HQFT: Wanna Be Happy?

This is SUCH a simple sentence. But think about it.

The pathway to happiness isn't getting what you want, it's doing what you love.

OK, so let's parse it out, a bit. I have to do this for myself, because I think there's a whole lot going on here, and I need to see it, think it through, for myself. You're just along for the ride, if you're reading.

First impression: Things.

OK, so happiness isn't about things. Getting what you want, whether it be a thing tangible, or a thing intangible. Such as that white picket fence and house, or prestige. Thing about things is: as soon as we get the one we want, the ratchet re-sets on the next one up the conveyor belt, ergo you never arrive.

Second thought. Wanting.

That the act of wanting implies that if we get the object of that want, that some equation is solved. Let's think about lottery winners. They got a whole lot of what most people think they want. Most of them are desperately unhappy, and lose more than they gained, only a few years after the windfall. A whole thesis could be written here, but this is fast and raw, so I'm gonna leave the details up to you, later.

Third: Doing.

An action, not a thing. Funny, how actions are limited to the present tense. The only time when we really live. That, to be happy, we have to be doing, and doing means living in the now. So, happiness is contingent on us living -- when?? -- in the now. Not the past, not the future. Dang, never thought I'd be back here so fast, after yesterday's ramblings. Guess it's really true, that HPs put us right where we need to be, each moment. There's that present tense, the NOW, again. I really need to pay attention to this, yes, people?

Fourth. To do, to give, to produce... is to receive.

There's a little song going on, right now, in my head, by the Second Me, and it's singing "Step 12!! See, I told you so!" and doing a funny little dance. I was taught in college that all truth is one truth, and if truths seem to contradict each other, it's just because we don't have enough of the big picture, yet, in our understanding. But that ultimately there is only one reality, one Truth. Hm. Like, I need a Higher Power, to make sense of my life - why I live, and how I should live. And, now, the getting is in the output. That's what this is saying, I think.

Hmmmmmmmm. I need to crawl off and think, a whole lot, about this sentence. Like about a year or two. Maybe that would do it.

Or maybe just a moment, like now.

-The Traveler