A concept of Happiness

Happiness and pleasure are among the main regulators of human activity. Their basic form acts as an emotional tone of sensations representing genetically caused experiences of a hedonist sign accompanying vital impressions. The other form of these emotions includes the affects representing very strong emotional experiences connected with an active behavior. Happiness is usually experienced by people at three ascending levels: corporal pleasure, mental well-being, and love to God. The Greek philosophers tried to find the basis of moral in person’s aspiration to happiness. The ethical systems starting from the beginning of happiness are called eudemonic. There are several of them:
1) The Aristae’s hedonism considering happiness as sensual pleasures.
2) Epicurism attaching both refined intellectual and esthetic pleasures.
3) Happiness in abstention from passions, absence of sufferings and in virtues.
4) The Christian concept about happiness in life and imitation to the Christ.
5) Happiness in harmony of individual and social requirements of “the happiness of a great number of people,” according to the Utilitarian doctrines.

Happiness is a concept of moral consciousness designating a human state which corresponds to the greatest internal satisfaction with life conditions, completeness and intelligence of life, realization of human predestination. Happiness is a sensual-emotional form of an ideal. The concept of happiness not only simply characterizes a certain definite objective position or a subjective condition of a person, but also expresses the representations about what human life should be and a pleasure for him is. Therefore, the concept of happiness has a standard-valuable character. The concept of happiness is understood depending on how the sense and predestination of human life is considered. Happiness is a feeling and condition of full, higher satisfaction, recognition of internal satisfaction with life, well-being, good luck, and quality of life.

Happiness radically differs from pleasures. If pleasures occur from things which satisfy the feelings, happiness can arise even from unpleasant experiences. A woman, who wish to try happiness of motherhood, at first passes through patrimonial torments, and then, charges herself with a long and exhausting responsibility of upbringing of children. A man feels weariness and a work pain in order to provide his family with everything necessary. In order to receive pleasure from life and to be happy, a person should be capable of having a deep love to God and combining harmony and serenity in a soul.

From the scientific point of view, happiness phenomenon is based, first of all, on strong positive emotions, high spirits and pleasure. Happiness is unusually pleasant, strong spiritual experience, lasting long time; it is a state of mind. People wrongly believe that we can change an absence of happiness with pleasures. According to my personal experience, happiness is extremely individual and variable: there are a lot of various reasons, including even opposite ones, to become happy.

There are many stages in person’s life. We study, work, fall in love, build relationships and support our interfamily relations of several generations. However, the classical model of a life circle for men is “youth - adolescence - family life - later adulthood.” Each stage of human development depends on many factors. The development of a human being and passage of various vital stages, cycles, passes only in strict correspondence with his life priorities, and his age psychology - reflection of his hopes and expectations. A person has some such “special” periods which have accurately enough contoured boundaries. One of such special periods was the period of my happiness, which has been lasting for more than two years.

It happened on July 20, 2010. I had to go through 2 weeks of university practice, but I did not attend it. I said my parents that I would work, but I went to the countryside cottage of our family and had a good rest there. I was lying in bed, sunbathing, and reading interesting books. I did it in absolute loneliness. When I finished reading books that are not worth mentioning, I came across a book about meditation. The only feeling that came to my mind at that time was that it could not catch my interest and I would just read two-three pages and my meditation experience would finish at last.

Having started reading the book, I realized that it was getting more and more interesting for me, and after an hour or two of my readings (later it turned out that I had been reading for at least 5 hours), I got to know that the book described 112 meditation techniques. As I had no choice of possible pastime activities, I decided to try several of them. Later, a thought about silliness of my activity came to my mind and I was about to stop that madness, but suddenly a strange feeling of pleasant sensations came to me and I never wanted to seize it. It was so captivating that I could not even imagine the rest of my life without that strange feeling of entire happiness which was going to obsess me.

Later I understood that there were several human states: when a person is a body (when you want to entertain, to relax, to live for the body), when he is a mind (when you want to achieve, earn, strive for something). However, there is another state when there are no thoughts at all, when you are neither a body nor a mind, but you do not think of anything, you have no thoughts at all. The feeling when there were no thoughts lasted for 20 minutes and I was stuck sitting and even being afraid to breath in order not to lose the feeling of absolute happiness and novelty. When the ability to think came back to me I understood that I wanted to repeat the feeling of absolute euphoria. In that state I could not think, my thoughts left me. Gazing at the surrounding objects, I looked as if inside them, and everything consisted of only euphoria including a watch, water, cars, people etc. In order to understand what it was, I continued reading the book and soon I understood that it was meditation. The only thing that made me happy was euphoria in surrounding objects. I came home and back in order to understand that this euphoria is everywhere. The usual objects looked in a different way, as if without thoughts.

Approximately a month later I was bored with that experience of meditation, the euphoria was the same each time, it did not give me bright feelings, there was no money and I decided to go to work. I lived a usual life for a month or so, but I was sometimes dissatisfied with my life. Later I read that it was necessary to meditate not only in the state of joy but also in the state of anger. When I was angry at work, I started meditating. It was so bright, captivating and beyond human abilities that I became absolutely happy as though I did not have any problems. I felt the feeling of the center in my solar plexus. Immediately I got to know that this meditation technique is known as the “cyclone center.” I was static and calm; I was the center, and everything was going around me. Whatever my body was doing and thinking, my body remained the center.

The feeling of happiness was so strong that I was lying in bed for the next two days. I did not want to lose that feeling. I understood that I was absolutely happy, and that it was forever and that nobody can steal it or take it from me. It is impossible to forget it whatever happened. Even if you die, you will always be the center, you will always be happy. Thus, I learnt how to be happy and have been happy since then.

It was January 25, 2012; I was going to apply for a new job. Travelling by train, I was thinking over my experience of meditation and caught myself on the thought that I was meditating again. I was gazing at the seats and suddenly a flow of love began pouring out of them. I had understood at once that it was love, later loved poured out of the whole carriage and out of me. In several minutes, I get off the train and noticed that everything was in love: trees, buildings, people, land, everything. Love was pouring everywhere. At that time, I realized that a new feeling of love entered my life.

I understood that I became the meditation myself and opened a new feeling in me. Love was an overwhelming and very obsessing feeling. I began thinking that it always existed in my life and was happy to realize that I could love everybody and everything. Thus, a new stage of life, my wise adulthood, began. I understood that I can do much in this life and much is in my powers. Since that time, I have been meditating for 16 hours per day, and an overwhelming feeling of happiness captured me. Everything around me seemed very beautiful and wonderful. I wanted to love and be loved. Soon, I realized that I need to love somebody. I started gazing at the faces of people passing by and, soon I had a definite image of a man I want to love. Later on, my experience of meditation progressed, and soon I felt more sophisticated in meditation and ready to love.

Love cannot help coming. It was the beginning of August. Warm days of sunny summer made me feel even happier than before. I was sunbathing at the seaside and once I saw a young man of unique beauty. I felt that I wanted to be with him. Some months later, we lived together and practiced meditation together. We were absolutely happy loving each other and our experience of meditation. I want this feeling to last as long as possible as I am happy and I would also like to share my experience of happiness with everybody in this world.

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