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Simple 6 words, but exudes barbell-like happiness, so although I don't know what you want to say, I can be sure that you are a very happy person. Well, let's talk about this answer, and some of my views on happiness are fine.

According to a study, the most common emotion in humans is happiness, followed by love and anxiety. But this does not mean that happiness is the state most of the time. For normal people, most of the state is neither sad nor happy, or, neither sad nor happy is a little bit happy, and in the rest of the state , Although happy emotions are very common, they are so elusive.

For example, this answer was written before the Qingming holiday. I knew that the holiday was coming, and the happy atmosphere in the group was overflowing. But when it was the holiday, I believe that everyone found that it was not so happy. In the end, we will find that, Half of the happiness of the holiday comes from imagination and planning... So, the question is, what is the source of your happiness? What are the parts? Do these compositions have to be produced in the context of a holiday? If happiness comes from imagination, isn't daydreaming happy too? Daydreaming every day, is this the happiness you want to pursue? How can you be sure that after this joy, you will not regret it? Do you think happiness is divided into low and high? ...

You can feel confused about these questions, and then rudely come to a conclusion: "Do as much as you want, do what you want, don't care about so much!" Finding a simple answer to a complex question can really be effective It can reduce the mental burden of people, but it is not conducive to your growth, it can only highlight the narrowness of your thinking.

Of course, you may find that after thinking about it for a long time, it may be the conclusion, but from seeing a mountain as a mountain to seeing a mountain as a mountain again, you have to go through a long way, although The conclusion may still be the same conclusion, but because of the change in the depth of your understanding, when faced with the same problem and the same situation, people with a deep understanding can make judgments and choices that are more in line with the underlying logic. This is often what we do. Often referred to as "growth".

Of course, I am not writing this answer to answer the previous questions, I just want to express that even if it is a seemingly simple emotion like happiness, there is actually a very complex mechanism behind it that needs to be considered, but I am not going to talk about this today. Mechanism, I want to talk about something else.

Let’s start with pain. After all, the purpose of our pursuit of happiness is essentially to hope that our lives will be happier. If our pain can be reduced or resolved a little, or if our tolerance is stronger, our life will be a lot happier.

When it comes to pain, the most profound influence on me is "The Power of Now 2" written by Eck Haktor. When I was in college, I copied it in its entirety, but I will share with you the contents of the book. , which makes this answer too long, so I'll briefly touch on what's in it.

The origin of the author's enlightenment lies in a thought that emerged from the author after a persistent state of anxiety: "I can't live anymore, I can't bear myself anymore". It was this sentence that got the author thinking. Because in this sentence, there are two "Is" in "I can no longer bear myself". If the "I" of the subject can feel the thoughts and emotions as objects, then the two should not be the same. So among the "me" and the "self" that I can't stand, which one is the real self? From this the author begins to think about himself.

We express the first "I" as the "observer" and the second "I" as the ego. The outside world's claim to identity forms the source of human suffering, and many people are so identified with the voice in their head, and the emotions that accompany that unbroken thought, that they are completely dominated by the ego's mind.

This is why I advocate the activity of "meditation" in the group. Meditation is not theology, and introductory meditation only takes a few hours to read books such as "Ten Minute Meditation" , or follow video tutorials at station B to learn and practice , like the Headspace Mindfulness Meditation Guide, which is only 8 episodes long .

I think practicing meditation has three very big effects, the first being that it allows you to observe yourself.

Because mindfulness in meditation can make you aware: I am directly interacting with the real world, I know that I am doing something, thinking about something. I was thinking about it, so it came to my head. It's me who's watching, not me getting caught up in it. Mindfulness gives us the ability not to be hijacked by our emotions and thoughts. Once you can develop this habit of observing yourself, for example, when you are angry, you can quickly realize that you are angry, but you can quickly adjust your emotions, rather than completely stop once you are angry. Don't stop, until you have completely vented your emotions and hurt others, you will start to look back and reflect.

The second effect of practicing meditation is to develop a state of mind that goes with the flow. Meditation is not trying to drive away the clouds, but moving a chair into the garden, sitting and watching the clouds and clouds, facing those thoughts in your mind, whether you hate it or not, whether you like it or not, don't force, don't resist, don't struggle, calm down. accept yourself.

Are you saying it's any good? In fact, when we think about our life, we often add our own emotions to many things, such as being late for a date, some people will be irritable, why are you late? Are you disrespecting me? You are late because you don't pay attention to me. If you don't pay attention to me, you don't love me anymore. You don't love me anymore, so why are you together? let's break up!

But in this example, I'm just telling the fact that I'm late for a date, and that's it, why have to include so many thoughts that may not be facts? You haven't checked whether those thoughts are true or not, so what's the point of thinking that way? It's just adding to your own troubles and hurting others. Maybe the truth is that you're late because you helped someone on the road. Practicing meditation can make us learn to accept the fact, just this fact, late, flowers are gone, someone stepped on your foot, failed, gave up... no stretch, no force, no self-investment, Don't generate unnecessary emotions, let nature take its course, accept the facts calmly, and life will be much easier.

The third function of meditation is to have a dialogue with oneself . Students often ask me what to do when I don’t know what to do. I always suggest trying this method, creating a new document, or taking out a page of paper and writing down my thoughts. I don’t need to pay attention to logic, and don’t do any thinking. Write whatever comes to your mind immediately, and keep writing until you don’t want to. After writing, you don’t want to organize and don’t organize, but after writing, you will often find yourself a lot more calm and indifferent.

There are many explanations for the effect, such as focusing on "writing" during the writing process, and gaining inner peace, but I think the more important thing is to put the worries, fears, Painful things are written out. Once things are clearly written out, you will not be so anxious and afraid. Many times, it is the vague things hidden in your heart that make you fear, fear, and worry.

Many times, we know the answer, and it will always appear in our minds from time to time, but we are always looking for the answer, looking for big shots, searching for Q&A, reading good books, or just watching anime and playing games. Watching videos, constantly looking for things to distract us, but turning a blind eye to the real answer in our hearts. Meditation gives us an opportunity to get in touch with our own heart, with our subconscious mind, so that the real thoughts in your heart can come to the surface. Remember that running away is always the worst decision, even if it is painful, even if it is troublesome, ignoring the inner thoughts will only make the pain and trouble continue to grow.

After talking about the pain, let's talk about the problems that will definitely be encountered on the way to pursue happiness: self-discipline and indulgence. In the answer to "Xian Yu's Answer to Reader Questions: Brother Xian Yu Loves You", I talked about a little understanding of "freedom":

Do what you want to do and refuse what you don't want to do is freedom. In doing what we want, is it freedom to do what we want? This makes us slaves to desire, biological instinct, not true freedom. Therefore, true freedom is to do according to our will, reason, and to follow our own principles.

So we often see such a statement: "Self-discipline is anti-humanity, the more anti-humanity you are, the greater the achievement you can achieve in life". And I have always resisted such a statement. In "Xian Yu's Answer to Readers' Questions: I'm 30 years old, is it too late to start working hard now?" "In this answer, I mentioned:

In this era of material abundance, we are more about highlighting ourselves. We believe that people only live once in a lifetime, and the most important thing is the journey itself

So I think that we should respect ourselves and find the value of life based on it, but now I am told to go against human nature. Isn’t this what makes us go against our self and achieve worldly achievements? So I couldn't accept this statement until I saw this answer :

It’s my human nature to spend a night on Douyin, but it’s also my human nature to feel the emptiness and regret for wasting time after finishing Douyin.

It's my human nature to eat and drink, but it's also my human nature to feel sick in my heart when I look out of shape and look fat in the mirror.

It is my human nature to lie flat and indisputable, but it is also my human nature to throw myself out of the street when I see my peers become famous.

It is my human nature to indulge in sexual immorality, but when true love comes, I have not grasped it in the best state of life and have deep regrets. It is also my human nature.

Delayed gratification, the focus is not on delay, but on gratification. Suppressing the small desires of the present is to satisfy the big desires of the future and violate the small human nature of the present.
This is the true meaning of self-discipline in order to achieve the future human nature. Self-disciplined people only see a little further than indulgent people.

Self-discipline is not noble, on the contrary it is very utilitarian. If suppressing one's human nature fails to bring about greater benefits, it is not called self-discipline, it is called self-abuse.

Self-discipline is not performed for yourself or others, it requires a strong inner drive. Focusing on the grand goal of the future, this little constraint now becomes trivial.

And what I want to say is that in our human nature, there is a human nature to strive for progress, become unique, and gain recognition from others. What we have to do is not to satisfy temporary indulgence, to enjoy the happiness brought by indulgence, and more The thing is, we need to inspire the positive side of human nature and do it according to the same principles that are based on our human nature, and this will bring us true happiness.

Finally, on how to get happiness, I would like to say my four suggestions:

First, do what you really want to do.

Do you see those who have light in their eyes despite hard work and difficult circumstances? Do you think they are in pain? No, they are happy. Because pain has nothing to do with "specific things", it's only about "whether it's something you want to do right now". All "bad" things are never bad, as long as it is the only thing you want to do at the moment, no matter what it is, when you do it, you must be the happiest, the most living in the moment, and feel the best meaningful.

The second is to overcome difficulties .

Happiness has a characteristic and that is adaptability, when you first have a dream thing, you are happy, but soon your happiness returns to normal, and then you expect to have new things, so a lot People are always in pursuit of happiness.

But don't complain about the mechanism of happiness, which has kept humanity alive until now. Imagine that in ancient times, if we were in a state of excitement for a long time, the body would consume a lot of energy, which would be detrimental to our survival, so this is also a mechanism for our self-protection. So how do we deal with this mechanism? What I want to say is that enjoying the moment is indeed very happy, but difficulties and challenges with negative meanings will bring us more happiness.

Aristotle said in "Ethics": Every happiness is based on the premise that people engage in a certain activity, or use a certain ability of people. Without this premise, there is no happiness.

The happiness we feel is premised on the use and exertion of our abilities. To give a very simple example, the joy brought by singing is often higher than the joy brought by listening to it.

But the reason why I give this advice is not to let everyone find difficult things to challenge when they have nothing to do. This is not called pursuit of happiness, this is called self-abuse. What I want to say is that we often avoid and hate difficulties, but in fact, difficulties are also a way to bring us happiness. The next time we encounter difficulties, instead of sighing for the first time, it is better to change our angle. You will be happy for a long time.”

The third suggestion is to connect with people.

Perhaps it comes from the "biophilic" characteristics of life, or from the habit of division of labor and cooperation derived from ancient times, people have the need to establish connections with others. Especially living in modern society, we have relationships with others all the time, family, friends, lovers, colleagues, society and the country. In connection with each other, we will feel needed and needed, which will bring meaning and joy.

Of course, connecting with people does not necessarily require face-to-face communication. As long as you can have a relationship with other people, I think it is a kind of connection. You once told me that since joining this group, I have many more friends. , the mood has become brighter, I am also happy that you can have such a change, just like when I recalled the college days, I forgot all the knowledge and skills I had learned, but the experience in the club and getting along with my classmates and roommates always made me forget. I can see it clearly. There is no such thing as a banquet in the world. I hope that one day, when you recall being in this group, you will be able to recall the connections you have established in this group and the happy moments that happened in the past.

The fourth suggestion is to connect with nature.

There was a period of time in college, my life was like a pool of stagnant water, but one morning after the rain, I was walking on the path of Wuhan University. The water on the road was clear and transparent, reflecting the appearance of the plane trees on both sides. It was so fresh, and suddenly, the haze in my heart was swept away. I believe that everyone must have had a similar experience. Go out for a walk more, feel the nature more, and don’t wait until you leave the city to find that there are still many places you haven’t been to.

Regarding happiness, do what you want to do, use your own abilities, solve problems and gain happiness at the same time, communicate with people more often, go out more in your free time, and see the world. above.

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