34. The Elements of Happiness

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XXXIV

The Elements of Happiness

Lecture Based Questions:

1. How does happiness arise in our feelings?

Please remember that you are not your physical self, but a higher spirit who has been entrusted with the care and feeding of your animal body. Your body has many impulses of its own that are meant to challenge you and stimulate you. Emotions are part of your physical body’s instinctive nature as well as part of your Astral Body’s energy. You are not your emotions. Emotions are karmic in nature. You can stimulate some emotions, but you cannot always control the body’s response. Your choice of behavior is your best avenue of control.

Every emotion has a hormonal basis in the physical body, which is triggered by the Astral Body through the solar plexus. Opioid peptides such as endorphins and enkephalins are the hormones mostly responsible for warm, fuzzy feelings and a sense of well being (which we call the state of happiness). The hypothalamus gives rise to many of these hormones. Beta-endorphins are the most potent and are generally produced by the pituitary—a gland in the brain that sits above the cerebellum near the center of the brain. It lies in a cluster with the hypothalamus and the pineal glands. Other glands in the limbic system also secret opioid peptides as well as other hormones that contribute to peaceful and contented emotions.

Is it possible to stimulate or create happy feelings?

Yes! There are several ways to give rise to happiness hormones in the body. These are accomplished by accessing the five senses.

A) Perform a behavior that you would normally do if you were already happy, such as smiling, laughing, dancing, jumping, hugging, or celebrating with music.

B) Certain foods trigger an endorphin response in the body, such as chocolate, milk, or berries. Foods that give rise to happy childhood memories will also stimulate endorphins by this Pavlovian association.

C) Certain fragrances trigger endorphins, such as some floral scents and certain food and spice combinations. These can differ between individuals. I think you already know what these are.

D) Certain hues of blue and green colors create feelings of refreshment and peacefulness.

E) Soft, high-pitched sounds (such as birdsong and children’s voices) as well as certain musical harmonies and intervals can also kick in the opioids.

F) Exercise definitely increases endorphin levels in the body. Anaerobic exercise—body-building, some forms of yoga, tai chi, slow walking, heavy lifting—stimulate endorphins right away as compensation for the lack of oxygen in the bloodstream. Aerobic exercise will bring up endorphin levels after about twenty minutes of exertion.

G) Meditation and contemplation are excellent ways of increasing endorphin activity in the body.

H) Last but definitely not least, The Big O—orgasm is a super stimulant of endorphin release.

2. Is happiness the same as pleasure?

No, but pleasure can definitely be part of happiness. There are two types of happiness—long-term happiness and jack-off happiness. Long-term feelings are invulnerable to daily events; they are anchored in well-established behaviors and strong foundations of faith and self-esteem. You could say that long-term happiness is an approach to life rather than a goal. Pleasure is instant gratification with a short term life; it depends on external conditions for its execution. I do not need to explain to you why long-term happiness is desirable to cultivate. It is everlasting and beneficial at the same time.

Pleasure, on the other hand, is a delicate instrument and needs closer examination. The body requires a certain amount of pleasure every day or it will try to commit suicide through fatal illness or mental imbalance. However, if a person becomes too focused on obtaining pleasure, addictive behavior will result.

The addictive cycle runs something like this: a person feels pain and wants to escape. He/she performs the ritual of pleasure and receives the endorphin payoff. The addict becomes burdened with guilt over the pleasure, and creates emotions of pain. The need to escape follows and the cycle starts over. The addict views everything in the world as a means to acquiring more of the ritual pleasure. In the Lower Astral World, addicts create dingy brown caves for themselves and their rituals. An addiction has a sticky texture to it, and the odor resembles that of a decomposing carcass. No need to feel alarmed about yourself—all of us have some type of addiction until the third degree of initiation.

There is a key to balancing pleasure in our daily lives so that it nurtures the body and remains within the bounds of healthy behavior. This would be the attitude with which we embrace the pleasure. The key word is ESCAPE. If we use pleasure to escape, we are cheating ourselves out of a purely joyful experience. Escape siphons away the energy that would otherwise flow to our success.

The correct way to experience pleasure is with relish and gratitude. Pure enjoyment heals us on all levels of our being. When the thrill is gone, we can move ahead with our life-affirming activities and feel refreshed by the short pleasure break.

Can we feel a mixture of happiness and unhappiness?

Yes of course. One can feel the endorphin condition that we call happiness and still feel dissatisfied with the state of one’s life, or be suffering from some trauma or loss. Happiness is not meant to be an escape from an unpleasant reality. It is supposed to be a lifestyle that transcends all circumstances.

3. What are the required components to a happy life?

A) Forgiveness—has many redemptive and blessed qualities. Also, when you are busy being bitter, you can’t be happy.

B) Active Faith—God makes everything right. Act as though you believe this, and watch good things happen to you.

C) Holy Expectancy—anticipate and observe life as full of blessings, harmony, good things and people, and amusement.

D) Cast your Burden on Christ—we are not meant to carry the load all by ourselves. We relieve stress by allowing God to handle the details. Also, there is always room for hope while God is helping.

E) Self Image—if you have fashioned your character into one that you like, then you will always be comfortable with yourself. Also, remember that character is destiny. Your integrity and endurance shape your choices, which in turn shape your life.

F) Striving to Improve—learning is fun. Gaining skill is fun. We are designed to be curious and in quest of something more. Our lives have additional dimensions of mental stimulation and adventure.

G) Filling my life with love—the more people (human and non-human) we have in our lives, the greater our potential support systems and affection quotient.

4. How do these elements affect the Astral Body?

The good things listed above have a healing affect on the AB, which retains emotional injuries over the procession of several lifetimes. They also have a metaphysical effect, meaning they have the power to improve the quality of consciousness and experiencial life.

5. Is feeling unhappy ever a good thing?

Yes. It makes you feel dissatisfied with where you are and squeezes you into striving for where you are going to be happier.

Why do we experience problems or sorrow?

Part of this life challenge, these are puzzles that need to be solved. The problem is always the key to the solution. They are always related to your neuroses. Your subconscious mind commands your life around you.

Can we help others through these experiences?

Yes, in a shamanistic capacity, we can help those who are going through problems that we have already survived and succeeded over.

6. Exercise: The Handyman

If something is bugging you, then fixing it is a good idea. In such a case, try the following technique.

A) In the finest detail possible, pinpoint the essence of your discontent.

B) Find the point on the body that corresponds to this issue.

Cleanse, heal, energize, and stabilize the nerve plexus.

C) Find the appropriate main chakra that rules this area of the body.

Cleanse, heal, energize, and stabilize the chakra.

D) Create the affirmation that countermands the original problem.

Repeat the affirmation five [5] times whenever the issue returns to your conscious mind.

7. Draw or describe one of your helpers.

Angels, nature spirits, ancestors, loved ones—lovingly wait to advise and protect you— honor one of them now in a short meditation.

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The Threads of the Magic Carpet

There is no loss, separation, or obstruction in Divine Mind,

And God is my Love, Joy, and Peace.

The physical body is a magnificent, roiling storm of emotions, feelings, and sensations that constantly change. It is quite a heady experience to be tossed and driven by these hormonal tides and combinations. Usually, the young soul requires several lifetimes to make any sense or order out of the experience. On top of the basic urges to survive and escape discomfort, we add varying degrees of psychic needs—the need for acceptance and love, the need to be entertained, the need to expand the mind, and the need to feel power.

Thus come we to the age old question, “What is happiness?” Books have been written on the subject. Philosophers have spent their lives analyzing it. The ways of happiness are subtle and ever changing. In this moment, however, let us address certain points.

Happiness of the spirit is not pleasure, security, comfort, beauty, wealth, recognition, or absence of frustration. On the physical hand, however, these things can make the body happy. We acknowledge that the ways of the physical world are fleeting; any condition can be removed or changed at any time. Therefore, lasting happiness must be invulnerable to the capricious ways of the physical realm. It must necessarily be an approach to solving the problems that plague the physical life. It must be the array of tools that we may use to perfect our feelings, our perceptions, and our interactions with daily experience. So then, we may say that lasting happiness is not a destination or a goal, but a useful and powerful set of techniques that enable us to create contentment for the physical body, wholeness for the astral body, and clarity for the mental body.

Emotions are generally karmic. They arise from the lymbic system—a complex and pervasive system of glands and ducts that network the entire body. It is the hormonal factory that rules the instinctive nature:

fight-flight

territory-protectiveness

anger-aggression

love/caring

fear

depression

pleasure/pain

As we become increasing conscious of our individuality and our unique sense of belonging in the Universe, our feelings have less influence over our behavior, and we gain more influence over the conditions that cause hormone response (feelings). We can establish a sense of emotional hominess through knowing our limitations and inclinations. Through this we can sense an affinity for certain people and places. This is one of the reasons why we learn the importance of honoring feelings, giving them expression, and examining their sources.

That warm-fuzzy feeling that we enjoy whenever anything is working smoothly is nothing more than an endorphin response. Certain things that we do trigger endorphin production in the brain. Some stimuli trigger only short bursts of endorphins, other stimuli give rise to an extended cycle of endorphin maintenance.

One could say that a neurosis is any emotional or behavioral cycle that impedes contentment or thwarts success. When there is disharmony in our lives, we can examine our activities for moments when we are setting up situations that guarantee disappointment. Our thoughts and feelings have attractive powers. Fear, hate, love, desire, curiosity, familiarity, habit, and self image all create thought forms that affect our opportunities, blockages, and successes. These are the clues for personal growth and the direction of our next turn in spiritual enlightenment. Our unhappiness moves us to create new energies for our own redemption.

The law of Karmic Justice is part of this creative movement. It is the attractive force that brings us together with our subconscious thoughts and feelings. What we send out, we receive back; it is our due, for pleasure or for pain. We get what we ask for; if we have asked for happiness, then that is what we receive.

Within the earth, wood grows

The image of pushing upward

Thus the superior man of devoted character

heaps up small things

In order to achieve something high and great.

—I Ching Hexagram 9 The Taming Power of the Small

(Using Bollington Press's edition by Wilhelm & Baynes)