Why you need to seek ‘growth’ instead of ‘happiness’.

What has been the best moment of your life?

I asked myself this question, and the answer was very interesting.

I could think of many happy and exciting events and times that took place in past 24 years. But I couldn’t figure out, how to define the best moment. Is it the one when you felt the highest intensity of happiness, joy, love, excitement..all those positive feelings? Or just your most successful moments?

I didn’t know.

But I quickly came to this idea that that is all past. And the feelings are tied only to that certain period of time. Therefore I couldn’t define any best moment. Nor could I think of any best future moments. Because whatever I can imagine and achieve will be limited to that time. And after some time the intensity of that moment will fade away. 

When you consider your happiest moment as your best moment in life, you are under illusion. For in that moment, you were taken over by an emotion. No matter how positive and how great a feeling, it was your master. Being overwhelmed by happiness is no different than being taken over by anger, or depression or any other negative state of mind. Positive emotions certainly have their benifits, and really great benifits. But your happiest moments are not always the best moments.

I think the best moment of your life is the one when you demonstrated control and will over something that was very tempting. The moment when you did not let your emotions and thoughts rule you into doing something that you actually did not want to do. Each time you do this, it makes you feel stronger and more in control of your life. Your happiest and most joyous memories will fade through time, but such actions of self-discipline accumulates. They are the insignificant best moments of your life that will take you a step further to becoming someone who can command the mind rather than being commanded by it. That is probably the only goal humans need.

I consider that this realization of being able to notice how moments come and go is the best thing that happened to me. It did not come suddenly in one moment. It took some years of contemplation on life, and one day life became easier. 

So obvious is the fact that everything comes and goes. And yet we fail to realise that and Chase fantasy moments thinking that they will last forever.

Not to say that we should not have desires. Our minds function best when we have a desire. It is a great force that directs a mind to accomplish. Nothing beyond limits can be reached without a mind desiring it. But We must know when the desire is getting out of control and creating its own life-force that can destroy the balance that needs to be maintained in life.

A desire should be a pet, and a will needs to always watch it and tame it to make the best out of it.

The question led me to the idea that we should not be seeking happy moments. We should seek the growth. And the growth is not in happiness, but in the exercise of a will, and the control of the most powerful tool in the world, your mind.