The Happiness Trap
Chogyam Trungpa said that “Enlightenment is ego’s ultimate disappointment.” Why would he say that? It seemed to me for a long time that enlightenment meant I could be happy all the time impervious to whatever was happening and it was the most natural thing in the world to pursue this worthwhile goal. How wrong I was. The Happiness Trap is a title of a fantastic book which outlines using mindfulness as personal therapy and it explains very clearly that the biggest trap we face is wanting to be happy all the time. It just completely goes against reality. The reality of change, the reality of disappointment, the reality of trying and failing. It is the ego’s greatest victory when it convinces you it can protect you from all this stuff. The only realistic way is acceptance.
Do you long for happiness all of the time?
The more we try to avoid the basic reality that all human life involves pain, the more we are likely to struggle with that pain when it arises, thereby creating even more suffering.
What many great spiritual teachers have said – resistance to the present situation is the root of all suffering. Unfortunately that includes resisting unhappiness, or pain or even depression. As the old saying goes, “what you resist persists.” Allowing space for these things to be and move, actually allows them to pass right on through, it doesn’t mean they won’t return, life is full of suffering, but the good news is nothing is permanent. There is no need to tell ourselves sweet stories or sugar coat reality, as Brad Warner says:
Real wisdom is the ability to understand the incredible extent to which you bullshit yourself every single moment of every day.
Being intimate with reality:
Meditation is not about trying to escape or transcend into something otherworldly, it’s being intimate with reality, seeing things as they are not how you would like them to be. It is from this place of acceptance that effective changes can be made because you are perfectly aware of the situation.
Tags: Observe Your Mind
