Practicing Contentment

I wrote this originally in October of 2012. I had been let go since July, and had just spent 2 months traveling. What I saw during my travels made me realize exactly how lucky I am. Though I was still unemployed, and I had badly sprained my foot, I was at a really happy place, and this was the collection of my thoughts...

My home town

Have you ever experience that feeling of unease, restlessness, that sense of dissatisfaction like you are not yet where you want to be even though you might not know where that destination is? Or maybe it’s a void, a feeling of emptiness, a lack of something you think you should have but not yet possess? So you do more, buy more, push yourself further hoping this feeling would go away, and maybe it does for a little while, but eventually, it sneaks back into your life.

Many of us are raised to strive for external validation and “success” in society’s view. Some may even work mostly on creating and maintaining a superior image so they can show the world that they are worthy of life and has demonstrated so with their glamorous appearance. I believe the initial intention of this way of thinking is a positive one; one that encourages people to be better and ultimately lead to a happy and fulfilling life. However, for many of us modern urban beings, when we try to apply this, the negative counterpart of this positive intention manifests itself more often than not.

When am I enough

Striving for excellence, or wanting more in life, has 2 sides. One is the positive side that encourages hard work, diligence, and the betterment of oneself. The negative side takes away our happiness and emphasizes on the “lack of” success before a goal is achieved. Once this pattern of thinking is established, regardless of our past or current achievements we become happy only when we arrive at the destination, the goal, or what I call the peak. But that moment of success eventually fades away, whether it lasts for 5 minutes or 2 weeks depends on the individual, but once the feeling ends we sink back into dissatisfaction until another peak is conquered.

Many of us don’t even realize how much modern society promotes this way of thinking. We are bombarded by other people’s values like “you will finally be beautiful when you get this dress”, “you will finally be worthy of love when you lose 30 more pounds”, or “you will finally deserve to be happy when you escape to that tropical destination”. And people work like mice on a wheel, chain themselves up like slaves until they reach their annual vacation and can finally live the life they deserve. But they don’t just live like humans then, they have to live like kings and queens so they make up for the 48 weeks of slavery they’ve endured all year. They’ve worked hard at it and they did a lot more than other people around them, so surely they must deserve the happiness this extreme lifestyle brings them right?

Doing more is not the solution

The truth is, happiness is not something we can gain by externally achieving an arbitrary goal (especially by society’s standards). Happiness is and has always been within us; it is who we are. However, understanding this theoretically is far from effectively applying it to our every thought. Most of us have a self-protective mechanism that serves us when we are in danger and prevents the same threat from happening again. Our subconscious picks up the slightest movements and dictates what lessons we ought to learn and what to discard. This protective mechanism is loyal, but if we have been living in too much fear and worry, this mechanism could have been hyper active and have imprinted too many warnings that no longer serve us.

Thinking we need to have accomplished something to be worthy of happiness can be a difficult habit to break, and that’s why we need to practice contentment, because for many of us, being content simply doesn’t come as naturally as being discontent.

Keep practicing, all is coming

You’ve heard of this before, but here it is again, the key to contentment lies in gratitude. When we focus on the things we do have instead of the things we don’t, we open ourselves up to the wealth that already is. There is literally no downside to this mentality, because if being happy about all that we have fulfills us already, all there is to come in the future, is more abundance. Keeping a positive attitude also improves productivity, besides, if all you have now is already enough, maybe savoring it is what you need to do next.

Focusing on internal satisfaction will also lessen the ups and downs external rewards (or lack of them) bring us. Unlike external gains, internal satisfaction is not a destination but an existing state that requires only awareness. So stop comparing yourself to others, the grass will always look greener on the other side, but no matter whether you really have more than the other person or if they have more than you, focus on you, just you. After all, you are the only person you have any control over, the number 1 person on your team, and the most important cast in your movie.

As with most things in life, there are no short cuts. Practice is the best way to implement this new habit into your life. Grab every chance you can find, and remind yourself when it’s most difficult to be content and in time, you will notice that the drama around you no longer have as much of an effect on your happiness and eventually, inner peace will blossom.