UnbornTao

What do you mean by "that"? Getting what you want? For example: Are we able to be happy when our wants aren't met or when we fail to avoid what we don't want? What we consider happiness, as a culture, is 'winning', accomplishment, success--things going your way (self-survival). The rare moments when we've simply been happy in life are when the self-survival force has been transcended to a certain degree, at least temporarily. These moments allow us to experience what is taking place as it is without reservation or self-concern. Seeing things as they are seems to free us and promote happiness as we connect with the presence of something real. So, the substance of happiness still seems to elude us, something to look into.

You guys are speculating too much. Stay focused on the topic at hand. Recall a moment when you considered yourself to be genuinely happy, and ask yourself what that was about. We can start with that.

This sounds to me as "I don't know what it is."

Happiness will make you nothing!

To ground our contemplation: Is happiness getting what you want? Is it the rush of pleasure at accomplishing something? Is it the temporary relief of a successful self-survival -- or "winning"? Is it avoiding what you don't want? Is it being free from some threat, pain or fear? Our relationship with happiness may be similar to a hamster running on a wheel, chasing a cheese that it will never reach. We think of happiness as the cheese, but perhaps it isn't. Are we in actuality able to be happy regardless of circumstances, whether our wants and needs are met or not? What does this say about happiness and our confusion?

We haven't accessed insight into what happiness is.

Maybe, and this doesn't say much about its nature. An answer is an answer, after all. Insight into it is the goal. To contemplate it, we might imagine the following: We are Neanderthals without "language." What has to occur so that that context or invention takes place? What is the distinction of language itself? What occurs in one's experience that allows for language to show up? How does it really come about? Some questions.

So, what is happiness? I assert we don't know what it really is.

We could try to take a look at what language is, contemplate it, not assuming that we know what it is already-

Where did you hear about it? It originally wasn't an experience of yours. You wouldn't have come up with that particular concept/name and the associated ideas if you hadn't heard of them from an outside source. This is important to acknowledge. Without the obviously superficial interpretation of the belief system: What's experienced? Perhaps an intense bodily state, likely precipitated by your cosmology relative to this matter, adding a particular meaning, trying to reinforce your world-concept. You say that you experience something –whose nature is by the way unknown– and then hearsay is superimposed onto it. Without reference to belief, what's experienced is still up for grabs; your interpretation of it is filtered through the lens of your biases, beliefs, desires and worldview. So, is it real? I don't know. Is it relevant?

Nice.

My bad, I meant to mention @aurum.

@aurum whole, unbroken, complete, integral. A vase is either whole or it has a crack, at which point it is no longer complete. Its function is already diminished or broken. A perspective is partial. How do you define whole?

Then it isn't whole nor complete by definition.

Cute.

I thought about that, too.

Nice, thanks. Do your eyes stop working? It is independent from experience and already the case.

No.

What is concept?

The purpose of this journal is to share ramblings, questions, perspectives and insights on life and personal empowerment in order to deepen my own understanding, improve my communication skills, and hopefully assist others in seeing something in a new light. I hope the content is inspiring.

If you hold yourself as fundamentally unworthy or unlovable, you may only want to relate to people who don't love you, and whenever they do, you unconsciously sabotage the relationship. What is that about?

"What you think, you become." - Gautama. I'm not talking about a belief system. Leaving the fantasizing aside, there might be a principle at play here. As a small example, pay attention whenever you start the day angry, distracted, etc., and carry that out throughout the day. What consequences does this disposition have on your experience? What results does it produce in your life and those of others?

Some would say blue. I myself don't pay much attention to that. The good samurais lived according to powerful principles such as discipline, honor and integrity. They lived with the presence of death. There's much to learn from that. A model is a model while living with integrity and the reality of death kicks your ass. Loving the show so far.

Banana. Don't extrapolate.

Don't know if you're being sarcastic or not. It can be called however you want, really. I mean it as a profound consciousness of one's nature.