The path to contentment; an achievable goal

Striving for happiness is an unachievable goal in my view. This might sound a little morbid but hear me out on this one. As soon as I wish I were happy I am breaking one of the most fundamental natural laws of which the consequence is unhappiness. To wish I were something or somewhere else is to grasp. To grasp is be with the voices in my head. That's known as samsara and until I stop the voices happiness will rarely and only fleetingly appear in my life. That's because happiness is my natural state, and all goings on in the head cloud the delight of happiness from my experience. Well that's how I comprehend it and in practice it works for me and obviously for plenty of other people who spend time dissolving the mists of inner chatter to glimpse & if your lucky feel the state of well being that arrives when a state on non-thinking is achieved. No-thing in mind just happens to be being & feeling every-thing .. isn't that bizarre and the less you think the more you experience. That's not to say there isn't a time for thinking but when I am thinking I can be more focused because I know there is less in the way.

Being the most I can be, seems to me, to be being calm in a state of observation and that observation can either be accompanied with active thinking - the art of contemplation or without - the being of meditation. I cannot do meditation, I can only become meditative. Its a bit like saying I can do stillness, obviously not, you can only become still or I am confident, wrong, you are lacking in fear. Confidence is the natural state. I cannot do something that is the natural state. The sky doesn't become blue, the clouds clear, the sea doesn't do a mirror, it becomes one when the wind and waves abate.

So that is why when a thought comes, just like a wave, the wind or a cloud we are told to observe and let it go, observe & let go, observe & let go. And as long as we do not attach to these ripples, the turbulence or the mist, we do not exasperate its appearance. But these distractions come in many different forms & guises and some are just too appealing to ignore, like the chocolate & raspberry moose in the fridge, the film watched last night, that sexy beast in my yoga class etc.

And so I can see how even the best meditators are only as good at meditating as their last moment and it can go tits up at any second. But I'm sure as you practice the same patterns emerge and we are less likely to be tricked. How many different strategies can our mind have for gaining our attention? ... and who is it tricking?

So what is behind the veil, the mist, inside the vase ... my guess is there is a bright mirror on which I can know & feel everything. I'm starting to understand the concept now after several years of flirting with this stuff. I'm starting to understand that we all have those mirrors and the more still we become internally the clearer the picture, the more enhanced the feelings, the more appreciative I'm going to become & the more connected I'm going to feel to everything & anything.

So maybe this is why people practiced in the art of meditation seem less needy, maybe they are more independent and are able to spend long periods in isolation. Is this because many of their needs are met by nature itself and those that do not feel this connection have to rely more on other people to be able to gain a reflection.

So what gets in the way of the mirror is the first important question (the second being what the **ck is the mirror! We'll come back to that when I know it better). Well it would seem its a myriad of different things mostly related to our needs on some level or another and that's another episode too. The main point here is that to strive to be happy can be counter-productive in my view. I personally am setting my sites on the modest goal of contentment with the gut feeling that happiness will arise more often in that state and if its not arising, well at least I'll be content with that.

at your service ..