Three Kinds of Happiness

There are three kinds of happiness in the world: the happiness that comes from receiving things, the happiness that comes from doing things, and the happiness that simply is. It’s not done. But it does require that you put forth an effort to get there.

The Buddha recommends primarily the last two kinds. The things you receive from other people come from your old karma. You focus, though, on what you can do right now in terms of being generous, being principled in your actions, developing thoughts of goodwill for all beings. These are activities that are good in the doing. They give good results, of course. But as the Buddha said, the act of doing these things is another term for happiness.

So look for your opportunities to do good like this and cultivate delight in doing these things. Because the happiness that comes from receiving and the happiness that comes from the doing requires that you do delight in these things in order to get the most happiness out of them. In other words, it depends on the way you talk to yourself about them.

The problem with receiving things is we can talk ourselves into all kinds of wrong attitudes. But with doing things, when you’re doing the right things, talking yourself into doing them, it’s a way of energizing yourself so you keep on doing more so that your happiness has to depend less and less on the things you receive.

With the things you receive, sometimes the economy is good, sometimes the economy is bad. Sometimes society is peaceful; sometimes it’s not. Those things are largely out of your control. But the happiness you do is more in your control. You can decide to be generous and it’s your decision. You stick with it.

It may be difficult in terms of what the world has to say, what the world is going to do. But as long as you delight in being generous, then you know it’s a good thing. Delight in being virtuous. Delight in developing thoughts of goodwill for all beings, realizing you have no ill will for anybody. That’s a high state of mind. They call it a sublime attitude. or brahmavihāra. This is the attitude of the brahmas, high levels of devas.

But beyond that, there’s the happiness that simply is. And that’s the happiness that’s really secure: the happiness in nibbana. It doesn’t depend on anything outside being any way at all. It just is on its own. And because it can’t be threatened by anything, when you find that happiness, you’re not threatened at all, because you know this is the ultimate happiness, and nobody can take it away from you. Nobody even has to know. It’s totally safe. Nobody can know. It’s totally safe. You’re the only one who knows for yourself.

So work on those last two kinds of happiness—the happiness that comes from doing and the happiness that simply is. Find the happiness that simply is. Open up your mind. See what’s going on inside. In that way, your happiness will be secure; not only secure, but also totally harmless—ahappiness that doesn’t have to take anything away from anybody else at all.