What Really Creates Happiness?
Margaret Paul, Ph.D. is the best-selling author and co-author of eight books, including "Do I Have To Give Up Me To Be Loved By You? and "Healing Your Aloneness." She is the co-creator of the powerful Inner Bonding healing process.
Becoming Strong Enough to Love
Some people believe that achieving happiness is the purpose of life, yet the pursuit of happiness often leads to unhappiness. This is because happiness is actually a consequence of a different life purpose - the pursuit of evolving our souls in our ability to love ourselves and others.
When achieving happiness is your goal, you might pursue this in three different ways:
1. You might pursue momentary pleasure, believing that your happiness is the same as pleasure. When this is your belief, you might pursue happiness through substances such as alcohol, drugs, nicotine, or food. Or you might pursue happiness through activities such as sex, spending or gambling.
2. If you believe that your happiness is attached to money and the outcome of things regarding money, you might pursue control over outcomes through spending most of your time working, as well as accumulating and managing money.
3. If you believe that your happiness is attached to people, you might pursue control over getting love, approval, attention, admiration, or acknowledgement.
While momentary pleasure feels good, it is just momentary. Which means that you need to keep on doing whatever you believe will bring you happiness, over and over. This is what creates addictions - the pursuit of what you believe will avoid pain and bring pleasure. The problem is that none of these pursuits bring deep and abiding happiness, because their affects are always momentary.
True happiness is not the result of DOING, but of a way of BEING. Rather than being a result of the momentary pleasures of the outside world, it is the result of your intention to evolve daily as a loving human being.
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