We Can’t Hoard Happiness
“The perfect man’, said Chuang-tzu, ’employs his mind as a mirror; it grasps nothing, it refuses nothing, it receives but does not keep.”
I’m reading The Sun Also Rises (again) while waiting for my turn to collect my passport. A man next to me complains that people are cutting the line. “What takes 30 minutes will take 2 hours,” he says, “This is Lebanon.”
That could easily have been me complaining if not for Hemingway. I’m proud of myself for not getting angry or resentful that my time is being wasted.
Finally, after exactly two hours, I’m ushered into a small room filled with three uniformed men, many folders and large envelopes. After giving my name, I’m handed my new passport.
Walking out to the town square, I feel a sense of joy, an accomplishment done with grace—none of my usual tantrums. Doing these small obligatory errands makes me not sleep the night before. I know I sound ridiculous, but that’s the truth. I often find ways not to do or persuade others to do them.
With the passport in hand, it feels like a big win. And yet, instead of staying with that triumphant feeling, I’m thinking about how I should act in this same manner when faced with similar things to do in the future.
Do I always carry a book with me? Perhaps I was feeling sorry for the Lebanese officials who earn less than $200 a month and are doing their best that I remain serene. Setting the right expectations before leaving for the passport office is crucial.
A white dove flies by, and as I stop analysing and admire the bird’s flight, I realise I’m ruining my special moment. I’m turning a win into a loss. I’m killing the goose, the golden egg and whatever else comes next.
That’s me in a nutshell. I hardly dwell in the present. I’m always thinking ahead, what’s next, and how to be strategic.
It’s tiring. It’s unmindful. It’s ruining the small pockets of joy in my life.
It isn’t enough that I usually beat myself up when things don’t go my way. I also find ways to do so when something does go right.
Other situations come to mind. Like when I’ve just finished a good writing session, my mind doesn’t say well done; instead, how can I set the right conditions to write the same way tomorrow as I did today?
I regularly turn potential sources of happiness into a source of stress.
Buddhism has a concept known as taṇhā, defined as the craving to hold onto pleasurable experiences and be separated from painful or unpleasant experiences.
This longing comes from our underlying fear of facing our finitude.
Our evolutionary biology means that we want certainty. We want to control our environment and look for ways to predict the future to remain safe and survive.
But we end up standing outside our present experiences without ever getting into them.
Instead of processing these joyful moments, we kill them.
No matter how much we plan, we can’t always have the same outcomes. There’s always a different agenda at play.
Experiences are meant to be had.
We can’t hoard happy experiences to use for later.
I’ve learned to control my outcomes since I was very young. I had to survive in a new country after a sudden departure from home without much support at 11. That mindset helped me then, but it has outlived its usefulness today.
During the COVID-19 outbreak and that month when I had to remain at home and isolated, something strange happened; I found myself letting go and being more present.
In slowing down and not drowning in the noise of my own life—troubles at work, societal pressures, meetings and/or deadlines—I became calmer and more content without any expectations or responsibilities. It’s like I pressed pause but without any consequences in doing so.
Throughout that month, my phone hardly rang. There were few urgent emails to respond to and even fewer people to deal with.
There was a sense of freedom that I hadn’t had for many years.
I felt light, more mindful of the world and me in the world. I was reminded that I’m nothing but a speck of cosmic dust. All these shadows I chased weren’t that important.
Suddenly, what seemed urgent became less so. Instead, what became important was family, friendships, health, and being happy.
Everything was so uncertain that I didn’t have to face the future. I didn’t care about what happened tomorrow. I was freed from the responsibility of thinking about what could happen in the future.
I started to live in the now and savour what I was doing. Blissful afternoon walks, having good conversations with friends in the evening while red wine flowed, and reading for at least an hour every morning.
However, the challenge is remaining present while living my everyday life despite all the pressures it provides. How can I treat my mind as a mirror? Savouring small bouts of happiness instead of saving them.
Awareness helps. But so does practice. I’ve got to battle my 11-year-old, who still lives in me. To explain to him that control up to a point becomes unnecessary and, instead, letting go is the key to happiness.
I’ve now made it a point to write at least one win every morning, no matter how small. For example, in the past week, I took a few minutes to appreciate how Hemingway introduced a new writing method in The Sun Also Rises. The early morning workout focused on my legs on Tuesday, which left me feeling the testosterone rise in my body.
Then there was having a Kanafeh sandwich—a traditional dessert(to be eaten at breakfast) made with fine semolina dough, soaked in sweet, sugar-based syrup, and typically layered with cheese, all fitted into a Lebanese street “Kaak” bread.
I’ve set up our company meetings to start with the week’s wins. I’ve also asked people around to remind me to celebrate my successes constantly.
The more I celebrate my wins, the less control I’d deem necessary.
Enjoying, savouring, and dwelling in my joyful moments is what I hope to do.
What other ways can we celebrate our wins and let go of our analysing mind?