Church of the Churchless

If there's a universal happiness method, this might be it

Time for some grandiose thinking, an activity I excel at. Not that my grandiosity leads to grand ideas or wisdom, but, hey, it's the grandiose effort that counts.

Tonight's Big Ponder is centered on the question, is there a universal method for being happy? 

My first reaction was absolutely not. For if there was, seemingly we wouldn't have such a plethora of ways people seek happiness.

The "self-help" category on Amazon would shrink to just a small number of books, each advising pretty much the same approach to being happy.

Complicating my pondering was another issue. 

Is happiness really what we should be after? Maybe meaning is. Maybe contentment is. Maybe not seeking anything is. 

However, I find it difficult to get emotionally excited about a memory of a deeply meaningful moment, a deeply contented moment, or a deeply not seeking anything moment.

But a deeply happy moment? Ah, those come to mind easily. 

(I'm focused on moments rather than a longer time period, because moments are where we actually live our lives -- moment by moment. A bunch of happy moments can lead to a happy week, month, or year, yet take away the moments and there's no happiness left in any span of time.)

My suspicion is that if there really is a universal, or quasi-universal, approach to being happy, it has a lot to do with some strangely happy moments I had back in college. 

Or rather, a summer in between my freshman and sophomore years, if I recall correctly.

Summer jobs were scarce in the San Jose area. I was lucky to get a job at a cannery for the swing shift, something like midnight to 8 am. Being new, I got one of the crappier jobs at the cannery.

Which was, me dressing in waterproof clothing, crawling under the structure that supported a conveyor belt carrying fruit that women sorted, picking out the bad fruit, and hosing the fruit debris into channels that carried the pulp and water away.

I distinctly remember how different this job felt in two states of mind: (1) my normal "this job sucks" attitude, and (2) my benzedrine-fueled "so much fun!" attitude.

The same thing happened when I used benzedrine, an amphetamine that was popular for several decades among all kinds of people, including creative types, to study a subject that usually bored me, like statistics.

A bennie or two could convert any activity into a series of deeply happy moments.

I'm sure there are complex explanations for how benzedrine changes one's mood. For me, it seemed to come down to focus.

Instead of resisting whatever I was doing, benzedrine would cause me to concentrate fully on that one thing with almost no mental leakage of "I wish I were doing something different." And when I think of other deeply happy moments, the same seems to be true.

I was immersed in something to such an extent, hardly anything else in the world existed for me at that moment. I wasn't torn between this and something else. Only this was present in my awareness.

This is, of course, pretty much what mindfulness is all about: being acutely aware of what is actually present, instead of getting behind or ahead of ourselves by leaning toward the past of future.

Well, having just written these five hundred or so words, right now I'm acutely aware that what I've said in this post may strike many people as being either so obvious or so off-base as to be worthless. And I can't disagree with that assessment.

However, i also know that one reason I almost always write a post for one of my three blogs every day is this:

When I'm writing, the world shrinks to my computer screen and the thoughts inside my head that end up being converted to words, sentences, paragraphs, and eventually, an entire blog post. 

This shrinking doesn't feel like a loss. It feels like a gain. A happy gain. 

I got a transcript of a call to the Spiritual Surrender support line

Thanks for calling the Spiritual Surrender support line. How may I help you today?

Well, I've heard a lot about the benefit of surrendering to a higher power. Isn't that how some addicts get off drugs and alcohol? I think it is. Anyway, i've got quite a few problems -- who doesn't these days -- and I'm wondering if some sort of spiritual surrender is right for me.

Excellent. You've come to the right place. We specialize in helping people like you. Let's start with me asking you a few questions.

No problem.

OK. Do you have an idea of who, or what, you'd like to surrender to? 

I'm open to suggestions. Some possibilities I've been toying with are God, or maybe a guru. I like the idea of letting some higher power handle my problems instead of me having to deal with them on my own.

Fine. Do you believe in God? More specifically, are you sure that God exists? And if so, that God is willing and able to take on your problems?

I sort of believe in God. I mean, I was raised to believe in God, but I've got to admit that there's no proof God is real. I just hope this is true.

A lot of people who call us say the same thing, so you're in good company. However, I need to ask if you would feel comfortable handing your problems over to a being who might not be real. Wouldn't this lessen your confidence in undertaking a spiritual surrender?

I guess so, now that you mention it. But what if I felt better turning my problems over to a higher power, like God, whether or not that power actually existed? Sure seems like this would be better than the anxiety I'm feeling now, being unsure what to do a lot of the time.

You make some good points. Consider this, though. We want to make sure that you get the best spiritual surrender that meets your needs at the lowest possible cost, ideally for free. So if you're good with turning your problems over to a God who may not exist, aren't you really content with turning your problems over to yourself, to a part of your own mind?

Hmmmm. I need to think about that. Give me a few moments... [pause] Yes, I guess you're right. What I want is the relaxed feeling of not having to worry about my problems so much. How that happens doesn't really matter to me. I just want to lessen my worrying.

Great. We're making progress. I'm getting a better understanding of your situation. Now, you mentioned the possibility of surrendering to a guru. Tell me more about this notion.

I have a couple of friends who follow a guru. They got a secret mantra to repeat that's supposed to connect them with the inner guru. Then, they tell me, the inner guru guides them when they have a problem in their life. That sounds cool to me.

It does indeed. But how can they, or you, be sure that the guru is really doing the guiding? Isn't this just like you not being sure that God exists, yet you hope this is true? If you turned your problems over to a guru, what makes you think the guru actually is capable of handling your problems?

Well, I couldn't be sure about that. I just would feel better if I turned my problems over to a guru whether or not... Wait, I'm repeating myself. That's what I just said about God -- that it doesn't matter if a higher power is real, so long as I worry less by surrendering to it.

Exactly. What you say you want is to not worry so much about your problems. Maybe, just maybe, your best approach would be to simply... do you see what I'm getting at here?

To simply not worry so much about my problems, right?

Right. Something to consider, at least. Let's leave things like this. Give us a call back if you still have questions about spiritually surrendering. From what you've told me, I think your best bet is to surrender to yourself -- hand your problems over to a part of you that will say, "No need to worry; just deal with your problems without worrying about them."

Thanks. You've helped a lot. I have a feeling this will be my first and last call to you.

Failure can be fabulous. Perfectionism can be pitiful.

Most of us have experienced a lot of failures. Probably we feel bad about those. Most of us have some sort of perfectionist tendency. Probably we feel this is a good thing, since it spurs us toward success. 

But maybe we should look upon ourselves differently, viewing failure more positively than perfectionism.

Here's excerpts from Oliver Burkeman's book, "The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking." Dome is a reference to the failed Millennium Dome, built as a monument to the dawn of the year 2000.

There is an openness and honesty in failure, a down-to-earth confrontation with reality that is lacking at the higher altitudes of success. 

To achieve something impressive -- as might have happened had the dome ever become, as Tony Blair predicted, 'a beacon to the world' -- is necessarily to erect a kind of barrier between yourself and everyone else. To be impressed by something, meanwhile, implies feeling yourself to be in the presence of something different from, and better than, yourself. 

Failure, by contrast, collapses these boundaries, demonstrating the fallibility of those who might otherwise try to present themselves as immune to defeat. It cuts people down to human size. The vulnerability revealed by failure can nurture empathy and communality.

...Still it can be exceptionally hard to adopt this attitude towards your own failures. As Christopher Kayes' notion of 'goalodicy' suggests, we too often make our goals into parts of our identities, so that failure becomes an attack on how we are.

Or, as Albert Ellis understood, we alight upon some desired outcome -- being happily married, for example, or finding fulfilling work -- and elevate it into one we feel we must attain, so that failing at it becomes not just sad but catastrophic. To use the Buddhist language of attachment and non-attachment, we become attached to success.

All these counterproductive ways of thinking about failure manifest themselves most acutely in the phenomenon of perfectionism. 

This is one of those traits that many people seem secretly, or not so secretly, proud to possess, since it hardly seems like a character flaw -- yet perfectionism, at bottom, is a fear-driven striving to avoid the experience of failure at all costs. At its extremes, it is an exhausting and permanently stressful way to live. 

(There is a greater correlation between perfectionism and suicide, research suggests, than between feelings of hopelessness and suicide.)

To fully embrace the experience of failure, not merely to tolerate it as a stepping-stone to success, is to abandon this constant straining never to put a foot wrong. It is to relax.

'Downfall', writes the American Zen Buddhist Natalie Goldberg, 'brings us to the ground, facing the nitty-gritty, things as they are with no glitter. Success cannot last forever. Everyone's time runs out.' She goes on: 'Achievement solidifies us. Believing we are invincible, we want more and more.'

To see and feel things as they really are, 'we have to crash. Only then can we drop through to a more authentic self. Zen transmits its legacy from this deeper place. It is a different kind of failure: the Great Failure, a boundless surrender. Nothing to hold on to, and nothing to lose.'

...Her [J.K. Rowling] words chime with many of the insights of the Stoics, the Buddhists, and others into the benefits of negativity, and they are worth quoting at length:

I think it fair to say that by any conventional measure, a mere seven years after my graduation day, I had failed on an epic scale.

An exceptionally short-lived marriage had imploded, and I was jobless, a lone parent, and as poor as it is possible to be in modern Britain without being homeless. 

The fears that my parents had had for me, and that I had had for myself, had both come to pass, and by every usual standard, I was the biggest failure that I knew. 

Now, I am not going to stand here and tell you that failure is fun. That period of my life was a dark one, and I had no idea there was going to be what the press has since represented as a fairytale resolution. 

I had no idea how far the tunnel extended... so why do I talk about the benefits of failure?

Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me.

... I was set free, because my greatest fear had been realised, and I was still alive. [Failure] gave me an inner security that I had never attained by passing examinations.

...Such knowledge is a true gift, for all that it is painfully won, and it has been worth more than any qualification I ever earned.

Why you should be happy today, right now, no matter what

Here's a guest post from myself. It comes from one of my other blogs, HinesSight, where I called it My iron-clad argument to be happy right now, no matter what.

Not surprisingly, what I wrote makes a lot of sense to me.

After all, one of the greatest gifts we can offer to others is our own happiness. Why? Because it's much more pleasant to be around a happy person rather than someone who isn't happy.

Also, life is much bigger than we are, as is the world we live in. We can hope for certain things from life, from the world. We can do our best to work to make those things happen. But there's no guarantee we'll be successful.

So we can't wait for life to give us what we believe we need to be happy, because we might end up waiting for a very long time, and maybe until our last breath.

Happiness has to be felt right here, right now. Read on...

Periodically my brain comes up with cosmic conclusions that feel ever so right to me. For example, on my Church of the Churchless blog I've written about how back in 1968 I had a convincing realization that the universe is a paper bag turned inside out. 

If this doesn't make sense to you, I recommend ingesting a psychedelic, mescaline, since that substance was responsible for the paper bag turned inside out insight. Which, I readily admit, didn't last very long in my psyche.

On the other hand, my current cosmic conclusion arose while I was in a normal state of mind (leaving aside the vexing question of what "normal" means in relation to anybody's mind, mine or anyone else's).

It pertains to happiness and goes like this.

Be happy today, right now, at this very moment and every following moment.
Why? Because our future contains only three possibilities. 

Tomorrow, or the next moment, could be better than right now.
So be happy! Life will look even brighter soon.

Tomorrow, or the next moment, could be worse than right now.
So be happy! Enjoy life in this more pleasant present.

Tomorrow, or the next moment, could be the same as right now.
So be happy! Life has brought you some stability. 

Now, I readily admit that what I've just written isn't exactly a groundbreaking idea. Few, if any, ideas are. We humans have conjured up so many thoughts in the course of human history that it is very tough, if not impossible, to come up with a completely fresh one.

But these ideas about happiness were new to me. At least, in a certain sense.

As I have for almost all of my life (can't remember my earliest child years), I spend a lot of time worrying about the future and fretting about the past. 

I hope that I'll be happier tomorrow. I regret that I wasn't happier yesterday. Somehow today, the present moment, has a way of being shunted aside by my mental time travel into the future or past. 

Which is crazy, since if there is any time I'm going to be happy, obviously it is now... or never.

By "never" I don't mean that if I'm not happy right now, I never will be. Rather, I mean that when happiness is felt, it is in the present moment, since this is all that exists for us.

Further, we don't know what will happen in the future. We also don't know with a whole lot of accuracy what happened in the past, since our memories are faulty and decidedly selective. 

(Once I had an email exchange with my ex-wife about some details of our divorce after several years had passed since our breakup. I was surprised at how different my recollection of what went on differed from hers, probably because each of us had come to view ourselves as the "good guy/gal" in the divorce and so had come to focus on memories that supported that view of things.)

So this argues for being as happy as possible right here, right now. We don't know what awaits us. It could be better, worse, or the same as what is in our life currently. 

Given that uncertainty, embracing happiness in the present moment makes a heck of a lot of sense, even though it is difficult to give up habits of worry, anticipation, hopes, regrets, and such.

A few days ago I shared my cosmic conclusion about happiness with Aujene, a LifeSource Natural Foods employee who asked me "how's your day going?" prior to checking out my grocery purchases. I took the opportunity to share my happiness ideas.

It was encouraging that after I gave Aujene the basics of what I've written above, she said "that's so close to what my mother always told me."

Which goes to show, as noted above, that my insight is no way original. But more importantly, it seems to contain some valid wisdom that's been expressed in many different ways by many different people.

No lions? Then relax. Especially if you're a zebra.

I've been saying "No lions" to myself quite often the past few days.

Not because there aren't any lions in my life, because there also aren't any elephants, black holes, or starfish in my immediate vicinity, and I don't go around commenting on their absence via my inner thoughts.

Rather, recently I started reading Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers, a book by Robert M. Sapolsky. First published in 1994, it's been updated regularly, with the current 3rd edition coming out in 2004.

Naturally I checked the index under "ulcers" to see if Sapolsky talks about the research that implicates H. pylori bacterial infections and non-steroidal inflammatory drugs like Aspirin and Advil in the formation of stomach ulcers. Not surprisingly, he does.

So contrary to what was thought for a long time, stress isn't the primary cause of ulcers. However, stress is a risk factor for ulcers, and can make them worse and more difficult to heal, according to the Mayo Clinic.

My interest in the book comes from my desire to worry less and enjoy life more.

I agree with my psychotherapist wife (now retired) that worrying can be productive if it leads us to recognize potential or actual problems that we can do something about.

But as Sapolsky notes early on in his book, modern life for us humans tends to be filled with stress that bears little resemblance to that felt by a zebra being pursued by a hungry lion, or to that felt by a hungry lion desperate to find food needed to survive. Instead, we often worry about things that are far removed from clear and present dangers.

That's why I've started saying "No lions" when I find myself getting worked up by thoughts or feelings that aren't connected to a genuine problem that I can do something about. 

I combine those silently-spoken words with a mental image of zebras grazing peacefully on an African savannah. Of course, I'm aware that my carefree zebra-mind can, just as with actual zebras in the wild, be jolted into full alert by an actual problem at any moment.

Which comes with being alive. A problem-free life doesn't exist. Our only choice is how to deal with problems, not whether they're going to appear.

The genius of Sapolsky's book title, Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers, is that it points to a truth that zebras intuitively understand, but we humans have a lot of trouble grasping. Namely, problems should only be a source of stress when they actually exist.

If there's no lion in sight, go back to grazing. If a lion appears, run. Then go back to grazing. Worrying about lions isn't going to make lions disappear.

For zebras, there's no way to guarantee a lion-free life. Similarly, there's no way any of us can guarantee a problem-free life. Something is going to go wrong before too long, guaranteed.

Cars break down. Bodies fall prey to disease. A nasty email gets inadvertently sent to the person being complained about. Our job demands too much of us. Family members are fighting. A beloved sports team has a nasty losing streak. What we care about most gets a yawn from politicians. Noisy neighbors make it impossible to sleep.

Etc. Etc. Etc. 

That's why I enjoy saying "No lions" when my mind conjures up a problem that is imaginary rather than real. I should be saving my energy for dealing with genuine problems in my life, just as zebras go back to grazing after a lion attack because they need to be able to cope with the next appearance of a lion.

Sure, it's wonderful that we humans can envision a future or past that doesn't actually exist. This enables us to plan, learn, create, and so much more. But that capacity also leaves us prone to stress, anxiety, worry. We often find it difficult to let go of a problem that has already occurred, or to stop thinking about a potential future problem.

Since I'm sharing this post on my Church of the Churchless blog, I want to add that religious beliefs can also be a non-existent lion that leads to stress. 

People worry about their afterlife even though there is no solid evidence that life after death exists. Ditto for sin, whether God is pleased with us, and a host of other sources of worry that lack any demonstrable foundation. No zebra spends its day anxiously wondering, "Am I doing the right thing?"

And neither should we, without good reason.

Life is too short to spend it in a state of concern over supernatural imaginings. Be concerned about real problems in the real world. There's no lack of them. Don't add on extra religiously-inspired worries that almost certainly are non-existent. 

Do less, be happier

I believe it was in a comment by Amar on one of my blog posts that I learned about a great book by Mark Williams and Danny Penman, "Mindfulness: An Eight-Week Plan for Finding Peace in a Frantic World."

I've been practicing mindfulness meditation for quite a while, as noted in Mindfulness has become my meditation and Mindfulness is meditation on reality, not supernatural illusion.

The book by Williams and Penman is the best I've ever read on this subject. Very clear, well-written, and creative.

A core theme is the difference between Doing and Being. Doing is fine, if what we're after can be obtained through specific actions. But as you'll read in the excerpt below, Doing leads us astray when we try to apply it in the wrong way.

Why do your best efforts to get rid of unpleasant feelings backfire so tragically? When you try to solve the "problem" of unhappinesss (or any other "negative" emotion) you deploy one of the mind's most powerful tools: rational critical thinking.

It works like this: you see yourself in a place (unhappy) and know where you want to be (happy). Your mind then analyzes the gap between the two and tries to work out the best way of bridging it. To do so, it uses its "Doing" mode (so called because it performs well in solving problems and getting things done).

The Doing mode works by progressively narrowing the gap between where you are and where you want to be... It's a tremendously powerful way of s0lving problems. It's how we find our way across cities, drive cars and arrange hectic work schedules.

...It's perfectly natural, then, to apply this approach to solving the "problem" of unhappiness. But it's often the worst thing you can do because it requires you to focus on the gap between how you are and how you'd like to be: in doing so, you ask such critical questions as, What's wrong with me? Where did I go wrong? Why do I always make these mistakes?

Such questions are not only harsh and self-destructive, but they also demand that the mind furnishes the evidence to explain its discontent. And the mind is truly brilliant at providing such evidence. 

Imagine walking through a beautiful park on a spring day. You're happy, but then for some unknown reason a flicker of sadness ripples across your mind. It may be the result of hunger because you skipped lunch or perhaps you unwittingly triggered a troubling memory.

After a few minutes you might start to feel a little down. As soon as you notice your lowered spirits you begin to probe yourself.: It's a lovely day. It's a beautiful park. I wish I were feeling happier than I am now.

Think about that: I wish I were feeling happier.

How do you feel now? You probably feel worse. This is because you focused on the gap between how you feel and how you want to feel. And focusing on the gap highlighted it. The mind sees the gap as a problem to be solved. This approach is disastrous when it comes to your emotions because of the intricate interconnection between your thoughts, emotions, and bodily sensations.

...The mind can do so much more than simply analyze problems with its Doing mode. The problem is that we use the Doing mode so much, we can't see that there is an alternative. Yet there is another way.

If you stop and reflect for a moment, the mind doesn't just think. It can also be aware that it is thinking. This form of pure awareness allows you to experience the world directly. It's bigger than thinking. It's unclouded by your thoughts, feelings, and emotions.

It's like a high mountain -- a vantage point -- from which you can see everything for many miles around.

Pure awareness transcends thinking. It allows you to step outside the chattering negative self-talk and your reactive impulses and emotions. It allows you to look at the world once again with open eyes. And when you do so, a sense of wonder and quiet contentment begins to reappear in your life.

Makes a lot of sense.

What's said above applies to spiritual goals as well, like believing that you need to do something to reach God, heaven, holy spirit, or whatever. That belief creates a gap between where you are now and where you want to be. Then that gap becomes a problem to be solved, which takes work and creates anxiety.

Yet where is the evidence for any gap at all? God, heaven, holy spirit, and such are just concepts, ideas, thoughts. Give them up, and you are much closer to where you want to be: reality, here and now.

Happiness lies in ordinary things

Am I happier since I gave up the fantasy of religion? Probably.

It's a big relief to not have a cosmic weight on my back -- the expectation that I need to do this and that, plus that and this, in order to be worthy of being admitted to God's heavenly realm. 

That's a lot of pressure, believing that the fate of my supposedly immortal soul rests on whether I've been fortunate enough to find a path that leads to God-realization, and, having hopefully found the right path, on whether my efforts to follow it will meet with success.

In my current atheist days I'm much more satisfied with finding happiness in small things, ordinary things.

Before, I had my sights set on a Very Big Thing: ultimate reality. Now, scratching our dog's stomach when she rolls on her back in newly-mown grass makes me feel like life is good. As does a cup of coffee, which I'm enjoying right now.

A TIME special edition, "The Science of Emotions," contained a short essay by Meg Wolitzer that resonated with me. Here's an excerpt from her The Psychology of Happiness that I like a lot.

Everyone talks incessantly about stress now, and how it has changed our lives and made us so unhappy. Less obviously, I think stress has also changed the quest for happiness itself, making it more aggressive and occupying more of our time.

Ever since antidepressants and sexual-enhancement drugs hit the airwaves and ever since we were told that we had a right to our happiness, damn it, and that we could ask for it -- no, demand it -- from our doctors, spouses, friends, or employers, it seems that the desire for happiness has increasingly become a source of anxiety.

Which is why I have taken a few steps back. At this point, being happy is about having the space to appreciate the ordinary things that do in fact make me "happy," though at first glance they might not be seen that way. 

An absence of chaos; an absence of phone calls with disturbing news; an absence of business emails that up-end your day and demand attention right then and there; no acutely ill parents; no fragile children calling shakily from college.

Being able to sit down with a glass of wine and some really good, tiny little olives with your husband; having a nice meal with your kids that's not rushed or fraught.

These seem like small things, perhaps pedestrian things, but I protect them fiercely, knowing that on the other side of an imaginary wall waits the possibility that all of them will soon be gone and that something terrible will replace them.

But I no longer quake in fear.

I used to think that happiness was something a person was so lucky to find that, like Lord Voldemort (a.k.a. He Who Must Not Be Named), it should never actually be mentioned. Now, with happiness taking on a new, modest cast, the fear of losing it is smaller too.

You might think: Good god, woman! This isn't happiness. Happiness has wild colors and flavors; it involves bodies draped across a bed, or things that come in gift wrap. Or even, once in a while, Carvel. Don't you want any of that?

Of course I do.

But being allowed to enjoy some of the more modest pieces of my life happens right now to be my own personal Carvel; my own dachshund, gift-wrapped present, snow day and secret lover. Perhaps for most of us -- or anyway, for me -- happiness has gotten smaller over time, becoming endlessly and exquisitely refined, though somehow never diminished.