Happiness
The first step toward living a happy life is to treat every other human with kindness. There are several steps after that, but I can’t remember them right now.
The Dalai Lama
We could all use a recipe for how to be happy. Mix this and this, stir with that, bake for 30 minutes. If some chef could come up with a “happiness” entrée, serve it over rice, charge big bucks, we’d line up to pay and eat. What a great thing to do – walk into a restaurant with your friends, maybe get a table with a view, and order up a big dish of happiness for everyone. Share the bill, add a generous tip, and stroll out smiling.
Okay, enough fantasizing.
How can we be happy, really?
Isn’t the world so messed up that no one can ever be happy? How can anybody be lighthearted when children are dying from hunger, the polar ice caps are melting, and bombs are going off in market places? Plus a thousand other terrible social problems. Add in a dozen personal issues, and being happy starts to look impossible.
But it’s not. It’s actually very, very possible.
And believe it or not, there is kind of a recipe for happiness. But you have to gather the ingredients and do the cooking. Just reading a recipe isn’t enough. If you want to enjoy tikka masala, pizza, burgers, or any other food, you have to do way more than read about them. Same with happiness.
And don’t be shy about asking for help from an experienced happiness cook. Parents and grandparents, aunties and uncles, especially the cheerful ones, may surprise you with excellent tips for whipping up a batch of happiness.
Before you begin making a mess in the happiness kitchen, remember this: It’s okay to have an “off” day sometimes. Not every day is sunny. Occasional sadness is natural, maybe even important. It can teach us to understand how others feel and help us become more emotionally mature.
So here’s one recipe. No charge. I’d love for you to cook it up and then give it a review. Feel free to experiment. You can leave out a few things or stir in some others. (Chocolate may be a crucial addition!!) Experience has shown that some basic elements are required. Like sugar and flour in a cake recipe, friendship, kindness, and gratitude seem to be essential for making happiness.
Happiness
This recipe feeds you first and then as many people as you want. Use a lot of the following! The more you have of each ingredient, the better the recipe turns out. Nobody cares which ingredient you start with. Just start.
Mix:
- Acceptance of yourself. Be sure to use the organic variety – the kind of acceptance that comes without comparisons between you and anyone else.
- Understanding what you can control and what you can’t.
- Gratitude, the best sweetener.
- Good friends. Be one to get one.
- Kindness – always in style.
- Exercise – sports, dance, yoga, a walk, whatever. Move it.
- Help someone. Be a peer mentor, visit an old person, volunteer at a kids’ camp, clean your local beach or park, work at a free kitchen, or ...
- Music! Make it yourself, download it, go to a concert, check out a flash mob, plug in your headphones, join the school choir, form a band.
- Perspective. Will something that bothers you now really matter in five years? Five months? Five days?
- Do something you enjoy. You can double up on this with the exercise or music ingredients or add your own flair.
- Spend time in nature. Sit by a river, walk through a garden, hike through a forest, dive into a lake. Go outside at night and find the moon. Take a picnic to the top of a hill at sunset. By yourself or with friends, when you’re out in nature, you usually won’t feel lonely. Alone, maybe, but lonely – probably not.
With this recipe, you’re going to get the best of both worlds – some instant increase in happiness, some increase that shows up over time. If you’re really wanting to help yourself feel better now, you might heap some of the following on top of what you’re cooking:
- Write in a journal.
- Watch a funny YouTube video. (Try a laughing baby post. You can ask for a refund on the price of this book if it doesn’t make you smile. Oh, wait – the book’s free online....)
- Organize your notebook! Weird, right? But it can feel so productive.
- Cook. Follow a recipe or create something original. Feed friends or sit down to a formal feast all by yourself. Eat on a blanket outside or set your table as if royalty were coming to dine. It’s fun!
- Pet an animal. There’s a reason they’re called pets.
This recipe has a bit of magic in it: Eat as much of this as you want – you’ll never be too full. Share your cooking with friends, family, and strangers. You can create lightheartedness, wellbeing, and contentment. Awesome thought.
The dish you bake is designed to make long-term happiness rather than short-term pleasure. Those two things are way different. Anyone who’s ever gone on an ice cream binge can tell you that, and the same principle applies in more complex situations. What do you really want?
Connections are often the basis of lasting happiness. You want to connect with yourself – your spirit, emotions, intellect – your friends, and your family. You may want connections with people, with animals, or with the natural world. Connections are at the core of happiness.