The Path to True Contentment: Embracing Unconditional Happiness

The Threefold Nature of Happiness

To navigate the path to true contentment, it is essential to discern the three basic types of happiness:

Physical Pleasure: Derived from sensory experiences, this form of happiness is fleeting and often leads to a cycle of desire and fulfillment.

Mental-Emotional Joy: Stemming from achievements and altruistic deeds, this form of happiness has a more extended duration.

Soul's Bliss: This is the innate, unconditional joy of the soul, untouched by external circumstances. It is accessed through spiritual practices and a life aligned with higher purpose.

It is worth noting that realization of contentment (leading to supreme happiness) is among the top ten virtues cultivated on the Kriya Yoga spiritual path. It’s right up there with nonviolence and truthfulness and nonstealing. Why should it be so important?

The first, simple answer is that it calms the mind, allowing the soul light to shine through, providing access to higher wisdom or inner guidance.

The second answer is that true contentment requires us to release the ego-based identification of ordinary states of consciousness and instead live from the awareness of our essential spiritual nature.

Why wouldn’t we want contentment and supreme happiness?

While it is easy enough to discern that all beings want to be happy and want to avoid suffering, many, if not most, people want happiness but are committed to suffering. I know it sounds unreasonable, but it is a pervasive tendency. I have seen it in myself and countless others.

The soul, our essence of being, is unconditionally, supremely happy. We are innately inclined to realize that happiness. But we don’t know where it exists or how to look for it. Add to that the existence of what Paramahansa Yogananda called the “pseudo-soul.” It is the false self or ego, the function of the mind, that pretends to own and control experience. Thus, the ego puts itself forth as the owner and controller of the happiness we seek. But ego can’t attain the unconditional happiness of the soul because it is beyond the reach of the ego (which is a mental function). The ego can only perpetually attempt to find happiness. That never-ending search for happiness becomes an ongoing commitment to unhappiness.

Ego is based on the false assertion that we are separate from the Source. That erroneous claim of separate existence can obstruct our knowledge and realization of wholeness. Without the fundamental knowledge and experience of wholeness, something is always missing. That is the prop of ego. There is always something missing, something wrong or not enough, not quite it, or unsatisfactory. If we don’t recognize this tendency as the way of ego, we can spend our life looking for happiness that we will never find with that instrument or from that perspective.

Wholeness is the basis of unconditional happiness. Once we see through the unrelenting pattern of ego’s commitment to suffering, we can decide to be content and discern how to do it. Until then, there are a thousand reasons not to be happy. We can find new ones every day—the world, our suffering, the suffering of others, our families, our bodies, or other people.