“When I was 5 years old, my mum always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote down “happy.” They told me I didn’t understand the assignment and I told them they didn’t understand life.”

– John Lennon

I believe at a fundamental level what we’re all really chasing is happiness. Whether consciously or subconsciously, this basic human desire drives so much of our behaviour.

Chasing happiness, while ignoring the mind is like trying to build a house with no foundations.  We spend countless time and money chasing happiness in our lives, whether it’s through relationships, careers, achievements, expensive cars and houses, only to find happiness to be an allusive, fragile state, which can seemingly disappear at any moment.

Truth is, we’re looking for it in a place that it doesn’t exist. Our whole life is an experience in consciousness. As such, the quality of our lives is determined by the quality of our minds. If we want to be happy, we best realise it’s an inside job.

When it comes to establishing true happiness, nothing is more essential than a daily meditation practice. This is not to say that exercise, diet, connecting with nature, spending quality time with friends and loved ones, finding what lights us up and making that a priority, are any less important. It’s just that meditation is the foundation, transforming our minds, and with that, every aspect of lives.

So, rather than chasing happiness, sit down, close your eyes for 20 minutes and create it. Or perhaps more accurately, uncover it. For when we strip away all the layers of stress and fatigue through meditation, what we discover is that happiness is our natural state of being. In that sense, chasing happiness is akin to the ocean reaching out to the rain for wetness.

Photo credit: Hean Prinsloo on Unsplash