I feel like therapists often push the power of positivity rather than actually dealing with negative feelings. I found affirmations to just make me feel worse.
its such an up and down. And accepting even bad emotions is happyness. To tell myself its ok to be angry or sad. That is happyness for me. If I accept bad feelings I can also have the good ones
'Life is nice and there to be enjoyed.' A final response from a friend when talking about existential questions, like how to deal with all the suffering in the world, something like that. So it was what you mention, this goal of blindness to the dark things that are a huge part of reality. This supposedly upbeat, good boy response felt so rejecting, numbed and dead to me. Shortly before I head from a very different person 'When I was only positive and happy I felt like I was making a huge part of myself homeless.' It seemed so much more true and alive.
The majority of my life has not been happy. As far back as I can remember I was at least anxious and always had a sense of being unsettled due to growing up in such a toxic family environment. I had depression for many years. I was just thinking today of how much I grew and how healthy I got as I achieved more and more independence. I think my struggles made me a stronger person.
React to your thoughts and feelings with passion and try to understand them in order to be alive. Accepting your thoughts and feelings exist and do nothing about is a road to emotional dissociation that Daniel is talking about
@@elenabalyberdina2393 - I don’t think the two tactics have to be mutually exclusive. Plenty of meditators have done lots of therapy and self archaeology. At some point when you’ve understood and processed your past it’s then time to stop letting it define your life or impeding happiness. I find that’s most often the point that people who practice meditation are at in life, in my experience.
@@67NewEngland As long as they aren't using it to numb their feelings. My experience with meditators is this...and they have NOT done a deep grieving process. Once you do the feeling work, you don't really need something to quiet your thoughts. That's just my experience with it. I see people meditating and getting into so-called spirituality who have never re-experienced their original rage and grief on a deep level. I see it as dissociative, not healing. When you've done the feeling work and as you said "understood and processed your past"...there really isn't any need for meditation.
A life of meaning is better than aiming for happiness because you can’t maintain that but meaningful life can sustain you through periods of hardship or unhappiness
Whenever I do self-therapy I always try to think about how Daniel would deal with the situation. His honesty and openness about how to deal with the traumas of the past helps me immensely.
Being at peace with yourself feels to me like the goal, like that should be the state of idle. That natural peaceful curiosity that occupies the mind sorta like it does with kids. Emotions like happiness, sadness, fear and anger are all reactions to things.
Always here for a Daniel take. It's true that meditation - like any activity or spiritual practice - can be used to dissociate. For me, the goal is awakening and opening. And it's just another way to stay with and turn towards the discomfort that arises habitually. Insight meditation was foundational to IFS, not incidentally.
This was so refreshing to watch, Daniel. I tend to agree with the overall message, I feel like it's either paying the price of emotional awareness (and also enjoying the deep meaning that it brings to your life as you become more integrated) or dissociating by pushing down the scary/negative feelings, which results in being overly focused on superficial things that give you pleasure then ending up being all confused when anxiety/depression or both come and punch you in the face out of nowhere - the 'surprise attack' being a manifestation of the unresolved issues you've been ignoring for too long.
I think the goal of people like who you describe is to get along, survive, and make others believe they're happy. They've decided that's good enough, and they are convinced they are fooling everybody. A few can see through it.
Wow, intense video. Just had a conversation about happiness a few nights ago. I was you Daniel. The other person did not understand. So wow, this video came at great timing. You are such an interesting speaker too, thanks for your 'wild truths', I resonate with a lot of them it seems.
Like the way a flower's goal should be to be a good flower, making the world better simply by being what it is, a human should try to be the best expression of a human's potential and their own uniqueness. A human isn't whole and can't really be a good human when shutting down all emotions and dissociating. That's more like a robot. Society is a macrocosm of dissociating toxic families, trying to push down anyone who tells the truth, and trying to make everyone else fake their own happiness, so those in power never have to face their own true selves.
Modern society expects everyone to be good little robots operating in a giant heartless machine that isa capitalist economy that worships only one thing: money.
I can so relate to everything you are saying. Our world is sick. And those who are considered insane are probably mentally more healthy because at least they feel empathy and see injustice. I think jesus said something about us not being of this world - we must be in it but not accept it as it is. Keep doing your thing truth and justice warrior.
The goal of life is to achieve a happy life and not evade your unhappiness and just pretend that you are happy. You are confounding two different concepts.
The two best lines in the book: "It's not what I want out of life, it's what life wants out of me." "The Statue of Liberty on the East Coast should be supplemented with a Statue of Responsibility on the West Coast."
Traumatized people give a shit about other people. Your story about stopping the guy from beating up the old man struck a cord. I work in a hospital and I'm constantly told how caring and kind I am, which i feel should be the default for Healthcare workers!!! I am constantly angered by those who have been in Healthcare too long who seem to have deadened their natural empathy response as a survival tactic.
This is on point. I think a lot of this "happiness" is just wanting to not feel bad. Being comfortably numb, as lyrics in one of Pink Floyd's songs says.
Oh you hit this out of the park... The existential angst and confusion I feel being named Happy??!! Repress, deny, disown, drug, isolate- my life everytime I am at odds with my name. Which is a lot. This video was ripped from the recesses of my mind .
Yeah. Totally agree. I remember when I was doing an internship at a job training program for "psychologically ill" juveniles and I was grieving that I had been locked in my house for like half a year. I had figuered out after like 2 seconds being there that the so called "psychologically ill" juveniles were way more present than the supposedly healthy tainers there. (Not saying the juveniles weren´t troubled...) And so after 4 days the manager kicked me out telling me that basically he doesnt want depressed people (and immature people, cus I´m 21) to do an internship there. Yes. Well.... Quite ironically that now I won´t become a therapist any time soon and the dissociated trainers there, half of them are doing the therapist´s training and will probably be done all the sooner.
Hi Daniel, thanks so much for this video. I really like the idea that happiness is a possible by-product or side-effect, rather than a goal. I like to think about success in the same way.
I appreciate you so much. It seems you have retained such empathy despite the suffering you must have experienced to get to this point in life. That plus your unending self reflection: maybe that's the goal of life! Suffering, self reflection, retain empathy, repeat. Thank you for sharing. I'm out here listening.
Thank you Daniel 🙏🏼 in the times of war, genocide and crimes against humanity around the world and in our city of NYC this message helps very much. All love to you Daniel 💚 hope to see you out in the streets fighting for a free Palestine, Sudan, Congo and everyone else 🤍
I have heard this sentiment -- that happiness is not the goal of life -- in a few different ways, but I found Viktor Frankl's view on it to be the most interesting. In his book "Man's Search for Meaning" he argues that the true goal of life, the key to satisfaction is to find and fulfill one's own meaning (whatever it may be), that meaning is the most important aspect of the human experience to find (hence the book's title)
Maybe the goal of life should be to not have goals. For almost, every other species on this earth, their life's work is pretty basic: find enough to food to survive and find a mate to pass on their genes. They never once have to justify their existence and seek out a raison d'etre.
Why do I suffer? On the other side of that question is a freedom I am starting to catch brilliant glimpses of. Simply “letting go” things is a spiritual platitude and I agree that Buddhists seemed to be in a trance. It’s not my position to say that is wrong for them. I meditate but I don’t aim to be at peace and ease 24/7. The world is amazing yet we are, as humans, very lost and headed in very bizarre directions. To be truly human is to be thoroughly curious as to how and why I think, feel, and operate. That is my goal thus far on my journey.....that could change. “God” or “the spirit of the universe” (the name does not matter) has a sense of humor and is beyond our comprehension. This is only a blip in the life of my soul.
Thank you so much for addressing this.. for years decades I have been trying to figure out my unhappiness as people often called it. I mean people would tell me I am as happy as I make my mind to be., or that I need to believe in goodness and kindness of others when the predominant experiences in my life from my biological parents have been abuse, violence, brutality, neglect and abandonment. I don’t want to even begin telling you how my other relationships have been after I ran away from the abuse and neglect from my parents., you can deduct they were far from loving and caring. And for years I must have been suppressing the rage, anger and resentment towards those who abused me.! And now I am here listening to you tell me suppressing my most natural emotions and feelings is perhaps causing all that build up rage and misery ..!
okay.. I mean, joy is a state of being tho, I know that I might have some things that are not solved like to 100% that tho is not an excuse for me to hold back on being happy, being empathic and understanding people dose not mean that if someone is going show a difficult time then I'm not allowed to be happy because someone else is not, that is something I have believed for a long time, I was actually put down for being happy and people would tell me "how can you, after all that is happening around the world and don't you see how terrible that is and this is.." and I started believing it, I started believing that I was a terrible person because I was not suffering, even if I have gone throw certain unpleasant thing in my life, I was happily open about being emotional and I have had the opportunity to speak with people about certain things that happend in my life and that helped me a lot, dose not mean I was done with it, I still went throw a very heavy deep depression, was suicidal actually but now, yeah my God I'M happy big time, I enjoy so many things that I love doing because I'm just be, I get to be joyous FOR NO REASON AT ALL, just because I get to, this is what I want to me and what I want to give to the world and I love it, not like faking never being sed or angry or anything like that but I do laugh much more then I cry and I have not numbness anymore, thank GOD
Imagine if you ran into Alec Baldwin on the street. I think he lives in New York, doesn't he? I know people have seen him there before, anyway. It disgust me that he continues to have a career after the way he treated his daughter, became publicly known. I guess people don't care about child abuse unless it leaves physical marks that would allow for legal action.
great vid dani and love ya! but you got it wrong on meditation. Meditation is just one practice of the eightfold path set forth by the buddah and its purpose is wisdom, not hapiness. in fact, the whole idea is to not be happy, since happines is a form of agitation and change. The goal is equanimity, through proper wisdom, not dis asociation, which would be imposible for the wise
What if you are so scared to be happy that you sabotogize every chance you get to be happy? Idk how to stop that I really want to be happy. I can’t even feel it anymore.
I agree with everything you say here, anxiety is in large part a product of developmental trauma. Another factor is that our primitive brain systems are precautionary, that's what kept us alive). But... (and)... when we are active in defining and looking after our needs, then the "positive" emotions tend to increase. Its the difference between being anxious and content, between disappointed and joy, between fear and trust.
These videos are tremendously helpful. Its good to know that real help comes from what is outside of the accepted convention. Truth stands alone and needs nothing to prop it up . Honestly look for truth, be sincere in quest to be healed and prioritize the well being of others...and the truth with her companions, healing and peace, will find you.
Not what i mean when i say i choose happiness and not what the ascended masterd mean either. Life is a miracle a gift something to be enjoyed. With this mindset i can remember everything is for me even my thoughts n feelings. So its not ignoring it's being one with. thus healing. Thus seeing theee reality instead of illusions. Love you're perspectives peace
I think deep, true happiness involves dealing and processing trauma. And is a good goal. Maybe it’s more accurate to call it ‘at peace’. Phony happiness is most definitely not a goal - but many people don’t understand the difference, and think if they fake being happy on the surface, then they’ve mastered the goal of life, and that other people will see them as having achieved something. Mostly I think we aren’t taught the difference between content and at peace and happiness, and aren’t given the tools to accept and process. So it’s at no fault of our own that we shortcut to appearances rather than doing the inner work.
Happiness is subjective. What is happy? One person happiness is another person nightmare. The purpose of life is not happiness. It is to overcome the lower self. Lowly desires. Fleeting temptations. Achieve your best self. It’s a journey full of struggles. Headaches. Loneliness. Losses. Disappointments. Doubts. Regrets. It’s a personal journey as well. Nobody can do it for you. It’s uncomfortable but this true life. The real life not some fantasies. Only the strong will persevere. Strength comes from patience.
The goal of life, as far as i understand it now, well it is to feel alive, right? Not confortable. Not easy I don't know, Daniel, if you've seen the movie "call me by your name". But at one point the father tells his son that he feels, and it seems horrible at that moment; but if he tries to push it away, he would end up like most people who have worn their heart out by the age of 30, and have nothing left to give or to feel. i thought about it today, as someone betrayed me, and I felt like shit. Feeking beter now, after this video
You say that happiness isn’t the goal, then you explain that peoples’s happiness isn’t real, and then you acknowledge that you are “happier” after working through your trauma and connecting with your genuine self. Your story is insightful and very helpful, and your observations ring true. But people using ‘happy’ as a euphemism for dissociation and outward appearance does not mean happiness is the problem, it means those people are actually unhappy. If we approach happiness as an actual goal and are honest with ourselves in understanding our experience of wellbeing, then certainly happiness can be a suitable and honorable aim.
I will add that some people dismiss the persuit of happiness as trivial and selfish only to later complain of various unhappinesses in their lived experience. It seems to me that understanding wellbeing and taking some authority over our own happiness will serve us well, and benefit our loved ones. If happiness is explicity not the goal, is then unhappiness explicity the goal? Of course not. The real conversation is about the methods we use to acheive wellbeing, and the way we think about ourselves and our context.
People who put pain avoidance as their definition of happiness are by definition blind to empathy. They have to bury their own pain, and if you can't see your own, you can't see others'.
Yes. It took me a long time to come to that realization. For the longest time I couldn't figure out how and why so many nice and happy people can be so indifferent to suffering in someone nearby to them. As in, "Can't they see? Don't they care?" Kind of heartbreaking really.
first thing meditation is important and gives a lot to person and the mental health of a person, it is important to understand that you give yourself time and attention to sit for example just in stilness and listen to yourself and it is not dissociation from reality at any point, second being happy is valid and experiencing happiness is nothing bad and dissociating but something that comes and goes like any other emotions and that is why it shouldn't be a goal it just the way life works (ups and downs) happiness can be reached by listening to yourself and knowing yourself which include working with trauma obviously
One may like to check out a whole section of the library and human thought on these kindof questions: Philosophy. ---As a footnote: merely one perspective, which i am not here endorsing, but simply mentioning is: Even that one asks this question means you are coming from a certain milieu, and surrounding. [roughly Foucault.]
-7:23 Don’t bash meditation so quickly. It’s been proven to better develope the prefrontal cortex which is necessary for stress management. It’s also very common for people who meditate to be the same people who HAVE done the same archaeological investigating you speak of. They don’t have to be mutually exclusive tactics.
I have seen parents abuse their children and I pray for them because you really can't get involved. Sometimes I think back to these memories and continue to lift them up. This life is so painful. I think the goal is to "know God". Jesus was a "man of sorrows" and "aquainted with grief". I try to help others. And praise God. It gives me joy. I guess I look at all the pain-I'm not in denial - then "let it go"- not carrying all the pain arround- and choose to look for good and be grateful!
It is so strange to see these misconceptions about meditation. I learned meditation from a Tibetan standpoint, and see the approach as heavily compatible with all of daniels channel. I can illustrate this with two points 1. Mindfulness isn’t about dissociating or trying not to think. It’s a neutral/loving observation of the ways thoughts spawn out from emotions, and each time they spawn, you just say “ok, back to the body [aka root emotions and sensations]. You may find that when you have really strong emotions your thoughts are heavily distorted: THEYRE doing this to hurt me on purpose, I want to punch them, etc. Tibetan Buddhism is actually the “middle way” in the sense of “don’t suppress your emotions, but also don’t act them out, just be with them.” 2. “Enlightened” Buddhists like the Dalai Lama are seen by some to be crazy. He’s not always calm or always happy. He’s actually very “volatile” in the exact same way Daniel describes in this video - he feels the appropriate emotion at each moment very very strongly. So the emotional end point of Buddhism is actually exactly the current state Daniel finds himself in. The permanent joy that people often think Buddhism is associated with is actually the realization that you have within you a constant awareness that experiences your emotions, thoughts, and sensations. You’re not your emotions, you’re not your thoughts, you’re not your physical pain, when you identify yourself with this awareness you find “joy”. In a way it can be related to the security that Christian’s feel when they faithfully believe that god is always with them and loving them. In Buddhism this permanent joy and safety comes from the realization that “god” aka your awareness is always inside you.
Don’t take my word for it - you can read a very introductory book about it without the religious baggage in “places that scare you” by pema chondron. Would love to hear back what people’s impressions are.
John 15:19 If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you. This has certainly been my experience of the world - even though I have a tricky relationship with Christianity. There are some things that really resonate.
I feel like therapists often push the power of positivity rather than actually dealing with negative feelings. I found affirmations to just make me feel worse.
Yeah, they say instead of claiming something you truly don’t believe, change the way you say it. Instead of I am, try “ I want to be_____ “… etc.
Healing trauma is not a happy process BUT healing (my trauma) makes me happy!!!! Your teachings are so meaningful for me. Thank you.
Beautifully said! Here, here!!
its such an up and down. And accepting even bad emotions is happyness. To tell myself its ok to be angry or sad. That is happyness for me. If I accept bad feelings I can also have the good ones
“How can I even have a self, to have self-esteem about, if I don’t know my own history” 💯💯💯
'Life is nice and there to be enjoyed.' A final response from a friend when talking about existential questions, like how to deal with all the suffering in the world, something like that.
So it was what you mention, this goal of blindness to the dark things that are a huge part of reality. This supposedly upbeat, good boy response felt so rejecting, numbed and dead to me.
Shortly before I head from a very different person 'When I was only positive and happy I felt like I was making a huge part of myself homeless.' It seemed so much more true and alive.
I constantly reject negative and sad parts of myself and it makes me only worse off in the long run
The majority of my life has not been happy. As far back as I can remember I was at least anxious and always had a sense of being unsettled due to growing up in such a toxic family environment. I had depression for many years. I was just thinking today of how much I grew and how healthy I got as I achieved more and more independence. I think my struggles made me a stronger person.
Well done. There is gold in that struggle
♠️
Society does like dissociation.
It seems to be an attitude of "Your feelings are inconvenient so please kindly stuff them, thank you."
@@katehampstead6024 yes!
Society relies on it.
Society IS dissociation
@@azloii9781 Dissociety
Meditation is not to think things, but to not react to your thoughts and feelings. Simply accept they exist.
React to your thoughts and feelings with passion and try to understand them in order to be alive. Accepting your thoughts and feelings exist and do nothing about is a road to emotional dissociation that Daniel is talking about
@@elenabalyberdina2393 - I don’t think the two tactics have to be mutually exclusive. Plenty of meditators have done lots of therapy and self archaeology. At some point when you’ve understood and processed your past it’s then time to stop letting it define your life or impeding happiness. I find that’s most often the point that people who practice meditation are at in life, in my experience.
@@67NewEngland Thank you Ni Judy, Elena Balyberdina, 67NewEngland for the excellent discussion
@@67NewEngland As long as they aren't using it to numb their feelings. My experience with meditators is this...and they have NOT done a deep grieving process. Once you do the feeling work, you don't really need something to quiet your thoughts. That's just my experience with it. I see people meditating and getting into so-called spirituality who have never re-experienced their original rage and grief on a deep level. I see it as dissociative, not healing. When you've done the feeling work and as you said "understood and processed your past"...there really isn't any need for meditation.
@@anthonyiacobucci3652 from what ive seen, meditating is actually very spiritually destructive.
A life of meaning is better than aiming for happiness because you can’t maintain that but meaningful life can sustain you through periods of hardship or unhappiness
Happiness is a fleeting feeling not a goal. The goal in life is to experience your senses, form emotional connections, and gain power.
Whenever I do self-therapy I always try to think about how Daniel would deal with the situation. His honesty and openness about how to deal with the traumas of the past helps me immensely.
Being at peace with yourself feels to me like the goal, like that should be the state of idle. That natural peaceful curiosity that occupies the mind sorta like it does with kids. Emotions like happiness, sadness, fear and anger are all reactions to things.
This is very beautifully said.
Yes!!! Peace when the environment is peaceful, happiness when happy things or interactions come into your awareness, likewise for sad, angry, etc.
People don't care what happens to people unless it happens to them.
Always here for a Daniel take. It's true that meditation - like any activity or spiritual practice - can be used to dissociate. For me, the goal is awakening and opening. And it's just another way to stay with and turn towards the discomfort that arises habitually. Insight meditation was foundational to IFS, not incidentally.
This was so refreshing to watch, Daniel. I tend to agree with the overall message, I feel like it's either paying the price of emotional awareness (and also enjoying the deep meaning that it brings to your life as you become more integrated) or dissociating by pushing down the scary/negative feelings, which results in being overly focused on superficial things that give you pleasure then ending up being all confused when anxiety/depression or both come and punch you in the face out of nowhere - the 'surprise attack' being a manifestation of the unresolved issues you've been ignoring for too long.
man this really hits hard! thanks for sharing
How true
Eternally grateful to have discovered Daniel Mackler at only 24
I think the goal of people like who you describe is to get along, survive, and make others believe they're happy. They've decided that's good enough, and they are convinced they are fooling everybody. A few can see through it.
Wow, intense video. Just had a conversation about happiness a few nights ago. I was you Daniel. The other person did not understand. So wow, this video came at great timing. You are such an interesting speaker too, thanks for your 'wild truths', I resonate with a lot of them it seems.
You are a blessed individual! Love your videos
your videos make me tear up sometimes, especially when i feel so alone and overwhelmed, having you say that it is indeed difficult is very validating
Like the way a flower's goal should be to be a good flower, making the world better simply by being what it is, a human should try to be the best expression of a human's potential and their own uniqueness. A human isn't whole and can't really be a good human when shutting down all emotions and dissociating. That's more like a robot. Society is a macrocosm of dissociating toxic families, trying to push down anyone who tells the truth, and trying to make everyone else fake their own happiness, so those in power never have to face their own true selves.
Modern society expects everyone to be good little robots operating in a giant heartless machine that isa capitalist economy that worships only one thing: money.
I can so relate to everything you are saying. Our world is sick. And those who are considered insane are probably mentally more healthy because at least they feel empathy and see injustice. I think jesus said something about us not being of this world - we must be in it but not accept it as it is. Keep doing your thing truth and justice warrior.
“Be in the world, and not of it.” - Book of John : 17:11, verses 14-15
The goal of life is to achieve a happy life and not evade your unhappiness and just pretend that you are happy. You are confounding two different concepts.
I agree. You articulated it much better then I’ve been able too.
Instantly reminded me of Man’s Search For Meaning by Viktor Frankl
If you don't know the meaning of life then you are so far from God that he wishes you never existed.
The two best lines in the book:
"It's not what I want out of life, it's what life wants out of me."
"The Statue of Liberty on the East Coast should be supplemented with a Statue of Responsibility on the West Coast."
Traumatized people give a shit about other people. Your story about stopping the guy from beating up the old man struck a cord. I work in a hospital and I'm constantly told how caring and kind I am, which i feel should be the default for Healthcare workers!!! I am constantly angered by those who have been in Healthcare too long who seem to have deadened their natural empathy response as a survival tactic.
slowly going through all of your videos, your experience really resonates with me. thank you for sharing your journey.
This is on point. I think a lot of this "happiness" is just wanting to not feel bad. Being comfortably numb, as lyrics in one of Pink Floyd's songs says.
Did you listen to the whole album?
Happy? I have thought at times that I deserve an award for just not going bonkers.
Great talk Daniel. Another really good one that I connect with strongly. I get the rage. My hatred of bullies is wild and incredibly intense.
You're on the form of your life here sir. God bless you for the magnificent work you do.
Oh you hit this out of the park... The existential angst and confusion I feel being named Happy??!!
Repress, deny, disown, drug, isolate- my life everytime I am at odds with my name. Which is a lot.
This video was ripped from the recesses of my mind .
Yeah. Totally agree. I remember when I was doing an internship at a job training program for "psychologically ill" juveniles and I was grieving that I had been locked in my house for like half a year. I had figuered out after like 2 seconds being there that the so called "psychologically ill" juveniles were way more present than the supposedly healthy tainers there. (Not saying the juveniles weren´t troubled...) And so after 4 days the manager kicked me out telling me that basically he doesnt want depressed people (and immature people, cus I´m 21) to do an internship there. Yes. Well.... Quite ironically that now I won´t become a therapist any time soon and the dissociated trainers there, half of them are doing the therapist´s training and will probably be done all the sooner.
Hi Daniel, thanks so much for this video. I really like the idea that happiness is a possible by-product or side-effect, rather than a goal. I like to think about success in the same way.
I appreciate you so much. It seems you have retained such empathy despite the suffering you must have experienced to get to this point in life. That plus your unending self reflection: maybe that's the goal of life! Suffering, self reflection, retain empathy, repeat. Thank you for sharing. I'm out here listening.
Thank you Daniel 🙏🏼 in the times of war, genocide and crimes against humanity around the world and in our city of NYC this message helps very much. All love to you Daniel 💚 hope to see you out in the streets fighting for a free Palestine, Sudan, Congo and everyone else 🤍
I have heard this sentiment -- that happiness is not the goal of life -- in a few different ways, but I found Viktor Frankl's view on it to be the most interesting. In his book "Man's Search for Meaning" he argues that the true goal of life, the key to satisfaction is to find and fulfill one's own meaning (whatever it may be), that meaning is the most important aspect of the human experience to find (hence the book's title)
People are dead inside, Daniel.
The meaning of life is life itself.
Maybe the goal of life should be to not have goals. For almost, every other species on this earth, their life's work is pretty basic: find enough to food to survive and find a mate to pass on their genes. They never once have to justify their existence and seek out a raison d'etre.
Why do I suffer? On the other side of that question is a freedom I am starting to catch brilliant glimpses of. Simply “letting go” things is a spiritual platitude and I agree that Buddhists seemed to be in a trance. It’s not my position to say that is wrong for them. I meditate but I don’t aim to be at peace and ease 24/7. The world is amazing yet we are, as humans, very lost and headed in very bizarre directions. To be truly human is to be thoroughly curious as to how and why I think, feel, and operate. That is my goal thus far on my journey.....that could change. “God” or “the spirit of the universe” (the name does not matter) has a sense of humor and is beyond our comprehension. This is only a blip in the life of my soul.
I'd gladly settle for contentment.
I remember the Wilford Brimley Diabeetus commercials lol.
Thank you so much for addressing this.. for years decades I have been trying to figure out my unhappiness as people often called it. I mean people would tell me I am as happy as I make my mind to be., or that I need to believe in goodness and kindness of others when the predominant experiences in my life from my biological parents have been abuse, violence, brutality, neglect and abandonment. I don’t want to even begin telling you how my other relationships have been after I ran away from the abuse and neglect from my parents., you can deduct they were far from loving and caring. And for years I must have been suppressing the rage, anger and resentment towards those who abused me.! And now I am here listening to you tell me suppressing my most natural emotions and feelings is perhaps causing all that build up rage and misery ..!
Well said Daniel! This was really really perfect for me to hear for where I am right now
okay.. I mean, joy is a state of being tho, I know that I might have some things that are not solved like to 100% that tho is not an excuse for me to hold back on being happy, being empathic and understanding people dose not mean that if someone is going show a difficult time then I'm not allowed to be happy because someone else is not, that is something I have believed for a long time, I was actually put down for being happy and people would tell me "how can you, after all that is happening around the world and don't you see how terrible that is and this is.." and I started believing it, I started believing that I was a terrible person because I was not suffering, even if I have gone throw certain unpleasant thing in my life, I was happily open about being emotional and I have had the opportunity to speak with people about certain things that happend in my life and that helped me a lot, dose not mean I was done with it, I still went throw a very heavy deep depression, was suicidal actually but now, yeah my God I'M happy big time, I enjoy so many things that I love doing because I'm just be, I get to be joyous FOR NO REASON AT ALL, just because I get to, this is what I want to me and what I want to give to the world and I love it, not like faking never being sed or angry or anything like that but I do laugh much more then I cry and I have not numbness anymore, thank GOD
Imagine if you ran into Alec Baldwin on the street. I think he lives in New York, doesn't he? I know people have seen him there before, anyway. It disgust me that he continues to have a career after the way he treated his daughter, became publicly known. I guess people don't care about child abuse unless it leaves physical marks that would allow for legal action.
How do you know you didn't run into ten people today who are even more abusive?
Thank you so much for your wisdom❤
great vid dani and love ya! but you got it wrong on meditation. Meditation is just one practice of the eightfold path set forth by the buddah and its purpose is wisdom, not hapiness. in fact, the whole idea is to not be happy, since happines is a form of agitation and change. The goal is equanimity, through proper wisdom, not dis asociation, which would be imposible for the wise
Equanimity is the goal
Brilliant. Thank you.
What sensational words, my friend. Thank you so much for sharing so much knowledge with honesty.
What if you are so scared to be happy that you sabotogize every chance you get to be happy? Idk how to stop that I really want to be happy. I can’t even feel it anymore.
I agree with everything you say here, anxiety is in large part a product of developmental trauma. Another factor is that our primitive brain systems are precautionary, that's what kept us alive). But... (and)... when we are active in defining and looking after our needs, then the "positive" emotions tend to increase. Its the difference between being anxious and content, between disappointed and joy, between fear and trust.
These videos are tremendously helpful. Its good to know that real help comes from what is outside of the accepted convention. Truth stands alone and needs nothing to prop it up . Honestly look for truth, be sincere in quest to be healed and prioritize the well being of others...and the truth with her companions, healing and peace, will find you.
Minimizing pain & suffering is more important than happiness.
This is so, so true.
I think our purpose is to learn
People do want us to put on fake smiles, I refuse to participate 😑
You are amazing, amazing amazing
Dont forget the distraction of carbohydrates that seems so normal now
Not what i mean when i say i choose happiness and not what the ascended masterd mean either. Life is a miracle a gift something to be enjoyed. With this mindset i can remember everything is for me even my thoughts n feelings. So its not ignoring it's being one with. thus healing. Thus seeing theee reality instead of illusions. Love you're perspectives peace
I think deep, true happiness involves dealing and processing trauma. And is a good goal. Maybe it’s more accurate to call it ‘at peace’.
Phony happiness is most definitely not a goal - but many people don’t understand the difference, and think if they fake being happy on the surface, then they’ve mastered the goal of life, and that other people will see them as having achieved something. Mostly I think we aren’t taught the difference between content and at peace and happiness, and aren’t given the tools to accept and process. So it’s at no fault of our own that we shortcut to appearances rather than doing the inner work.
Happiness is subjective. What is happy? One person happiness is another person nightmare. The purpose of life is not happiness. It is to overcome the lower self. Lowly desires. Fleeting temptations. Achieve your best self. It’s a journey full of struggles. Headaches. Loneliness. Losses. Disappointments. Doubts. Regrets. It’s a personal journey as well. Nobody can do it for you. It’s uncomfortable but this true life. The real life not some fantasies. Only the strong will persevere. Strength comes from patience.
You are a strange and interesting person. Thank you for your helpful suggestions
The goal of life, as far as i understand it now, well it is to feel alive, right? Not confortable. Not easy
I don't know, Daniel, if you've seen the movie "call me by your name". But at one point the father tells his son that he feels, and it seems horrible at that moment; but if he tries to push it away, he would end up like most people who have worn their heart out by the age of 30, and have nothing left to give or to feel.
i thought about it today, as someone betrayed me, and I felt like shit.
Feeking beter now, after this video
You say that happiness isn’t the goal, then you explain that peoples’s happiness isn’t real, and then you acknowledge that you are “happier” after working through your trauma and connecting with your genuine self. Your story is insightful and very helpful, and your observations ring true. But people using ‘happy’ as a euphemism for dissociation and outward appearance does not mean happiness is the problem, it means those people are actually unhappy. If we approach happiness as an actual goal and are honest with ourselves in understanding our experience of wellbeing, then certainly happiness can be a suitable and honorable aim.
I will add that some people dismiss the persuit of happiness as trivial and selfish only to later complain of various unhappinesses in their lived experience. It seems to me that understanding wellbeing and taking some authority over our own happiness will serve us well, and benefit our loved ones. If happiness is explicity not the goal, is then unhappiness explicity the goal? Of course not. The real conversation is about the methods we use to acheive wellbeing, and the way we think about ourselves and our context.
Compassion: “with suffering,” sentient, emotionally-aware.
I totally relate to this video
Feeling better now feeling bad usually. Thank you.
To be at peace is my goal.
One of your super powers is lucidity. Absolutely brilliant!
If being happy is the goal. Then I failed miserably…. 🐷🎶🎵
There's a term for what you described...spiritual bypassing!
People who put pain avoidance as their definition of happiness are by definition blind to empathy. They have to bury their own pain, and if you can't see your own, you can't see others'.
Yes. It took me a long time to come to that realization. For the longest time I couldn't figure out how and why so many nice and happy people can be so indifferent to suffering in someone nearby to them. As in, "Can't they see? Don't they care?" Kind of heartbreaking really.
@Lhaulho Pretty sure the Buddha didn't include 2 stout martinis after dinner in the eightfold path.
superficial happiness vs meaningful potential and joy, positive qualities of gratitude and contentment
I know people that are happy on the inside when they will do something horrible to someone and get away with it
There being a goal in life is its own presupposition. Anihilist pessimism. An approach to wholeness.
Love this one, Daniel! Beautiful!
OMG, so much to learn from you, sir
The goal of life is to live it.
first thing meditation is important and gives a lot to person and the mental health of a person, it is important to understand that you give yourself time and attention to sit for example just in stilness and listen to yourself and it is not dissociation from reality at any point, second being happy is valid and experiencing happiness is nothing bad and dissociating but something that comes and goes like any other emotions and that is why it shouldn't be a goal it just the way life works (ups and downs) happiness can be reached by listening to yourself and knowing yourself which include working with trauma obviously
yep. in school a fight was happening and I was the only one to step in and break it up. one guy got sucker punched in the head from behind
One may like to check out a whole section of the library and human thought on these kindof questions: Philosophy. ---As a footnote: merely one perspective, which i am not here endorsing, but simply mentioning is: Even that one asks this question means you are coming from a certain milieu, and surrounding. [roughly Foucault.]
-7:23 Don’t bash meditation so quickly. It’s been proven to better develope the prefrontal cortex which is necessary for stress management. It’s also very common for people who meditate to be the same people who HAVE done the same archaeological investigating you speak of. They don’t have to be mutually exclusive tactics.
Self respect is my goal. And to never become bitter.
Permission To Be Miserable by The School Of Life is an essay...reading it freed me to feel.
Chasing happiness gets in the way of living a fulfilled Life. Happiness can’t be achieved but happens as a result of living one’s own authentic Life.
How would the capitalist system go on if people didn’t dissociate?
Daniel that was bad ass thank you we talk soon…🕊🦋
"Don't worry. Be happy". So that I can do whatever I please.
2:34-3:00 Daniel please can you talk about this more in depth?
I'd rather be a good person than a happy person.
I think that could be another trap because of how our society values both fake happiness and fake goodness. Too many people are hypocrites
Not me.
I have seen parents abuse their children and I pray for them because you really can't get involved. Sometimes I think back to these memories and continue to lift them up. This life is so painful. I think the goal is to "know God". Jesus was a "man of sorrows" and "aquainted with grief". I try to help others. And praise God. It gives me joy. I guess I look at all the pain-I'm not in denial - then "let it go"- not carrying all the pain arround- and choose to look for good and be grateful!
the goal of life is to heal & be delivered by the creator, being a blessing & light to others
transcendental meditation is very dangerous people! Only the word of the most high is healing us! Greetings from an ex yoga teacher
It is so strange to see these misconceptions about meditation. I learned meditation from a Tibetan standpoint, and see the approach as heavily compatible with all of daniels channel. I can illustrate this with two points
1. Mindfulness isn’t about dissociating or trying not to think. It’s a neutral/loving observation of the ways thoughts spawn out from emotions, and each time they spawn, you just say “ok, back to the body [aka root emotions and sensations]. You may find that when you have really strong emotions your thoughts are heavily distorted: THEYRE doing this to hurt me on purpose, I want to punch them, etc. Tibetan Buddhism is actually the “middle way” in the sense of “don’t suppress your emotions, but also don’t act them out, just be with them.”
2. “Enlightened” Buddhists like the Dalai Lama are seen by some to be crazy. He’s not always calm or always happy. He’s actually very “volatile” in the exact same way Daniel describes in this video - he feels the appropriate emotion at each moment very very strongly. So the emotional end point of Buddhism is actually exactly the current state Daniel finds himself in. The permanent joy that people often think Buddhism is associated with is actually the realization that you have within you a constant awareness that experiences your emotions, thoughts, and sensations. You’re not your emotions, you’re not your thoughts, you’re not your physical pain, when you identify yourself with this awareness you find “joy”. In a way it can be related to the security that Christian’s feel when they faithfully believe that god is always with them and loving them. In Buddhism this permanent joy and safety comes from the realization that “god” aka your awareness is always inside you.
Don’t take my word for it - you can read a very introductory book about it without the religious baggage in “places that scare you” by pema chondron. Would love to hear back what people’s impressions are.
John 15:19
If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you.
This has certainly been my experience of the world - even though I have a tricky relationship with Christianity. There are some things that really resonate.
Wow... thank you
Your grandmother doesn't sound happy at all. Sounds like she put on a happy face but was miserable.
Eres lo máximo!!