At some level we know that the more we focus on the self and our small, singular story, the more lost we can become.<\/p>\n
Now imagine for a moment an alternative view of the world, which may be very difficult for many. Imagine now that you look up from the pool where you have been staring at your own image, believing it to be the source of happiness and the truth about the world. As you look up, you realize that you are not alone. You are here because of a long line of DNA stretching back far beyond memory or even imagination. In this sense you have always been part of the great lineage of life. Your eternal and connected nature begins to come into your awareness.<\/p>\n
You see now that those who have died are alive in you, just as you will be alive in all that comes after you. Your life already has meaning because it is part of a greater story of the revealing of life in the universe. No shortcoming you have, no goal you fail to achieve, no mistake you make on the path of your life story right now\u2014none of this can separate you from the greater conversation of which you are a part. There is nothing you need to do to earn the right to be part of that greater entity, except perhaps to see that because you are part of it, one with it, your life must be used in some way to enhance that greater good. In that moment all fears\u2014of death, of insignificance, of not finding personal happiness\u2014melt into the beauty of the one thing that appears to surround you but of which you are actually a part.<\/p>\n
An analogy of our galaxy may be helpful. When you look up on a dark night, far from city lights, you will clearly see a dense constellation of stars that looks like a kind of white film splashed across the sky. The Milky Way appears that way because the galaxy is so dense with stars that their individual lights blend together. It is estimated that there may be 400 billion stars in the galaxy and perhaps 100 billion planets. To the naked eye, the Milky Way appears to be \u201cout there\u201d when, in fact, our solar system is right in its midst. Though it appears that we are outside of it, we are actually inside of it. This is what conceit prevents us from seeing.<\/p>\n
We are not separate from other people or from life itself but rather in the very center of it. What appears to be separation is actually an illusion. Quantum physics posits that even time may be an illusion and that everything that has happened and will happen may actually be happening at the same time. As mind-blowing as that may be, it bears witness to the way we can become deluded into believing something to be so true, like time or our ego, even if it simply is not so.<\/p>\n
Service\u2014the oppositional force<\/p>\n
When I interviewed those 250 wise people for The Five Secrets, it came as little surprise that most of those identified as happy were not self-focused. Most of them told me that the truest source of happiness was a life of service and a path of giving. All the great teachers have told us this, but most of us ignore it at our own peril. The thief wants us to turn our head toward the water and try desperately to find happiness in our own small ego and its accomplishments, when it knows that lasting happiness can be found only in giving.<\/p>\n
Just as the oppositional force of control is surrender, the oppositional force of conceit is service. Once again nature can be a great teacher. The biologist Janine Benyus, author of Biomimicry, told me once that the purpose in all of nature is to extend life and make it better. This is something the rest of nature appears to remember but that humans can forget. When we are contributing to the greater good, we are in our natural place, connected to our true nature. Most of nature does not have to reflect on its purpose but simply acts in a way to perpetuate and extend life.<\/p>\n
Our small ego, that fading image in the pool, will die, but what we contribute to the greater conversation and evolution of life lives on. And we are not doing this for future generations alone. Research has shown that people who consistently perform acts of kindness for others are in fact much happier than those who live more self-oriented lives.1 As we rise each morning, rather than wonder what the world will give us that day, we might be better to ask, What can I give the world today?<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The Five Thieves Of Happiness<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n JOHN IZZO<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" At some level we know that the more we focus on the self and our small, singular story, the more lost we can become. Now imagine for a moment an alternative view of the world, which may be very difficult for many. 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