Read Summary of '''[[Happiness Summary|Happiness]]'''
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=What is Happiness?=
Happiness is a condition of gladness, sense of inner ease and welfare, contentment, a sunlit life—it is more quiet in its nature than joy and delight.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/peace#p58</ref>
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Happy heart: smiling, peaceful, wide open, without a shadow
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/happiness#p1</ref>
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The Divine is the unalloyed happiness, the blissful felicity, but this felicity is perfect only when it is integral.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/the-divine-is-with-you#p61</ref>
==Types of Happiness==
===Ordinary (Superficial) Happiness===
Happiness in the ordinary sense is a sunlit state of the vital with or without cause.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/cheerfulness-and-happiness#p15</ref>
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Ordinary happiness is of vital origin; it is impure and depends on circumstances.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/17/18-november-1933#p3</ref>
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...[For a happy and comfortable life] most people would always choose the same thing. Generally speaking, the most common ideal is to be born in an environment comfortable enough to avoid too many difficulties in life, to marry someone who won't give you too much trouble, to have healthy children who grow up normally—again to avoid trouble—and then a quiet and happy old age, and not be too ill, again to avoid trouble. And then to pass away when one is tired of life, again because one does not want any trouble.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/8-february-1956#p34</ref>
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[Superficial] Happiness and success bringing happiness are, no doubt, a legitimate demand of humanity; it is an attempt of life and matter to catch a pale reflection or a gross image of felicity…
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/22/rebirth-and-other-worlds-karma-the-soul-and-immortality#p24</ref>
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Generally in this world as we see it, what is happy for one is unhappy for another; what is happy in one case is unhappy in another, and that too is an expression of disorder. I don't say that necessarily it is a chance occurrence which makes you unhappy, I say that it does not correspond to the order of truths, which is very different.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/14-may-1951#p4</ref>
===Spiritual (Inner/ Divine/ Real/ True) Happiness===
Spiritual happiness: calm and smiling, nothing can disturb it.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/happiness#p23</ref>
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Real happiness is of divine origin; it is pure and unconditioned.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/17/18-november-1933#p3</ref>
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Spiritual joy or a deep inner happiness (not disturbed even when there come superficial storms or perturbations) is a constant concomitant of contact or union with the Divine,
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/the-lower-vital-being#p54</ref>
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It is a fact that this inner gladness and happiness is something peaceful and happy at once—it is not an excited movement like the vital outward pleasure, though it can be more ardent and intense.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/the-inward-movement#p47</ref>
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There is a quietude and happiness which you can find by living in yourself in contact with the Divine which you will never get from outside.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/interactions-with-others-and-the-practice-of-yoga#p16</ref>
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Indeed, true happiness is the happiness one can feel in any circumstances whatsoever, because it comes from regions which cannot be affected by any external circumstances. But this happiness is accessible to a very few individuals, and most of the human race is still subject to terrestrial conditions. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/12/helping-humanity#p10</ref>
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...as the Gita describes it, antaḥ-sukho antarārāmaḥ, an exceeding inner happiness, brahmasaṁsparśam atyantaṁ sukham aśnute. Nothing can disturb it, and it extends itself to the soul's view of outward things, imposes on them too the law of this quiet spiritual joy. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-action-of-equality#p7</ref>
==General Notions about Happiness==
Happiness is not the aim of life.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/the-true-aim-of-life#p50</ref>
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It is not in order to be happy that we are upon earth… <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/the-true-aim-of-life#p53</ref>
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…superficial happiness and material success, however desirable to our vital nature, are not the main object of our existence.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/22/rebirth-and-other-worlds-karma-the-soul-and-immortality#p24</ref>
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In the world, as it is, the goal of life is not to secure personal happiness, but to awaken the individual progressively towards the truth-consciousness.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/the-true-aim-of-life#p52</ref>
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The aim of human life is to discover the Divine and to manifest it. Naturally this discovery leads to happiness; but this happiness is a consequence, not an aim in itself. And it is this mistake of taking a mere consequence for aim of life that has been the cause of most of the miseries which are afflicting human life.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/12/the-new-age-association#p105</ref>
==Happiness in Different Parts of the Being==
An aspiration, a demand for the supreme and total delight of existence is there secretly in the whole make of our being… In the body consciousness this demand takes shape as a need of bodily happiness, in our life parts as a yearning for life happiness, a keen vibrant response to joy and rapture of many kinds and to all surprise of satisfaction; in the mind it shapes into a ready reception of all forms of mental delight; on a higher level it becomes apparent in the spiritual mind's call for peace and divine ecstasy.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/22/the-gnostic-being#p26</ref>
===Physical===
By the "Physical" I mean the physical consciousness, the most ordinary outward-going consciousness, the normal consciousness of most human beings, which sets such great store by comfort, good food, good clothes, happy relationships, etc., instead of aspiring for the higher things.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/aspiration-in-the-physical-for-the-divines-love#p1</ref>
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...what it [the body-consciousness] craves for is duration, health, strength, physical perfection, bodily happiness, liberation from suffering, ease. These demands are not in themselves unacceptable, mean or illegitimate, for they render into the terms of Matter the perfection of form and substance, the power and delight which should be the natural outflowing, the expressive manifestation of the Spirit.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/22/the-gnostic-being#p24</ref>
===Vital===
Below the navel is the lower vital plane, which is ignorant and obscure, the seat of small desires, greeds, passions and enjoyments.
<ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/28/the-vital-being-and-vital-consciousness#p36</ref>
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...happiness and good fortune are what the lower part of our vital being most desires, misfortune and suffering what it most hates and dreads… <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/22/rebirth-and-other-worlds-karma-the-soul-and-immortality#p22</ref>
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It is the vital which asks and asks and is never satisfied.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/16/letters-to-a-young-sadhak-iv#p19</ref>
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The human vital is almost always of that nature [full of desires and fancies], but that is no reason why one should accept it as an unchangeable fact and allow a restless vital to drive one as it likes. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/the-nature-of-the-vital#p23</ref>
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In all that is developed by the life-force there is developed at the same time a secret delight somewhere in the being, a delight in good and a delight in evil, a delight in truth and a delight in falsehood, a delight in life and an attraction to death, a delight in pleasure and a delight in pain, in one's own suffering and the suffering of others, but also in one's own joy and happiness and good and the joy and happiness and good of others. For the force of life-affirmation affirms alike the good and the evil… in all its acts there is the same passion for life-affirmation, the same force of action and fulfilment. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/the-origin-and-remedy-of-falsehood-error-wrong-and-evil#p27</ref>
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Indeed, the vital in man's nature is a despotic and exacting tyrant. Moreover, since it is the vital which holds power, energy, enthusiasm, effective dynamism, many have a feeling of timorous respect for it and always try to please it. But it is a master that nothing can satisfy and its demands are without limit. Two ideas which are very wide-spread, especially in the West, contribute towards making its domination more sovereign. One is that the chief aim of life is to be happy; the other that one is born with a certain character and that it is impossible to change it.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/12/vital-education#p2</ref>
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It [the vital] is a very good worker, it works very, very well, but in working it seeks always its own satisfaction, it wants to get something from the work, all the pleasure that can be drawn from it, all the advantage that can be had, and when this satisfaction is not given for one reason or another (there may be many reasons), it is not happy, not at all happy...then it sulks, it does not move, it keeps mum, and at times it says, "I do not exist." Then all energy runs out from the body, you get tired, exhausted, you can no longer do anything. And all of a sudden this becomes worse, for I must tell you that the mind is very friendly with the vital—not the reasoning mind but the physical mind is very, very friendly with the vital; so, as soon as the vital begins to say, "I have nothing to do with that, I have been badly treated, I won't have anything to do with it", the mind naturally comes in to encourage it, to explain, give good reasons, and it is the same old story: "Life is not worth living, people are truly disgusting and all circumstances are against me, it is better to leave it all", and so on.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/25-january-1951#p7</ref>
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It is the physical vital that seeks after happiness, the bigger vital is ready to sacrifice it in order to satisfy its passions, search for power, ambition, fame or any other motive. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/28/the-vital-being-and-vital-consciousness#p39</ref>
===Mental===
When you are doing a thing, always those two, the mind and the vital are there, trying to draw some benefit or other out of what you are doing: the benefit of personal satisfaction, the benefit of happiness, the benefit of a good opinion that you have of yourself. It is difficult not to deceive oneself.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/20-may-1953#p16</ref>
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...when the mind sees one thing here, another thing there, yet a third elsewhere, this is very unpleasant for it. It fills up the holes, it says, "This leads to that", "That is the cause of this", and so on, and the mind is very happy because this is logical. What the mind adds in between the points of the vision may happen, by chance, to be true, but it may also be false.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/15-february-1951#p15</ref>
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Vital mind proper is a sort of mediator between vital emotion, desire, impulsion etc. and the mental proper. It expresses the desires, feelings, emotions, passions, ambitions, possessive and active tendencies of the vital and throws them into mental forms (the pure imaginations or dreams of greatness, happiness etc. in which men indulge are one peculiar form of the vital mind activity). There is a still lower stage of the mental in the vital which merely expresses the vital stuff without subjecting it to any play of intelligence. It is through this mental vital that the vital passions, impulses, desires rise up and get into the Buddhi and either cloud or distort it.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/28/the-mind#p44</ref>
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...the mind as well as the larger vital is not bound by the pursuit of happiness. It can seek Truth rather or the victory of a cause.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/28/the-vital-being-and-vital-consciousness#p39</ref>
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We can just conceive of a positive or absolute realisation of happiness, because the heart to which that instinct for happiness belongs has its own form of certitude, is capable of faith, and because our minds can envisage the elimination of unsatisfied want which is the apparent cause of suffering.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/the-ego-and-the-dualities#p9</ref>
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The Buddha taught that if you are free from desire, things that seemed to you unfortunate would no longer seem to you unfortunate at all. Therefore, we come to this: it is the thought you have about it which makes you consider this or that thing unfortunate. If you thought an event happy, it would become happy for you; and that is what it is, in fact. In most cases when the thought has accepted that a thing ought to be, for whatever reason, it is no longer unhappy; when the thought has not accepted this, it finds this unhappy. So, as long as you are in the field of emotions, of sentiments and thoughts, all this is true. That is, the notion of "unhappiness" has entered the world with the capacity to consider that things were unfortunate.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/7-april-1951#p51</ref>
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The mind in its higher part is aware of being one with the Divine, in all ways, in all things—having that supreme knowledge, it is not disturbed by its own ignorance and impotence in its lower instrumental parts; it looks on all that with a smile and remains happy and luminous with the light of the supreme knowledge.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/thought-and-knowledge#p43</ref>
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Our gain in becoming more perfect mental beings is that we get to the possibility of a subtler, higher and wider existence, consciousness, force, happiness and delight of being; in proportion as we rise in the scale of mind, a greater power of these things comes to us: our mental consciousness acquires for itself at the same time more vision and power and more subtlety and plasticity, and we are able to embrace more of the vital and physical existence itself, to know it better, to use it better, to give it nobler values, a broader range, a more sublimated action…
<ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/22/out-of-the-sevenfold-ignorance-towards-the-sevenfold-knowledge#p5</ref>
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...on the spiritual-mind plane: there the first ecstasy felt is indeed a spiritual rapture, but it can be and is very usually mingled with a supreme happiness of the vital parts taken up by the spirit; there is an exaltation, exultation, excitement, a highest intensity of the joy of the heart and the pure inner soul-sensation that can be a splendid passage or an uplifting force but is not the ultimate permanent foundation.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/22/the-gnostic-being#p27</ref>
===Psychic===
Love, joy and happiness come from the psychic.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/28/the-psychic-being#p21</ref>
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In the psychic is the source of constant happiness.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/the-soul-the-psychic#p86</ref>
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It is the inner being which has the inner happiness, the calm and quiet, the silence free from any ripple of thought.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/the-inward-movement#p84</ref>
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The psychic, the true deep feelings are always satisfied and never ask for anything. The psychic feels my constant presence, is aware of my love and solicitude, and is always peaceful, happy and satisfied.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/16/letters-to-a-young-sadhak-iv#p19</ref>
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It is not the psychic being that suffers for personal reasons, it is the mind, the vital and the ordinary consciousness of ignorant man. This is because the contact between the outer consciousness and the psychic consciousness is not well established. He in whom the contact has been well established is always happy.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/the-soul-the-psychic#p56</ref>
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It is usually the habit of the mind and vital to associate happiness or interest only with activity, but the spiritual consciousness has no such limitations.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/emptiness-voidness-blankness-and-silence#p27</ref>
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When the vital being has been touched by the psychic, mere vital pleasure has no longer any interest, and may also be felt as a disturbance and discomfort because of the lowering effect upon the consciousness. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/the-vital-and-other-levels-of-being#p20</ref>
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It does not matter at all how it came about; the fact is not only there, it [the soul] determines our whole existence, it is the one fact which is really important to us as human beings with a will and an intelligence and a subjective existence which makes all our happiness and our suffering. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/the-soul-and-nature#p4</ref>
==Happiness in Relation to Other Qualities==
===Contentment===
Contentment is less than happiness—joy of peace or being free from difficulty is rather a state of joyful śānti. Happiness ought not to be a state of self-satisfaction or inertia, and need not be, for one can combine happiness and aspiration. Of course there can be a state of happy inertia, but most people don't remain satisfied with that long, they begin to want something else. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/cheerfulness-and-happiness#p15</ref>
===Peace===
Peace is always something positive bringing not merely a release as calm does but a certain happiness or Ananda of itself.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/peace#p2</ref>
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The happiness of this peace is far greater than anything outer objects can bring—there can be no comparison. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/peace#p5</ref>
===Delight===
...there is a state of consciousness in which each one is happy to be, just as it is. So at that moment one knows one has touched true Delight. And it is not conditioned... it is a communion with the raison d'être of the universe. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/23-january-1957#p19</ref>
===Ananda===
Ananda and the spiritual happiness which precedes it (adhyātma-sukham) are something quite different from joys and pleasures.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/the-lower-vital-being#p50</ref>
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In Ananda there is no excitement, it is a calm and happy and intense spiritual state or spiritual movement. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/peace#p62</ref>
=Why is Happiness Important?=