By Wes Annac, Culture of Awareness

If you think about it, the way we seek happiness as a society seems counterproductive. We rush around every day to earn a living, and in doing so, we never give ourselves any time for the pursuit of actual happiness, contentment or inner peace.

The busy, hurried nature of life causes us to seek happiness in shallow external things that only satisfy us for a short time before failing to meet our growing material hunger, and this causes us to crave more and more external stimulation as we gradually lose touch with our essence.

Anyone can temporarily lose touch with it, even spiritual seekers, and if we aren’t careful and we don’t diligently watch our thoughts and habits each day, we could fall into the trap and start relying on material things for happiness like everyone else.

Very quietly, peacefully and gently the raging inside will subside……..then one day soon, you will wonder what all the raging was for. I can tell you; to get you to this very moment in time. ~ Creator

Happiness is the greatest pursuit of life.  Some people want their dream job, others want to find their soul mate, but in reality, we are all just searching for happiness and joy.  Without happiness (or at least the hope of happiness), life almost becomes meaningless.  Here is the truth about happiness:

The number 1 thing preventing people from living truly happy lives comes down to their belief about what happiness actually is.  When you have the wrong idea about what happiness is, you will end up spending your whole life either looking for something in the wrong place or looking for something which never even existed to begin with.

Let’s go over some common false beliefs about happiness.  Here are 3 false beliefs that sabotage the happiness of many:

Give yourself a break. You may tend to be hard on yourself, too hard. You may tend to be a tyrant to yourself. To your expendable self, I hear you crack your whip and say:

“More more. Deliver more. Even if you have exceeded all my expectations, I will you to do better. And, then, when you do better, I will whip you to go even faster in order to prove something unprovable. What a hard taskmaster am I. I am insatiable. I will work you to the bone. I assign myself to illegal servitude.

“Maybe I am trying to prove to God that I am the hardest worker of all. Maybe I know only effort and strain. Maybe I think I’m not worth anything else unless I give and give. Maybe I think that to rest on the Sabbath is not for me. I certainly don’t seem to allow myself to both work and relax while I’m at it. I wouldn’t treat a horse the way I treat myself. I’m not even half so generous to myself as I would be to a horse.

“I would whisper sweet nothings in his ear. I would feed him the very best of the best, and I would make sure he has rest and does not work too hard.

“So what am I to myself? What kind of servitude have I sentenced myself to? What am I trying to run away from? What keeps me back from setting myself free? When is enough? When will I have earned my freedom?

“Why would I compel myself to overdo, as if whatever I do or how much I do cannot be enough? What have I done to myself, and why would I? Why do I set my expectations so impossibly high?

What is an empath?

Being an empath is when you are affected by other people’s energies, and have an innate ability to intuitively feel and perceive others. Your life is unconsciously influenced by others’ desires, wishes, thoughts, and moods. Being an empath is much more than being highly sensitive and it’s not just limited to emotions.; Empaths can perceive physical sensitivities and spiritual urges, as well as just knowing the motivations and intentions of other people. You either are an empath or you aren’t. It’s not a trait that is learned. You are always open, so to speak, to process other people’s feelings and energy, which means that you really feel, and in many cases take on the emotions of others. Many empaths experience things like chronic fatigue, environmental sensitivities, or unexplained aches and pains daily.; These are all things that are more likely to be contributed to outside influences and not so much yourself at all.  Essentially you are walking around in this world with all of the accumulated karma, emotions, and energy from others.

“How people treat other people is a direct reflection of how they feel about themselves.” ~Paul Coelho

By nature, I am a happy, optimistic, idealistic person. I have always been one to look on the bright side and see the good in people. My usual philosophy in life is that the world is full of brightness, love, and possibilities to seize.

Recently, though, my philosophy began to fade in the face of a mild depression.

I began to cry a lot and retreat into myself rather than being social and opening up, which only furthered the problem. I felt alone, miserable, and, try as I might, I could not regain that feeling of the world being beautiful.

I felt like something had crawled into my brain and flipped all the positive switches off and the negative ones on. I felt hopeless, like it was more of a disease than a feeling.

Before the depression, I was a kind, gentle, and compassionate person. Sometimes I was even toogentle, afraid to bring up anything that might offend someone else or damage our relationship.