happy

Nothing in the world can make us happy. Happiness is there in the intervals between attaining a desire and the dawning of a new one. It's inherent, only obscured by the very process of desiring itself. Happiness doesn't come from getting what we want, it comes when desiring is no longer there. If desiring is dropped, happiness can come. If not it remains an elusive potential, since the nature of desire is such that they arise endlessly, one after another, until finally understood and recognized as a mechanism of the mind.

If this isn't seen, focus will narrow upon object after object, situation after situation, relationship after relationship. Consuming attention and energy, creating endless cycles of pleasure and pain. Once understood, it can be seen and disengaged from, and thus arises choice.

Understanding that the pursuit of every desire will come with both pleasure and pain, as these two are interdependent poles which can't exist apart from the other, we can choose whether or not to pursue the desire which has arisen or to acknowledge and let it go. We can choose to remain choiceless. Receptive, accepting, flowing, allowing all to come and go as it will. Holding onto nothing, expecting nothing to make us happier than what we already have, and what we already are.

The rollercoaster highs and pleasures that pursuit and attainment can bring are sacrificed, since they're directly dependent and proportionate with the depths of the lows in their pursuit. But in exchange we can rest in peace, contentment and clarity. With choices that are always ours to make.