Inspired by the Buddha's Twelve Links of Dependent Origination and Happify.com
We
often think of happiness as being due to external factors, as a noun
or an adjective. Happiness has no verb form. It's a little sad
that there's no happiness verb. Without a verb, all we can do is hope
for happiness, wait for it, long for it – happiness remains an
object somewhere out there in the distance. Sometimes, we get lucky
and we experience it a bit.
Thinking
of happiness as being dependent entirely on external factors is
totally mistaken. We incorrectly think of happiness as either being
outside of our control, or being dependent entirely on external
factors, such that I try, endlessly and tirelessly, to control them.
In
reality, my happiness mainly depends on me, on my mind, on internal
causes within me. Happiness is a state of mind, and my mind is
essentially the only thing that is in my control – as long as I
train it. Right now I'm at the mercy of my mind. But through mind
training, it's possible to change that situation, to change habits of
mind, to gradually become happier and happier, and eventually,
to develop genuine and lasting happiness.
There
are causes for happiness and causes for suffering. When we abandon
the causes for suffering and adopt the causes for happiness, we
happify ourselves.
 |
| Public Health Model to Heal Violence |
The Public Health Model to Heal Violence can help us understand how the
destructive emotions that mess up our happiness, that obscure the
supreme happiness, the hidden inner radiance that lies within each
one of us, that hover like a cloud hiding the sun, arise.
Let's
look more closely at what happens in the mind when the mind engages
with any object.
What happens in the mind?
Since
our mind is untrained, as soon as we engage with any object, as soon
as the mind perceives an object, as soon as an object appears to
the mind, and without us noticing it at all, that troublesome “I”
is already there. Because of the “I” point of view, the “I”
perspective, the "I" misperception, “I like” and “I don't like” immediately pop up
and forcefully overtake us. As a result, we grasp at the object,
reify the object, give the object a concreteness that it doesn't
really have. “I like” so intensely that I MUST get that thing. I
hate so much that I HAVE TO get away from it or destroy it.
The three main destructive emotions or the three root destructive minds or mental states that we need to abandon are: (1) Ignorance, our mistaken view of self/ego/"I," (2) Attachment/Greed, and (3) Aversion/Hatred/Anger.
A
trained mind, a mind that is mindful of itself, discerns the stages
that precede the intense splitting. The ability to discern the mind
moments that precede the arising of attachment and aversion
(splitting, dualistic perception) frees our grasping at the object
and reduces our destructive emotions. We begin to become the masters
of our own mind, instead of being its subject, instead of being
enslaved by it.
In
this image, we can see what really happens, without our
noticing it, without our realizing it. One of our sense
consciousnesses (seeing, hearing, etc.), a physical sense organ
(eyes, ears, etc.) engages with an object. We discern an object. This
is Contact. Alternately or additionally, our mental consciousness
engages with a non-physical object, for example: love, truth, ethics.
We discern these non-physical objects with our mental consciousness,
not with our sense consciousnesses (after our eye consciousness and
the physical eye engage with text, in this instance).
Immediately
after some object appears to the mind, immediately after Contact, we
feel, we experience, we perceive, one of three feelings, one of three
possible perceptions: pleasant, unpleasant and neutral. Neutral is
not very interesting, not so important. Every mind, every
consciousness, every sentient being, will always feel an infinite
continuity of “pleasant” and “unpleasant” (and neutral). This is Feeling.
A
mind that is free of suffering experiences pleasant and unpleasant,
but does not grasp strongly at the pleasant and the unpleasant. The
pleasant and the unpleasant simply pass; they come and go, arise,
abide and disappear. The drama happens when the mind grasps strongly
at the “pleasant” and “unpleasant,” and as a result, also
grasps strongly at the object.
This
perceptual error of a solid, permanent, independently existing ego is responsible for all the destructive
emotions, for all our negative emotions. All the violence in the
world comes from this mental misperception. If we want to cultivate
happiness, to happify, and if we want a more pleasant world for all
of us, the way to expel violence from our hearts and to eradicate
violence in the world is through learning, through education, by
mindfully observing the process by which the destructive emotions
arise in our mind.
Once
we understand that we are all interdependently linked and
interconnected, that my happiness depends on your happiness and vice
versa, we will not want to harm any other being. We will be ethical
and happy. Lack of ethics is like mud that clouds water when we stir
a cup of water and mud. The mental mud can only settle by practicing
ethics and honesty, and then we can start to discern the internal
mental process I described. I pray and wish that everyone's mental
mud settles.
--
These
are the days of the Tibetan New Year, the Year of the Fire Bird. I
wish everyone a happy New Year, health, long life and the realization
of all our compassionate wishes.
