" Happiness ": The ultimate Goal.

" Happiness ": The ultimate Goal. While most of us experience happiness in favorable circumstances, it is an art to remain happy when life is troublesome. People easily become dismal in the face of problems. That is because of the negativity bias of our mind, where adverse events impact our brain more deeply than positive ones. For example, you remember the one critical feedback your boss gave and forget the ten good ones. Your mind keeps revisiting the single mistake you made while ignoring the many good things you did. Hence, we have trained our mind to selectively harbor negativity or remain fixated on problems. If we wish to be happy, we simply have to change the training of the mind to deliberately see goodness and notice the abundant opportunities that exist in the same situation. This is the art of " positive reframing" that our Gurudev teaches all the time. Understand it through the following story. Two Indian soldiers had been wounded in anti-terrorist operations in Kashmir. Both had unfortunately lost one leg in a grenade explosion. They had been operated upon and received an artificial limb. With it, they were learning to walk but needed a crutch for support. The first soldier was full of complaints. He was protesting the unfair hand of God. He was cursing the terrorists, and even blaming his commander for putting him on the frontline. The second soldier was brimming with gratitude. He realized he could have lost his life in the grenade explosion but was still alive to tell the tale. He saw it as God's blessings that he could sit in a wheelchair, feel the flowers much closer to him, and look his little kids in the eyes! The contrasting perspectives explained the two soldiers’ experience of distress or lack of it. One was seeing himself as a victim, while in the same situation, the other was thrilled to see himself as a lucky survivor. Misery is the consequence of viewing life through the lens of negativity and discontentment. In contrast, positive reframing is the art of finding the silver lining in any situation. Stay blessed