Happiness is Like Gazing At A Distant Star
It vanishes when you focus on it too much.
The faintest stars in the sky can only be seen indirectly. You’ve experienced this right?
I’ve read that this is because of the ways that the rods and cones in our eyes detect light. Central vision is more sensitive to color and detail. Peripheral vision is more sensitive to movement and light.
Happiness behaves much the same way. When we focus directly on happiness and the desire to become happy, it sort of loses its glimmer and fades away into the darkness.
We have to remember that happiness is a symptom. We cannot find happiness as if it were a lost object that can merely be located and picked up.
For that reason, I don’t like it when people talk about finding happiness. It conjures up the idea that happiness is just something that you have to find “out there” in the world — in the right job, relationship, financial status, etc. This leads people down a path that is much like gazing directly at a distant start. As soon as they hone in on the “thing” it will disappear and a new pursuit will emerge off in the periphery.
Happiness is cultivated, not found. Happiness is the fruit of life rooted in nutrient-dense soil. Happiness grows as a result of dedicating our lives to the…
