How many of us want to only focus on positive energy and dismiss negative thoughts? To run and hide, avoid, brush under the rug or ignore uncomfortable or painful thoughts, emotions and experiences? (Hint: everyone)
 
Our human consciousness has dual experiences that are inevitable - the happy and positive, as well as the sad and negative ones. To be human is to experience the good and the bad, and that actually is a beautiful thing. If we can learn to experience both energies without separating them as good and bad, we can experience the totality of our Consciousness – which is astounding in its beauty.
 
But many never get to experience this beauty. Why? Because we live in a society in which we are told to put our efforts to experience only pleasant experiences. We are taught to ignore, shove, and hide the unpleasant experiences – to avoid them at all costs because they are uncomfortable. We are given the impression and taught the belief (consciously and unconsciously) that negative thoughts have no purpose in our lives. We are told to overpower our happy memories and remove the negative memories. We are even told never to talk about the sad moments even if they are real.
 
We must pause and ask ourselves – Is it possible to experience one without the other? Can you truly experience joy if you never experience suffering? Can you know true happiness without sadness?
 
Maybe we are not given the right understanding about the purpose of negative moments in life, and we are not educated on how to deal with them. We are irrationally expected to push them away, ignore, or hide them under the carpet because someone believed or said that negative thoughts have no use in our lives.
 
To be whole is to embrace all the aspects of us. It is not just enjoying part of us that we like about ourselves but rather, and more importantly, it is allowing the dark part of our consciousness to emerge from inside and allow itself to express fully. We must encircle those qualities, emotions and experiences from which we have been running and continue to run from.
 
In our meditation practice this month, we will encounter and connect with our whole being by identifying and understanding the dark side along with the bright side to feel connected to our entire being.
 
We invite you to join us in this practice during our Monthly Meditation at our Happyness Center on Sunday February 23rd from 10:30AM – 12:00PM (optional discussion period from 12 – 12:30).
 
At the Happyness center our main aim is to help you develop mindfulness and deeper awareness of your inner self. We learn to see ourselves in silent observation and enquiry rather than act from the noisy activity outside.
 
We all lead busy lives, and meditation can help us relax and renew. We will share, learn, and practice together. Group meditations has many advantages that can reinforce our desires of daily practice that inspires us and others.

​Are you kind to yourself? Are you loving towards others?
 
Success in life, and true happiness, always begins with being happy with our self.  Only when we are happy with our self can we manifest what we are seeking in our life.
 
Many times though, our happiness is dependent on material things – what we own, the money in our bank account, the things we can touch and feel. We also often base our happiness on others - we depend emotionally on others for love, recognition, validation and approval. We cling to the belief (often unknowingly), that being something or somebody in someone else’s eyes will make us feel worthy and important, and therefore, happy.
 
In doing so, we never take control of our lives completely. We give control of our happiness to things and people that we cannot control. Sometimes, our mind gives us a false belief that somehow, we are still managing to be in control, and we live in that illusion. And we will continue to live with this false sense of control, and unknowingly attaching ourselves to someone or something until we recognize how much we depend on that person or object for our happiness.

Our mind argues with us over this: what is wrong with depending on someone or something when that is giving us security and happiness? The truth is, there is nothing right or wrong with this inherently, but what we fail to recognize is that which we depend on is temporary and will diminish at some point, thus it cannot be trusted or relied upon. Sooner or later, a day or time will come where we don’t feel fulfilled and complete. That person or thing we depended on is now no more with us, not enough for us, because it/they is/are temporary. We then begin our search for happiness again, pursing it elsewhere – in another desired object/job/adventure or a new person. And the more that we do this, the more unhappy we become; our search to find lasting happiness becomes more increasingly difficult and painful, for us and those we have depended on and then abandoned.
 
This is why is it essential to seek for the love and kindness within. Only when we learn to look within ourselves for what we crave can we experience true and lasting happiness. Only then can we truly be kind and give to others, because we are no longer seeking relationship with them out of our own selfish ambitions (to satisfy our own happiness), but we are seeking to have a giving relationship with them in which we can simply enjoy and love that person as they are, with no expectations. Only then can we begin to experience “enough”.
 
This is a very difficult transition for us as humans to make though, so how can it be done?
 
We invite you to join us for our upcoming Monthly Meditation on Sunday, January 26th where we will discuss this loving kindness towards self and others, and how to look within to find lasting happiness.
 
At the Happyness center our main aim is to help you develop mindfulness and deeper awareness of your inner self. We learn to see ourselves in silent observation and enquiry rather than act from the noisy activity outside.
 
We all lead busy lives, and meditation can help us relax and renew. We will share, learn, and practice together. Group meditations has many advantages that can reinforce our desires of daily practice that inspires us and others.