By Hu Wo (Cuckoo’s Song)
What is happiness? If so, what about the real happiness? The first question looks pretty easy to answer, but it will be quite challenging to reply to the second question. Many people perceive the term happiness as having diverse meanings from different points of view. Some find it happy to lead a life of luxury, live a family life, or even have an unmarried life. Others think that happiness or love depends only on money. That is, almost everything can be bought or done with money in their eyes. These opinions are easier said than done to be deniable to some degree. In actual fact, the very happiness gives not only pleasure but also life satisfaction. The following will describe the fundamental principles of finding true happiness.
Firstly, most happy people are free from debt. This debt can be subdivided into three types – a debt of reaction (Wut-kyway), a debt of action (Kan-kyway), and a debt of recurrence (Samsara-kyway) – by Buddhism. And the debt also includes a debt of money, words or gratitude, and backlogs. Of course, to owe any debt to nobody in the world is good. It would sometimes be hard to stay out of debt when some people get into others’ debt. To be said, at the very least, those who live a life beset with debt cannot sleep a sound night by night. Hence, a person with debt will be living an unhappy life even before his death.
Secondly, happy people are usually off the danger list, especially insecurity and ill health. Physical safety, psychological well-being, emotional stability, and good health are the bare bones of a person remaining happy. Physical safety involves three basic needs of life-food, clothing, and shelter, which are available as and when a person wishes, as well as reliable neighbours and a safe atmosphere. Psychological well-being is full of a tranquil state of mind, intrapersonal peace, permanent beliefs, mental strength, fine attitudes towards life, and a thriving hope. The emotionally stabilized ones are amazingly resilient to life’s uncertainties and come with moral courage. At last, poor health will never contribute to the fulfilment of positive emotions like happiness throughout human life.
Thirdly, a happy person does not like to look for trouble or make trouble for others. In other words, he is not a can of worms. Some people are naturally troublemakers, particularly having a finger in every pie. Actually, doing bad deeds on purpose resembles, most likely, digging one’s own grave. Several problems often bring about subsequent implications, such as ill feelings, hatred, vindictiveness, and revenge. If a person does not hanker after any trouble at all, then he will have no hard feelings between himself and others for sure. A strong desire for no hostility automatically breaks down any trouble in the future, as the Myanmar saying goes. Having less trouble will certainly bring more happiness in life.
Fourthly, many happy people tend to stay innocent of whatever they do. That is to say, they abstain from a life of sin. Instead of doing bad things, they are given the chance to practise meditation, follow their hobbies like reading or travelling, and so on. Meditation offers intrapersonal peace, which motivates someone to become aware of what is happening in the body, appears and disappears in a while. These coming and going processes allow meditation practitioners to control any sense occurring within the meditation time, whether pleasant or unpleasant so that they do not feel too many of those senses. People like to do their best with what they wish without noticing other external senses at all. Thus, their time to do negative things will be reduced apparently. Happy people are always able to neglect the offences of others and then help them as much as they can.
A Pope, a priest and laureate, once wrote, “Happy the man, whose wish and care, A few paternal acres bound,” in his poem `The Quiet Life’. The connotation means that a happy man content himself only with what he has got. Some people innately lust for a good voice, intelligence, beauty, fame or something like that, not their inborn features or the things which they would surely have achieved in any way in the future. Even worse, some totally envy others’ success and growth at which they should prohibitively arrive. Consequently, jealous people may potentially ruin successful ones’ reputations one way or the other. After all, the less greed, the happier.
Finally, bona fide happiness is just anything that happened in the past and will not take place in future, as Buddha Myatswa said. This sermon will make an infinite life cycle come to an end, namely, the Road to Nibbana. However, we humans will be born, live and die through colourful life cycles as long as we are not on the path to Lokkotara, i.e. Vivasana, which can take us to the route to Nibbana’s lack of death. Before this, we ordinary people should obey those mentioned five fundamental principles of seeing Lawki’s happiness in the letter. This life is absolutely worth living for us if we have actual happiness.
