Is this helping us or making things harder?

Fermin Liu wrote:Hey guys!

I think this quote that from Angela's little book is actually pretty self-explanatory and really encapsulates what has been discussed in Kenneth's thread:

"If only we'd stop trying to be happy we'd have a pretty good time."

LOL it so was not self-explanatory when i read it that time during chem, fermin xD

hm..so are you saying that youre fine with either, fermin?

Interesting comment there Joyce, about having everyone innocent. I want to say that is impossible, but I think that would my ego-mind babbling assumptions. It's just hard to imagine because it hasn't been that way in a while (since we were younger). Or maybe it really is impossible? Think about why utopia is impossible...everyone is bound to have a different perception of right and wrong, happiness, innocence etc. Sigh. Innocent adult seems like such an oxymoron and that...sucks. So..I guess I'd still want to grow up and experience life, no matter how traumatizing. It's kind of fascinating how much humans learn to adapt.
Reading your guys' comments made me come up with another question but I think I want to save it for when I moderate

HA I like that quote.
It reminds me of two other quotes by John Lennon (one of the founders of The Beatles) that are maybe relevant:
“Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans”
and
“Time you enjoy wasting, was not wasted.”

Haha

Joyce, I think that what I'm saying is that we should just live in the NOW--live our lives with a postitive attitude--instead of trying to live someone else's life or trying to be like someone else. When we actually TRY to be happy, we are trying too hard. We worry whether or not the next step we take will result in our happiness or our sadness, and this will make the ego-mind go into overdrive. The ego-mind will then constantly be nervous and scared of things that might possibly upset it, and focusing on the bad things, we will never to able to be happy then. Therefore, I think that to be happy, we should just live in the present (without worrying about the past or future), and just take on life with a bright, happy attitude, knowing that we have the power to do anything, to solve any problems.

I just saw Steph's quotes! I like the second one, but I'm not sure I get the first one.

hm, ok fermin, i see that. but does living in the Now affect which type of life we live in (or prefer to live in) - innocent or complicated?

Living in the NOW would essentially make life innocent and simple because we would be free of the frustrations of things in the past and the anxieties about the future. If we focus on one thing at a time, then we (and the ego-mind) will feel more in control, less hectic, and thus, more happy.

What do you think, Joyce?

Steph C wrote:HA I like that quote.
It reminds me of two other quotes by John Lennon (one of the founders of The Beatles) that are maybe relevant:
“Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans”
and
“Time you enjoy wasting, was not wasted.”

Lol!

The thing with complications in our lives is, I think, just like what JT said - it's the walker that paves one's own road. Can we seriously say that it's the complication that came into our life, not that we caused the complication? If we had the perseverance to ignore the complication, even remain optimistic through the complication, it wouldn't be a complication anymore, would it?

What complications plague us today? Like the 4.0 GPA example (lol) - can we really not have a good life without it? We can be happy, even if we live in a run-down shack, with close to no cash and only bread to eat. It's only whether or not you're satisfied. Satisfaction is the road to happiness, so they say sometimes the less ambitious are the ones that lead the most peaceful of lives.

Will we be unhappy without the internet? I think many of us (myself included, haha) would be unable to fathom a life without this all-connecting utility, but like the video Mr. Swan showed us once (the one we watched in guidance class, lol) the people complaining about having a sucky internet connection on the airplane should consider that there wasn't any internet about 20 to 30 years ago on any airplane in existence. So happiness should be what we decide is happiness, rather than an abstract view and dream. If one wants an happy, simple life, then one must be prepared to give up many conveniences, no?

ohh i see fermin. so even though you know all these things that we/egomind thinks makes lief complicated, we can still make life simple by not thinking of those things every single moment of our lives?

so then, joanne, happiness becomes a choice, as it depends on your perspective. how many of us are willing to let go of all of life's conveniences so that we live without electricity and go back to like farming or herding sheep? lol, this totally reminds me of this one article i read about earth hour (where everyone around the world turns off all electricity for an hour, to be "environmental"). it basically had the concept of how "practical" earth hour is if taken to the extreme (earth year, perhaps). in reality, it'd mean shifting our entire lifestyle. and though reducing or being more efficient when using things like electricity does require some shifting in lifestyles, but not as huge as living without it completely?
ANYHOW, we still experience a shift in perspective if we were originally complainers and wanted to look at things more optimistically.
and yep, being happy doenst necessarily mean being successful in worldly terms. why else would there be unhappy rich people?

Yeah! If we really want an uncomplicated life, we could go herd sheep, but I don't think many people are willing to do so lol.

If we were determined to live a simple life, as a child, perhaps, then it would require more work than merely understanding and being resigned that can't do anything about this 'cut-throat' society that we live in now. When we try and be optimistic and it ends up being beat down by words such as 'you can't do it', 'what about that new car?', 'how are you going to be happy if you don't go into Ivy league?' and reality just bears down on us, I think it's so much more harder to maintain this sentiment than to think it. We can escape from it, by going to live in a farmhouse and living a modest life without the happy conveniences, or we can try and be happy with our lives.

Many people are shaken by the prospects if we don't get a good job go into a good school get good grades then we are ruined, that if you want to be an actor be a performer be a dancer be a painter then you'd have no future because you aren't even sure you've got talent, then it would still boil down to whether or not you really want it. It comes down to weighing the pros and cons. Would you rather hold a tube of paint, risk having no fame and no money, rather than go to college and get an okay of perhaps good job?

If you think down, 20 years into the future, and you think that you'll regret the day you set down your paintbrush and took up your textbook... if you'd be happy, even if you're hungry and you're penniless but at least you're still holding the brush, and you're still alive, then everything is okay; some people think happiness is owning a new car. Some people think happiness is doing what they love, forever. The lucky people can do what they love and earn a lot of cash at the same time.

You can stick to being a painter, an artist, a dancer, a singer, but the point is trying to hold up even if you know you'll be hurt. We can be children again, if we don't mind that everything around us is controlled by the ego-mind. If you want to live like an innocent child, then we can do so - but the only thing is that you can't be surprised if someone stabs you in the back. The thing about being a child, learning, becoming wise, and going back to being a child is that you know what to expect - and the hard part is letting yourself be so even when you know what'll come your way.


I hope this helped. xD What I'm trying to say is going in circles, but it's there... somewhere... lol.