Are you happy? Yes, you're all looking happy and we all are happy sometimes. What if you ate chocolate with the foil?
You would enjoy the chocolate but periodically have to spit out the foil, right? Similarly, our happiness is unnecessarily intercepted by bouts of sorrow. Wouldn't it be great if we could just be happy without the intervening pain?
So, where is happiness? You believe it's out there in the world, right? But consider this.
You take a non-stop flight Mumbai to New York, and as you exit the terminal building there, a fellow passenger lights up a cigarette. He is happy. But a non-smoker walks away. The same object gives immense pleasure to one person, intense displeasure to another.
is happiness in the object? Then where is it? Think. As long as the desire for the cigarette was unfulfilled, the mind was agitated, unhappy.
The moment the desire got fulfilled, the agitation ceased, you're happy. So is happiness in the mind and not in the object? Are we chasing a mirage all our lives when the oasis is elsewhere?
By the end of the session, you will have the power to be happy with or without objects. Where do we seek happiness? We look for happiness through four avenues.
Sense enjoyment. Action. relationships and intellectual pursuits. Let's begin with sense enjoyment. You eat the first mango of the season.
It's delicious, right? But you keep eating mangoes, the enjoyment diminishes. The more you indulge, the less you enjoy.
What's the way out? Then action. Work.
What are you working for? Profit. Paycheck.
Watch the thousands of people go to work on a Monday morning. Does anyone look excited? They all pull long faces. Nadal also works. He is ex- Static every time he goes out to play.
Haven't you noticed it? What's the difference? next Relationships. Have you seen couples in the hot midday sun on marine dryad?
They don't feel the heat or discomfort because they are in love Emotional thrills are so fulfilling that physical inconveniences don't bother you. But then, the days of wine and roses soon become days of wine and neurosis. You think the partner is at fault, but is he really to blame?
And now, Intellectual Delight. A young girl wanting a PhD from Harvard gives up the luxuries of a home and walks away from her family. Physical and emotional pain become insignificant when compared to the joy of a doctorate.
But is that enough? You always want more. So where does satisfaction lie? Is there a prescription for happiness?
Yes. Take a look. Happiness equals...
Number of desires fulfilled divided by number of desires harbored. Using this simple formula, how can you enhance your happiness? Either increase the numerator or decrease the denominator. What are we all doing? Fulfilling desires.
You fulfilled many desires. Has your happiness increased? Not necessarily. Have you wondered why? Let's say you need a pair of walking shoes.
As you enter the mall, someone offers you a perfume to sample. A little ahead, you see a beautiful watch. And then, the latest smartphone. Finally, you buy the shoes.
What have you done? You fulfilled one desire. The numerator has gone up by one.
But without you realizing it, the denominator has gone up by three. Perfume, watch, smart phone. This is one experience. You can imagine what happens in an entire lifetime.
You want happiness, but only succeed in increasing desires. So what do you do? Focus on the denominator.
As you bring down the desires, your happiness increases exponentially. And when the desires come down to zero, you get infinite happiness. Spot on. Thereafter, anything added or taken away makes no difference. Because you know it.
Infinite plus or minus anything is still infinite. But the world is agog with objects and you are enticed to want more, buy more. Do you succumb and sink in the quicksand of desire or do you stand up and opt for happiness?
How do you reduce desires? You can't wish them away. The only way is to pick a higher desire.
As a child, you were obsessed with toys, right? Do you hanker for them down? Of course not.
Did you at any stage take a decision to give up desires for toys? No. Then how did they go?
You just grew to more exciting stuff. What is the cause of desire? Where does it come from? When do you feel hungry?
When your stomach is empty. If you've just eaten all the goodies outside, you won't even think of food. So desire comes from emptiness. Thoughts arise in your mind that go out to want. objects to fill that emptiness.
You fulfill many desires but that emptiness doesn't go. Have you wondered why? Because it's not real and this is the most important part which you need to think about.
Even as you feel this gnawing sense of void, you are actually full, totally full. You just don't know it. When you don't know your full, you become a fool. So you don't need objects of the world to fill you.
You only need knowledge of your fullness. A child gets separated from his family and grows up as a beggar in the same area where his parents live. The father, a millionaire, continuously searches for the son and many years later realizes that the beggar is his long lost son.
The son now knows that all the years that he thought he was a beggar, he was in fact a millionaire. We are not just millionaires, friends. We are infinites. ignorant of our real worth, we go out as beggars asking for petty, paltry things. Just wake up to the reality.
Gain knowledge of your fullness and your life will change. So where do you begin? Upgrade your desires. For how long will you remain in the kindergarten of life, oblivious to the suckler joys you are heir to?
Pick an emotional desire and your happiness multiplies. Feel one with the family and when anyone does well, you rejoice. Identify with the nation and you celebrate the achievement of all Indians. your happiness increases 1.3 billion times.
So as you walk out of here, friends, think of adding value to others. Work to make others happy. Only then will you truly be happy. Thank you.