I used to think happiness was the goal. Follow the “path” and you will live happily ever after. 

Happily ever after. What does that even mean? And how do you even reach that goal?

I read about the experience of a Harvard psychology graduate student in 1974. Richard Davidson attended a meditation retreat center in India and at the end of the experience he had the insight that “Happiness is a skill that can be trained.”

Happiness a skill? Hm.

Another Richard (Branson) once said, “Happiness should not be a goal, it should be a habit.”

In Branson’s case, I gather he believes that building a habit out of a behavior means that you have reached the goal. To me, this speaks more to his way of being. He navigates life in a mindful manner and in that he finds happiness and he labels it a habit. I get that.

There are a lot of ideas floating out there about happiness. About why happiness should be the goal of life. About why happiness should not be the goal of life. How striving for happiness actually gets in the way of finding happiness. How striving for happiness is the only way to achieve it.

Many psychological definitions of happiness suggest a transitory state and this fits with my thoughts about happiness. It can be fleeting. As it flits and floats through my experience, I trust that simply knowing myself and living mindfully allows me to fully recognize and appreciate happiness for what it is.

So how did I get to a place of knowing myself, living in wholeness? For me awareness and insight allow me to live in wholeness which, most of the time, allows me to experience the emotional state of happiness. The easiest way for me to know myself is connecting to my

Thoughts.

Feelings.

Beliefs.

Behaviors.

Desires.

Inner Truth.

Thrive believes that thought-provoking conversations, ideas, and the application of Human Progress Skills while filtering the experience of life through the six components of your Human Internal Operating System (H-IOS), allows you to understand yourself better, make the life upgrades you desire and be more you.

So, what is happiness for you? As you pass this question through the filter of your H-IOS?

Right now I am not after happiness. I love wholeness. Allowing myself to feel my feelings, think my thoughts, believe, behave and desire….I am right where I want to be.