The Seven Stages of Seeking Happiness

The Seven Stages of Seeking Happiness

Lately I've been doing some self-inquiry and mindfulness work... And along the road I have discovered something strange:

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Let me first talk about self-inquiry.

It is simple work anyway, the principle is to just take one "field" in your life, like I don't know… Studies/Work/Money or Health… for example, and you just go back to the past, from the day you were born up until the present moment.

For starters you need to write it down, divide your life into elementary periods of time, and then write up what happened in each period in details in that single "field".

First I noticed that it is hard to do so, especially, it's so hard to remember, because we were living so unconscious in our lives that we forgot the core causes of our struggles, which were, in the the first place, just nonsense !

To help you remember, you can try and recall trigger events, like your school, academic year, your closest friend(s) in that period, even teachers and close family members can help trigger memories, you will be amazed when noticing how many important events you have forgot due to living life so unconsciously. You can do this for several days, not spill everything in a single hour, the first time is going to be so tiring, and it will stir so many emotions and deep wounds that you decide to give up, but please don't… Stop today and continue another day.

After I finished laying down the plot, for almost all (the most important anyway) fields of my life, I discovered a pattern, like whole stages by which I pass to reach the present moment.

Of course, I am talking about the fields in my life that are making me sad/depressed/anxious/frustrated right now, and THESE are the important fields for you too. So here they are, the stages, please notice the alternation between enjoying the present and planning the future :

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1) The green stage :

In this period you just don't care about that field at all, you are young, and that thing either comes to you by itself, or you just don't go looking for it. What happens in this period is you're just enjoying what you have, not caring.

2) The yellow stage :

You start to notice the benefit of that thing, and you start to want it to be more "official", you start looking for it and try to control it. What happens in this period is that you start to plan the future, but more with dream-like plans, not objectives, just imagination.

3) The pink stage :

After little to too much efforts, you actually start to notice improvements, you control more… You feel happier with that when you work for it, better then when it was coming to you by itself. A sad "illusion" of control. What happens now is that you come back to enjoying the present moment, and be happy with what you have.

4) The black stage :

Now that illusion of control has been discovered, and you actually notice you had no control at all, but you're still stubborn, and you blame it on circumstances that made you lose control… Typical victim thinking, because that's actually YOU, who have given this field so much importance, who thought you could keep away negative emotions, that you actually did what's called "self-sabotage". What happens in the black stage is that you are so unsatisfied with the present AND the past that you actually stop everything ! And you just plan your future with that field totally "deleted" from it, it doesn't exist anymore for you.

5) The orange stage :

You decided to stop previously, but again, your emotions are stronger than you, and you go back little by little to engaging in that field again, but now with a wiser mind, you know how to avoid traps and know how to proceed without exposing yourself to "hurt". You may live again an experience of happiness, but you notice it's not "how it used to be", because you have so many protections and reservations that you're not fully in the moment. But you're still in the present and enjoying it.

6) The red stage :

Now this is the worst and final stage, and I am personally in this stage in exactly two fields of my life. What happens here is : you notice that even with those "protections" you are still committing "self-sabotage" and you expose yourself to hurt, and you have no control, and you can't even ignore that field. You're just trapped, with no solution, and sinking deeper. That's what causes sadness, anxiety and anger. What happens here is that this field now is out of control, and it even starts to leak into other "successful" fields of your life, making them feel bad and lose their taste, so you're back to planning the future, but now you're just anxious and catastrophizing about the future that you see no hope.

7) The blue stage :

Now this one isn't easy, and for me honestly, I haven't reached this stage in any field of my life, and I can say that some people will even die and never reach this stage in any part of their life. Which is sad, but this one is so tricky and counter-intuitive that we never think about it. In this stage, you have to, of course, go back and enjoy the present moment. But what's counter-intuitive is trying to "embrace" the negative feelings and not protect yourself from them. Yes… that's it ! Easy okay, but can you do it ? When you feel sad, can you stay by yourself and feel that sadness fully until you cry, without evading it or distracting yourself from it ? Just go with the flow of the world… I still haven't reached this stage, but I have one time, fully felt a negative feeling, and I was really amazed by the results ! The feeling just emptied all its energy, and then disappeared.. gone !

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If you like this article, then stay tuned. I will be publishing more articles in the future about the same subject, which is the counter-intuitive things that we never do, that are the true solution !

M.K. Ibn Hadj Kacem

Wednesday March 30th 2016