Happiness is now or never

If life is in the present moment, where else could happiness be found but in the present? It is as simple as this. However, most of us keep searching for happiness all our lives. We read books, attend courses, join laughing clubs, take vacations to exotic places, indulge in delicious food, seek variety of entertainment, amass wealth, or take refuge in a sanctum. However, all we get are the fleeting moments of so-called happiness. Unbroken happiness remains a mirage.

The definition of happiness is varied as expressed by different people. Indeed, everyone holds his/her own definition of happiness. The common denominator of these definitions, however, is an external source of happiness. We believe that we will be happy when we get a certain object, being, environment, position, or recognition. However, those who have achieved all of these, sadly realise that their search for happiness is not over. There seems to be a fundamental flaw in defining happiness. Our so-called happiness is subject to various conditions, often external and beyond our control.

We must realise that happiness is a state of mind when there are no thoughts. We experience temporary happiness upon getting our desired object because at that moment, having satiated the desire, our mind becomes devoid of thoughts. But, soon thereafter, a thought of another desired object fills the void and the happiness is again lost.

If happiness resided in the previously desired object, it should have continued as that object is still with you. Thus we continue to ride the roller-coaster of fleeting happiness throughout our lives. Such happiness is directly proportional to the number of desires fulfilled and inversely proportional to the number of desires entertained, but not fulfilled.

Life exists only in the present moment. It is dead in the moment that has passed and is yet to be born in the future moment. The past moment will never return and the future moment will always appear as present moment. Hence, a real experience can only be in the present moment. But, to experience the present moment, one has to be aware of the present moment and be fully available for the experience. This is where we miserably fail.

We allow our minds to brood over past moments or be filled with future speculations and anxieties. As a result, although we are physically present in a given moment, our mind, being preoccupied with a variety of thoughts, is not ‘in’ that moment. How many times have we walked through a place without registering anything on the way? How many times have we attended a meeting or a seminar without actually listening to speakers? We mechanically pass through each moment. Life, therefore, is hardly lived, except in those rare moments when, by accident or coincidence, our mind is brought to the present moment. So, how can we consciously experience happiness in the present moment?

Every moment passes so swiftly that a mind concentrating on the moment cannot entertain any thought and hence experiences happiness. Thus, a mind which remains focused on every passing moment, enjoys unbroken happiness. But we are victims of our own old habits. We are so used to thinking about the past and the future that absence of a thought is unbearable. No doubt, it is a challenge to break this habit. But with persistent practice, it is achievable.

We may start by being watchful in simple tasks, such as sitting, walking, eating etc. In the beginning, we may not be able to keep our attention on the present task for long. The mind is sure to drift. But, whenever it returns to the present moment, thank yourself for making a dent in the old habit and resume unbiased observation. While walking, be aware of your body movements and the surroundings. While eating, enjoy the sight of different dishes, feel the heat, take in the aroma and slowly taste every bite. Even while doing nothing, simply be aware of incoming and outgoing breaths. Let this practice naturally grow without any guilt of missing the continuity. As it grows on you, happiness will ooze out of you. This is famously called ‘spontaneous living’.

This does not mean that we should not review our past actions for learning and should not plan for achieving a goal in the future. Indeed, even these activities can truly happen only in the present moment. While reviewing the past, pay full attention on analysing the events objectively, without letting the mind drift on the experiences associated with them. Similarly, while planning for the future, take stock of all the known things at that moment with full realisation that everything is subject to change and there is no need to be obsessed with what you have planned. There are many roads to a destination.

In conclusion, the present moment is the only door through which all possibilities and opportunities enter. We just have to be there. Someone has rightly said, “The best way to find happiness is not to search for it.”

"Safety First" is not merely a slogan

In the ancient time, there were only natural disasters. Now, we also have man-made crises. Natural disasters still happen, but their frequency and intensity lag far behind man-made catastrophes. Are we paying price of progress? Where did we go wrong?

The human mind is said to have no boundaries. Using this power, we have made astounding progress in the fields of science and technology. From ‘making fire by rubbing stones’ to ‘generating electricity through nuclear fission’, we have come a long way. We have harnessed natural powers to make our lives more comfortable and productive. However, this has not come free. Every technological advancement has come with its own inherent risks, which we claim to manage effectively. Modern cars are equipped with a load of safety features. Industrial plants are said to be built on fail-safe standards. We invest considerable amount of money in researching for the safest design. We study all the worst possible scenarios and claim to manage the risks as low as reasonably practicable through sophisticated safety systems. We develop stringent safety laws and standards. We set up enquiry commissions after every catastrophic incident and produce large volumes of investigation reports, which record pages after pages on the lessons learnt. But, are these lessons really learnt by human minds? Have we really stopped recurrence of similar failures?

It was scary to read the following statistics in a recent report published by KT:

• 3 people get killed on the road every minute,

• $ 3 trillion is the cost of road crashes every year, and

• 90% of road accidents happen due to human error.

Broad analysis of major industrial incidents also reveals that 90% of them can be attributed to the underlying safety culture at a facility making it acceptable for someone to ignore or bypass some critical step. Increased automation and loads of safety features seem to create a false sense of safety. Statistics have shown that more people die at pedestrian crossings than the ‘jay-walkers’, simply because people at pedestrian crossings often assume that vehicles would stop and hence become less alert. In a 1996 essay about the Challenger disaster, Malcolm Gladwell observed that “We have constructed a world in which the potential for high-tech catastrophe is embedded in the fabric of everyday life.” Having built systems with thousands of interacting components, we cannot possibly foresee all the ways they will behave under all circumstances, some of the circumstances themselves being unforeseeable.

Although we try to reduce inherent risks of any operation through safer design and/or operating procedure, human tendency is to consume this risk-reduction either by being aggressive in its usage or by being complacent with its false sense of safety. Higher the automation and sophistication, lower seems to be the human alertness. A machine can always be expected to perform as per its specifications. But, a human being cannot be expected to perform at its peak all the time. Emotions tend to greatly influence our actions. Even a competent person may fail under adverse emotions. While continuous training, knowledge-upgrade and competency assessments are important, taking care of emotional health is perhaps the most important factor in any safe operation. The human mind must remain motivated on the job. This, perhaps, is the single most critical responsibility of every team leader. A happy employee will always keep your clients happy.

We retain those lessons the longest, which we learnt through our own personal experiences. All other lessons we tend to forget after a short while, as our information-memory is short. This problem is further compounded by the lack of corporate memory due to which new employees often lack the benefits of lessons learnt by their predecessors. It is, therefore, necessary to convert such lessons in some form of personal experiences such as real-life simulations, rather than mere documented information. And, they should be repeated at regular intervals so as to become part of our spontaneous behaviours.

How we harness nature’s power is perhaps a more fundamental question. In ancient China, they say, when a master carpenter wanted to make a chair; he would go out to the forest asking which tree was willing to be cut for this purpose. The chair made out of such a tree lived for several decades without any degradation. Guiding a wild river from the mountains through barren lands spreads greenery and prosperity for generations. Consuming only those resources that we need for our day-to-day living would always leave enough resources for everybody on the earth. Nature likes to nurture harmony in everything. Any attempt to disturb this harmony will sooner or later result in serious backlash. Nature has strange ways of striking a balance.

Human intervention, however optimised, will always remain vital for any safe operation. Let “Safety First” not be a mere slogan. Next time, you step out to drive a car or operate a machine, check your emotion-meter for stability, expect the unexpected and pull out your attention-antenna all the way up.