High on Happiness

Posts Tagged ‘practice’

As we ascend through the dimensions, I once read, rising from heaven to heaven, our bodies acquire new capabilities so that we can perceive the multitudinous wonders of our ever-expanding experience.   Instead of merely five senses, for example, we would one day have seventeen.

Imagine!  I think I’d need a different body  – much larger, much stronger – to hold that much joy.

The beauty that is here before us now is almost too much to withstand.

Look, right here, in a couple square feet of creek bed: sky spread across smooth waters, the papery layers on a fallen branch of birch and the deep shadows it casts, strewn pebbles, wet leaves, the glints of sunlight on the dancing wavelets, the colors meant for an artist’s eye.

And oh, the music of it all, the clicking of the rolling pebbles, the roar of the rushing, snow-fed creek, the wind in the branches of the trees, the sharp cawing of crows.

The cold air brushing against my cheeks and my skin soaking in the sun’s warmth despite it.  The wind whipping my hair and carrying the fragrance of the leaves and the water and the soil.   The give of the earth beneath my boots, the smooth slipperiness of the mud.

All this, in the lowest of all heavens, the one where the light barely shines through the thickness of our darkly clouded minds at all, except in rare moments.

I walk along the creek bed and practice.

The little elementals had been practicing for eons.  Like children at dance school, first they had to learn to hear the music and to do the steps in perfect synchronization with its rhythms and flow.  Now they had their parts down pat.

This group knew the pattern of the leaf and could hold it for an entire season.  That group did the stem.  Another did the roots.  Others did fragrance and nectar.  The senior team did the blossom.

That was the most difficult of course, the blossom, with its stamens and pistols, petals and pollen. The seniors had practiced the longest and had been together through age after age.

All of them knew they had unforeseen adventures ahead.  They would have to keep their attention on the music not only through the inevitabilities of wind and rain, the possibilities of drought and snow, but through the tickle of visiting insect feet and their licking and sucking and play.

They knew they might be plucked from the soil, or cut and dunked into water.  And still, they would have to stay attuned to the music and go on with the dance.  It was a glorious challenge and as the first vibrations of light approached, signaling that it was nearly time to begin, a tremendous thrill of excitement went through the troupe.

What an honor it was, after all, to be given the chance to be a flower!  To dance beneath starlight, to hear the great symphony playing not only for their troupe, but for the whole marvelous assemblage of birds and bugs and beasts and plants for an entire earth season.

All the centuries of study and learning, of practice and drill were worth it.  At last they would dance their joy, their glad gratitude and praise.  They got in formation now and quieted themselves, listening for the beautiful strain that would call them to the stage.

And it came, and they danced and were lovely.

Last July, on a whim, I set a goal to take a nature photo every day for a year and post it on the Net.  It was scary.  I didn’t know if I could do it.  A year is a long time.

Some days, I knew, would be dreary, and some would be brutally cold, and on some I just plain wouldn’t feel at all inspired to go in search of a photo after working all day at my regular job.  But the challenge of it excited me and so I plunged in.

Not long afterwards, I began writing this blog you’re reading right now, another daily venture.  And now, over 200 days in, the two projects have blended together in my experience, feeding each other, becoming important parts of my life.  The practice of producing them has enriched me in more ways than I can count.

Practices are like that.  They more than repay you for the energy you invest in them.  They take you to extraordinary places; they lead you to discoveries you couldn’t have made any other way.  They unfold beautiful lessons and precious insights.  They stretch you and grow you and bring you satisfaction and joy.

Late this afternoon, for instance, I found myself wading through heaps of snow deeper than my boots and crawling under a fallen tree to reach the edge of the creek.  I felt completely exhilarated and alive, the weariness of work left far behind me.  The creek sang with the music of rushing waters, and danced with scarves of color captured from the glowing distant hills and azure sky.  Everywhere I looked beauty met my eye and a symphony of gladness sang through my soul, filling my whole being with the music of happiness.

Somewhere I read that happy people tend to be involved in projects.  They incorporate rituals in their daily lives that allow them to stretch themselves toward greater joy.  I can see why now.  And I wholeheartedly encourage you to create space in your own day to practice something you love.  Anything.  Daily.   Watch it take on its own rhythm and begin to sing its song to you, infusing the music of happiness into your life with ever-deepening harmony and life-enhancing meaning, satisfaction and joy.

Just as with any quality you choose to increase in your life, or any skill you want to develop, happiness requires practice.  It’s a choice you make, over and over, a decision, an act of consciousness and of will.

Now let me honest about that choice.  Sometimes when you hear people say “happiness is a choice,” it comes across sounding like everybody has a magic little switch on their left wrist that they can just flick and Bingo! Happiness!  And then you feel bummed out because you weren’t in line when they passed out the switch.

Well, the truth is that nobody’s got the switch.  There’s no magic button.  I don’t know anybody who can instantly slide into happiness even from neutral, let alone from more dismal states.  I know some people who can get there pretty quickly though once they master a few techniques.

But even those people–the people who have learned some reliable ways to manage their moods, to steer their thoughts, and to surrender their resistance to happiness—still have to remember that they want to be happy, that they are committed to experiencing more happiness in their lives.  And once they remember, once they notice that they have drifted or been dragged into a less-than-happy state of mind, they still have to choose to use what they know to return to happiness.

I’m in the process of gathering a collection of happiness techniques that I will be sharing with you in the weeks ahead.  Some of them I have already mentioned here—practicing gratitude, naming three good things you experience every day, remembering to smile, and practicing kindness, for example.  But I want to give you a huge treasure chest of them to rummage through and play with.

In the meantime, the important thing to realize is that you really, truly can experience more happiness in your life, deeper, longer-lasting, more meaningful and satisfying happiness.  And while learning how does require commitment, practice and making the choice, over and over again, the practice itself is uplifting and fun, and the reward is delight and joy.

My friend Cristina has become a big proponent of kaizen, a new movement that teaches the age-old method of moving toward your goals one tiny step at a time.  And I do mean tiny!  If you wanted to be an artist, for example, you might start by pulling out a blank canvas every day for awhile.  Then you would add the action of setting out your brushes for several days.  You might do no more for a month.  Then you would get your tubes of paint, and later, uncap one of them.

The point is to move in the direction of your dreams by taking one tiny action every day—even if your action is no more than giving your dream a minute or two of focused thought.

One of the reasons it works is because you’re gently training yourself to tuck easy little bits of time into your day’s routine that are devoted to your desired objective.  In essence, you’re creating an intentional habit, a practice.  And as with any conscious practice, eventually it takes on a life of its own and begins leading you down your unique path toward realizing your goal.

But the bigger reason it works is because it tastes of happiness.  In one tiny moment every day, it compresses a whole bunch of elements that create happiness:  It allows you to feel self-directed and in control.  And while the moment may be tiny and fleeting, it’s full of meaning for you.  It yields a little flash of pride and satisfaction inside you and builds positive new pathways in your neural networks—paths with heart.

If you have a dream sitting in the back room of your mind somewhere, try adding this technique to your happiness practices.  Make it a daily dance of rhythmic progress in the direction of that dream.  The multi-layered results it yields may very well surprise you.