The Relationship Between Happiness and Beliefs (Blog)

[Erin Pavlina]

Use this thread to discuss the following entry from Erin Pavlina's blog:

The Relationship Between Happiness and Beliefs

[Emma G]

Why would you create a system of reality that is only what serves you?

Why not base it on truth, and see what is true?

You can choose to believe or see only things that are good for you, but what about the rest of the world? What if you decided to believe that everyone is happy, and then no one did anything about poverty in the third world?

This also goes against Steve's truth principle. What is true may not be comfortable or make you happy now, but you need to see it as it is, not gloss it over or ignore it. Believing or seeing only what serves your feelings is not seeing things based on reality.

Reality contains both good and bad. You can see only the good, but that is only half the picture. That is not entirely true nor an accurate model of reality.

[Erin Pavlina]

I didn't say I never saw bad things happen. I can notice things in the world that aren't going that well but I don't have to be unhappy to see them and I don't have to let myself feel sad to know about them. I have discovered that that happier I feel, the more power I have to make changes in my world and in the world of others. I think we owe it to those who are feeling miserable not to jump into the water and drown with them, but to use our strength to find a life preserver to throw them.

[Holistic Star]

I think it's the same that if someone close to you got very sick, you wouldn't make yourself sick too to support them. In fact, if it was a long term illness, you would have to make sure you stayed healthy so you had enough energy to look after them properly.

[StacyT]

Thanks for this post Erin. I agree that you can choose to be happy no matter what life throws at you.

My husband just asked me this morning, "What if it turns out that everything you 'know' is actually 'wrong'?" I told him that I would be happy because I will have learned something new.

The more I live, the more I realize that happiness is the journey, and that I really do create my own reality. I am eternal and so there is no endpoint to strive for. I can only be happy in this moment because it's all there is.

[AlanFurth]

Originally Posted by Emma G

Why would you create a system of reality that is only what serves you?

Why not base it on truth, and see what is true?

You can choose to believe or see only things that are good for you, but what about the rest of the world? What if you decided to believe that everyone is happy, and then no one did anything about poverty in the third world?

This also goes against Steve's truth principle. What is true may not be comfortable or make you happy now, but you need to see it as it is, not gloss it over or ignore it. Believing or seeing only what serves your feelings is not seeing things based on reality.

Reality contains both good and bad. You can see only the good, but that is only half the picture. That is not entirely true nor an accurate model of reality.

You don't need to believe that everybody is happy in poor countries, but you don't need to to hold an essentially negative judgement about the fact that they are poor.

"It is really terrible that there are poor people in the world". This statement is a judgement, and a judgement is nothing more than a belief. And being judgemental usually puts us in a negative frame of mind, not very conducive to effective action.

Why not work on our tendency to judge everything and change this belief for something like: there are lots of poor people in the world. These people might or might not be happier than me, because in the end happiness depends on tons of other things besides material wealth. Some people in the poorest countries are perhaps happier than people in rich countries, even if they go through hunger and sickness unimaginable in rich countries. So I am not going to judge their being poorer than me as good or bad. Still, my duty is to do all I can to help them achieve higher levels of material wealth, as they surely will benefit from that.

A bit longer, but no negative words whatsoever... I guess that's the whole point?

[AlanFurth]

It was great to read your article this morning Erin. I actually dreamed with you last night, you were telling me that my levels of spiritual energy "were incredibly high lately" :-)

And it happens to be that I am working at the moment on a series of posts at my blog on a similar subject: how our beliefs about "success" determine the kind of work we choose to do and our careers, with the huge impact on overall happiness that this crucial decision has.

What does it mean to love our work? Hint: It’s not about success (Part I) - Alan Furth — The Blog

My conclusion is that we should be very clear about our beliefs about what makes us happy at work. And this is clearly not about success. Success is about achieving goals, but the euphoria of achievement is very transitory. We should choose work that we love to practice, work that is fulfilling per se, independently of any measurement of achievement or success.

Of course, people who love their work tend to become excellent at it, but that is a byproduct of being immersed in an activity they love. They didn't choose their lines of work because they believed they would be successful at it by any measure, and that success would bring them happiness. They probably had the confidence that they would eventually be successful because they loved practicing so much that they would reach high levels of excellence... but that's definitely not the reason why they do what they do!

For example, many super-star salespeople love so socialize, to connect with others, to figure out what they want, and the challenge of persuading them to buy something. They manage to get through tons of rejections because they still love the whole persuasion game. And this love allows them to practice the persuasion game for long enough to the point that they become excellent at it.

Cheers!

Alan

Cheers,
Alan

[daj]

Love this post. I think a lot of fears/beliefs are from people watching too much TV. The news loves to put the world's problems on all of our shoulders, if you haven't noticed. Then you have these "judge based Tv shows" where people constantly are being judged by a set of unqualified judges (if you ask me) and some of the time they love to break the contestants down. Then you have all of these horror movies lately which love to make us fear. Seriously just turn off your TV, and focus on the world around you. Not the whole world, just you, your family, friends, and local community.

[StacyT]

Originally Posted by daj

Love this post. I think a lot of fears/beliefs are from people watching too much TV.

I totally agree!!!!

[Erin Pavlina]

I watch a lot of tv, but I only watch what serves my happiness. I don't watch the news. I don't watch daytime tv which seems very low awareness to me.

TV is a medium. There are nuggets of wisdom in most television shows. I love the idea of using fiction as edutainment, teaching and entertaining at the same time. I love the hero's journey, the fight between good and evil. TV doesn't bother me. Low awareness programming bothers me. Reality shows, tv news, and the like.

[Emma G]

Originally Posted by AlanFurth

A bit longer, but no negative words whatsoever... I guess that's the whole point?

Obviously that's not meant to be a judgment, but to show how tuning out certain parts of reality may not serve the whole, or even the self in seeing reality as it truly is and then acting effectively within that truth.


Also, your meta-analysis following that is wrong. GDP is correlated to happiness as well.

[Emma G]

Actually on media, it is easy to see how a lot of negativity is dwelt upon and spread, rather than the positive things in the world.

Maybe media should have a consciousness rating, so we know what is positive and good, or growth promoting, and what is not. The good things can be spread.

And then in the future, everything will be positive and good.



Also, on a metaphysical level, what is good is closer to truth, as in God consciousness. What is negative and bad on the earth, is more like 'earth things' that were incidental and happened because of the density of earth energy. But I wonder why the God consciousness is not strong enough to shine over all things, so that there is only neutrality or positivity and growth in the world?

[Angela]

Originally Posted by Emma G

Maybe media should have a consciousness rating, so we know what is positive and good, or growth promoting, and what is not.

Except that a person who is basing his evaluation of what's positive and good and growth-promoting on someone else's rating of its level of consciousness, that person is not being particularly conscious.

Each person has the choice to attract and participate in exactly the right media for hermself, and one person's deadening consciousness-flattener is another person's avenue to brilliant clarity and inspiration.

[JoeRad]

Erin, you did a great service today by writing that article. I had encountered previous concepts (Steve has been saying a version of this at times) but you helped to "bring it home" so to speak.

I liked how you answered a question I had had in my mind for some time; I am aware of alot of crappy things in this world, I have lived through some. But in the end, simply ignoring them is not TRUE, its not going to fly in your mijd to simply ignore what is currently in your reality. What you need is the ability to see past that, to see the good as well as the bad, and to frame your beliefs the way you want things to be, while allowing things that currently exist in your reality to exist. In other words, stop struggling against your reality, reframe it and it will take care of the rest.

Am I overstating your point, or am I close?

[Erin Pavlina]

Yes what you're saying is important.

We don't turn a blind eye or bury our heads in the sand. We don't ignore anything in our reality. We simply choose to be happy while we face it and solve our problems.

There are many ways to interpret what you see. You might see something and think "Oh my god this is terrible" and I might see the same thing and think, "What an excellent growth experience this person is having." Same reality, different lens. Since we can choose how to feel about a situation, I say choose happiness. It's amazing how fast reality will catch up and make it so.

[Emma G]

Um no, there is also absolute consciousness and everything in the world is located somewhere on that spectrum.

Originally Posted by Angela

Except that a person who is basing his evaluation of what's positive and good and growth-promoting on someone else's rating of its level of consciousness, that person is not being particularly conscious.

[TheAndySan]

I’ll be happy when I get my own place, win the lottery, and get out of debt

I'll also be happy when you and Steve get a YouTube channel going, haha!

[lacinato]

This reminds me of Byron Katie a lot. She says it's actually very important for activists to be able to see clearly, because then they are much more able to help other people. They can see the situation clearly and not be paralyzed by negativity. Because you are in a good place, you are in a place to help others.

So, instead of believing things that make us unhappy, we can choose to be happy. But we can still observe the situation and decide to take action. We don't need to be miserable to take action. In fact, action makes me feel even better

[Angela]

I'm not sure why there's such a focus on being happy. Happiness is only one flavor of feeling good out of many many many.

Why not open up to the possibility of other good-feeling emotions, too? I recognize that you have more access to those when you're happy (as opposed to lower on the emotional scale), and people often use "happiness" as kind of a catch-all emotion that holds all kinds of positive emotions. And for others, I think it's a sort of elusive, narrowly-defined state that conjures images of "happy happy joy joy" insane-smile plastered on your face kind of feelings that might feel out of reach.

Just wanted to give a shout-out to all the other poor, neglected good-feeling emotions that don't quite fit into "happiness."

[Lallymac]

Part of being human is being able to experience a wide spectrum of emotion. It's unhealthy and unrealistic to supress negative emotions but we do have a choice in how long we dwell in them. We can't always control our life experiences but we do have a choice in how we respond to them. As humans, we are social animals and influenced by social and cultural conditioning. When personal disasters strike there are expected social reactions/responses within societies. As intelligent individuals we're able to observe the personal consequences of social norms and choose to respond differently. There's a saying that goes something like, 'God grant me the courage to change the things I can change and except the things I can't and the wisdom to know the difference.'

You can be a victum or an active participant in life. As co-creaters of our lives, whatever you give attention to grows.

I personally love Napolean Hill's quote, 'Within every adversity lies the kernel of even greater potential.' If we seek greater personal potential, life becomes exciting again and we become co-creaters of our own destiny.

Lallmac

[Airstream Driver]

@Erin - Maybe you could help me with an issue I'm trying to get sorted out.

I get that we're all human, from Hitler to Ghandi, and that only we as individuals can free ourselves from suffering. I can feel a true empathy for others while remaining indifferent about their choices but...

I'm having a hard time getting around the suffering that I've caused as a result of my choices. I've forgiven myself and others for being human but from time to time when I think of the pain I've caused others it brings me to my knees. It's usually brief and intense and I feel better afterwards but it's still a form of suffering. Also, to a lesser degree but still an issue are the emotions that people project. Any suggestions?