait for something.
Yeah. I could wait in a line. Yeah. Just in the car? Traffic causes frustration to you.
You can use that as an opportunity to to yourself, interact with the moment. You breathe out and you let go and say, oh, wow. Here I am. Taking some moments for yourself? We’re not in control at all.
No, we’re not because they’re so changeable all the time. But somehow we believe we are, isn’t it? Or we would like to be. But if we can give that up and can just go with the flow, it’s and sometimes we might get things that we do not like, but if we can sit with that pain and just accept that, you know, then it also will pass. But if we fight it, it will just keep on coming back.
Then you have the demons that you can’t face. Fantastic. Well we can do a small meditation maybe to finish this off unless you have some questions. Thank you very much for all your contribution, that was wonderful. Meditation is nothing more than just being with yourself, a place where you can stop doing, where you can just see what’s going on in your mind.
And then just look into your life and how you move from day to day, how you move through your days. And see how that speedy energy, that attachment energy, how that rules in general our life. Be aware of your body and what you feel in your body when you follow that energy. And then wonder how would it be, how would my life look like when I give up following this energy? And you can imagine that that energy stops and that you come to rest.
How do you feel? Do you feel content straight away? Or is there a feeling of underlying discontentment or sadness, maybe anger, whatever feeling? Is there another feeling that you have covering up with following your speedy energy? And if you find another feeling, just try to let it go.
Feel that you have everything in your life that you need. You are alive, you have a roof, you have food and there are many people around you that you can love. Recognize craving or neediness that we have, that that is actually based on a wrong belief. It is based on a belief that we need something and try to see that that is not true. So having giving up that speedy energy, see how your life evolves.
What is important in your life? What kind of people are in your life? What kind of activities are you engaged in? And has something changed in the way you’re doing things? Has something changed in your attitude in how you do things?
How do you feel? And then make your own conclusion. And then we can dedicate by thinking, may all beings find happiness and peace. Thank you very much for coming.