Happiness

Happiness Plot Summary

Introduction

Imagine sitting on the steps of a monastery in Nepal, watching two different travelers approach a muddy courtyard after the monsoon rain. The first woman complains about every step, fearful of falling into the muck. The second woman hops across the same stepping stones with joy, remarking cheerfully how wonderful it is that there's no dust during monsoon season. Two people, two entirely different experiences of the same reality. This powerful contrast captures the essence of what we'll explore together: the transformative understanding that happiness is not merely a fleeting emotion dependent on external circumstances, but a skill we can cultivate through practice. Drawing from both ancient wisdom traditions and cutting-edge neuroscience, we'll discover how our minds create suffering or well-being, regardless of external conditions. We'll learn practical techniques to develop inner peace, overcome mental toxins like hatred and obsessive desire, and cultivate genuine altruism. The journey ahead offers not just intellectual insights but a roadmap for lasting transformation—a path toward experiencing each moment with greater clarity, purpose, and joy, even amid life's inevitable challenges.

Chapter 1: The Nature of True Happiness vs. Pleasure

In the monastery courtyard in Nepal, a monk was working at his laptop when a friend playfully spilled roasted barley flour on his keyboard as a joke. The monk's face darkened with anger as he snapped, "Was that supposed to be funny?" Seeing the monk's genuine anger, the friend simply replied, "One moment of anger can destroy years of patience." Though the joke wasn't particularly clever, the friend's observation was profoundly true. On another occasion in Nepal, someone who had swindled the monastery approached the same monk to lecture him on morality. His blood boiled as he angrily told her to leave, even giving her a nudge toward the door. At the time, he felt his anger was completely justified. Only hours later did he realize how destructive anger truly is—how it reduces clarity and inner peace, turning us into emotional puppets. In both instances, the monk later reflected that more constructive responses would have been possible. He could have calmly explained the laptop's importance in the first case, or firmly addressed the facts without anger in the second. These incidents became powerful teachers about the nature of emotions and their impact on our well-being. Most people confuse pleasure with genuine happiness. Pleasure is dependent on external circumstances—a delicious meal, a beautiful view, physical comfort—and it exhausts itself with usage, like a candle consuming itself. True happiness, by contrast, is a state of being that isn't dependent on particular conditions. It emerges from inner freedom, clarity of mind, and loving-kindness. While pleasure can quickly turn to indifference or even disgust when repeated, genuine happiness deepens with experience. The distinction is crucial for understanding how we might cultivate lasting well-being. Pleasure isn't happiness's enemy unless it disturbs our mind's equilibrium or leads to obsession. When experienced in the present moment, with inner peace and freedom, pleasure simply adorns happiness without overshadowing it. Our journey begins with this fundamental insight: happiness is not something to pursue externally but a capacity to be developed from within.

Chapter 2: The Illusion of Self and Freedom from Mental Toxins

A simple experiment reveals how our attachment to self distorts our experience: You are napping peacefully in a boat on a lake when another craft bumps into yours, waking you with a start. Thinking someone has carelessly crashed into you, you leap up furious, ready to curse them—only to discover the boat is empty. Your anger instantly dissolves into laughter, and you return peacefully to your nap. The only difference between these reactions is that in the first case, you imagined yourself the target of someone's malice. A similar dynamic occurs when we witness something valuable breaking. If you see a beautiful vase fall and break in a shop window, you might think, "What a shame!" and continue walking calmly. But if you had just purchased that vase and placed it proudly on your mantle, you would cry out in horror, "My vase is broken!" The sole difference is the label "my" that you had attached to the object. Buddhism distinguishes between an innate, instinctive sense of "I"—when we think "I'm cold" or "I'm awake"—and a conceptual "self" to which we attribute qualities of permanence and autonomy. From this conceptual self arises a powerful attachment to "me" and "mine," creating a sense of duality between ourselves and the world. This separation becomes the foundation for mental afflictions like craving, hatred, jealousy, and pride. Han de Wit, a Buddhist philosopher, describes the ego as "a mental withdrawal based on fear." Out of fear of suffering and anxiety about living and dying, we create the illusion of being separate from the world, hoping to protect ourselves. Ironically, this ego-grasping becomes the very magnet that attracts suffering. What's the alternative? Buddhism suggests that genuine self-confidence emerges paradoxically from egolessness—recognizing our interdependence with all things. This confidence comes from awareness of our fundamental nature and potential for transformation, which Buddhism calls "buddha nature." Such recognition imparts a peaceful strength that external circumstances cannot threaten. People who have partially freed themselves from ego's demands think and act with greater spontaneity and freedom. They emanate a quality of goodness that others can sense and appreciate. Their presence is enriching in ways that champions of the ego, with their theatrical self-importance, can never be. The path to freedom lies not in reinforcing our separate identity but in recognizing the illusory nature of the self that we've constructed.

Chapter 3: Transforming Emotions Through Mindfulness

In the early 1820s, a feared bandit entered the cave of the hermit Jigme Gyalwai Nyugu in Tibet, intending to steal his meager provisions. Instead, the thief found himself in the presence of a serene old man meditating with closed eyes, radiating peace and compassion. At that very moment, the bandit's aggression vanished, and he stood watching the sage in wonder for several minutes before withdrawing after asking for a blessing. From that day forward, whenever the thief contemplated wrongdoing, the serene face of the white-haired old man would appear in his mind, and he would abandon his evil plan. This story illustrates how a powerful presence of mind can transform not only our own emotions but influence those around us. While few of us possess such mastery, we all can develop greater skill in managing our emotional lives through mindfulness and meditation. Buddhism teaches three main approaches to working with disturbing emotions. The first uses specific antidotes—loving-kindness as an antidote to hatred, inner freedom as an antidote to craving. Since two opposing mental states cannot exist simultaneously, cultivating the positive gradually eliminates the negative. The second approach involves recognizing the empty nature of thoughts themselves. When we examine anger closely, for instance, it loses substance under our gaze, like frost under sunlight. The third technique uses the raw energy of the emotion as a catalyst for transformation. A monk named Patrul Rinpoche exemplified this freedom from emotional reactivity. Once while teaching thousands of people near a monastery in eastern Tibet, an old man insisted on giving him a silver ingot, placing it at his feet before leaving. Patrul simply walked away, leaving the valuable gift behind. Later, a thief who had observed this followed Patrul, intending to steal the silver. Finding nothing in the monk's meager possessions, the thief confronted him. "Oh dear," exclaimed Patrul. "What a hard life you lead, scurrying about like a madman! You've come all this way for a lump of silver! Poor man! Retrace your steps and at dawn you'll reach the mound where I was sitting. You'll find the silver there." The skeptical thief returned to the teaching site and indeed found the silver. Filled with remorse, he sought out Patrul again, prostrating himself and begging to become his disciple. Patrul simply told him: "Be generous, invoke the Buddha, and practice his teaching. That will do." This complete freedom from attachment to possessions reflected Patrul's inner liberation—the ultimate expression of emotional mastery.

Chapter 4: The Scientific Evidence: Happiness in the Lab

In November 2004, the prestigious scientific journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences published the first serious study on the impact of long-term meditation on the brain. Twelve experienced Buddhist practitioners, who had completed between 10,000 and 40,000 hours of meditation over fifteen to forty years, were compared with twelve age-matched volunteers who received just one week of basic meditation instruction. The results were striking. During meditation on compassion, the experienced practitioners showed dramatically increased high-frequency brain activity called gamma waves, "of a sort that has never been reported before in the neuroscience literature," according to Richard Davidson of the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The movement of these waves through the brain was far better coordinated than in novice meditators. Most significantly, monks who had spent the most years meditating generated the highest levels of gamma waves, suggesting that meditation produces lasting changes in brain function. Even more remarkable, the practitioners maintained considerably higher gamma activity than controls while resting in a neutral state, before they began meditating. As science writer Sharon Begley commented: "That opens up the tantalizing possibility that the brain, like the rest of the body, can be altered intentionally. Just as aerobics sculpt the muscles, so mental training sculpts the gray matter in ways scientists are only beginning to fathom." Paul Ekman, a world-renowned emotions scientist, conducted additional experiments with experienced meditators. In one test measuring the ability to detect microexpressions—fleeting facial expressions lasting just 1/30th of a second—two Western meditation practitioners achieved results far better than those of 5,000 previously tested subjects, including police officers, lawyers, psychiatrists, and Secret Service agents. In another experiment testing the startle response—a primitive reflex involving facial muscle contractions in reaction to sudden loud noises—one meditator was able to completely suppress the startle reaction, something Ekman had never seen in hundreds of subjects. "This is a spectacular accomplishment," Ekman explained. "We've never found anyone who can do that. Nor have any other researchers." These pioneering studies point to profound possibilities for human development. As Davidson observed: "What we found is that the trained mind, or brain, is physically different from the untrained one." The research suggests that with sufficient practice, people can develop extraordinary control over emotional responses previously thought to be automatic and unchangeable. While 10,000 hours of meditation practice may seem daunting, a study published by Davidson and Jon Kabat-Zinn showed that just three months of meditation training with highly active biotech company employees significantly shifted their brain activity patterns toward those associated with positive emotions. Their immune systems were also boosted, with flu vaccines proving 20 percent more effective than in a control group. The emerging science suggests that happiness skills can be cultivated by anyone willing to invest time in developing them.

Chapter 5: Altruism and Ethics as Paths to Well-Being

A man lies on the lawn of Manchester University, appearing ill. Only 15% of passersby stop to help. Later, the same man lies in the same spot, but wearing the jersey of the Liverpool soccer team—a team with many fans among the students. Now 85% of Liverpool supporters stop to check on him. This study confirms what many similar experiments have shown: we're much more inclined to help those with whom we feel a connection. The Buddhist approach challenges us to gradually extend that sense of connection to all beings by understanding that everyone shares our fundamental desire to avoid suffering and experience well-being. This universal responsibility begins with recognizing our interdependence with others—that our happiness is intimately linked to theirs. Studies consistently show a powerful correlation between altruism and happiness. When we are happy, self-importance diminishes and we become more open to others. People who have experienced a happy event in the past hour are more inclined to help strangers. Conversely, depression makes it difficult to feel and express love for others. Martin Seligman, pioneer of "positive psychology," found that the joy of performing disinterested acts of kindness provides profound satisfaction. When he asked his students to engage in both pleasurable activities and philanthropic ones, the results were striking. The satisfactions triggered by kindness far eclipsed those derived from personal pleasures like seeing a movie or enjoying dessert. Students reported that after performing acts of kindness, they were better listeners, more friendly, and more appreciated by others throughout the day. This dynamic reflects a fundamental truth: our true nature aligns more naturally with benevolence than with malice. Living in harmony with that nature sustains joy, while rejecting it leads to chronic dissatisfaction. Despite evolutionary theories suggesting that selfish genes prevail, research by psychologist Daniel Batson and others supports the existence of genuine altruism—helping others with no expectation of personal gain. One remarkable example is Dola Jigme Kalsang, a Tibetan sage who, while on pilgrimage in China, came upon a crowd gathered to witness a thief's execution. Learning the condemned man was to be placed on a red-hot iron horse, Dola Jigme pushed through the crowd and proclaimed, "I am the thief!" When asked if he was ready to accept the consequences, he nodded. He died on the horse, and the thief was spared. What motivation could explain such an act other than unconditional compassion? Such extreme cases show the human potential for altruism, but everyday expressions of kindness and generosity similarly connect us with our deeper nature. When we spontaneously perform acts of disinterested goodness, we experience harmony with our true nature. As Father Pierre Ceyrac, who cared for thirty thousand children in India over sixty years, observed: "Despite everything, I'm struck by the goodness of people... No one can resist the call of love. We always end up opening ourselves to it."

Chapter 6: Death, Time, and the Value of Each Moment

A man lies on the lawn of a university quadrangle in England, appearing sick. Only 15% of passersby stop to help him. Later, the same man lies in the same spot wearing the jersey of a popular local soccer team. Now 85% of passersby who support that team stop to check on him. This study confirms what we've seen repeatedly: people are much more inclined to help those with whom they feel a connection. The Buddhist approach is to gradually extend that sense of connection to all beings by recognizing that everyone shares our fundamental desire to avoid suffering and experience well-being. When our sense of belonging encompasses all living beings, we are intimately touched by their joys and sufferings. This is what the Dalai Lama calls "universal responsibility." Studies consistently show a powerful correlation between altruism and happiness. Happy people are more altruistic, and altruistic acts increase happiness. When we're happy, self-importance diminishes and we become more open to others. People who have experienced a happy event in the past hour are more inclined to help strangers. Conversely, depression makes it difficult to feel and express love. Martin Seligman, pioneer of "positive psychology," found that performing acts of kindness provides profound satisfaction. When he asked his students to engage in both pleasurable activities and philanthropic ones, the results were striking. The satisfactions triggered by kindness far eclipsed those derived from personal pleasures like seeing a movie or enjoying dessert. Students reported that after performing acts of kindness, they were better listeners, more friendly, and more appreciated throughout the day. This dynamic reflects a fundamental truth: our nature aligns more naturally with benevolence than with malice. Living in harmony with that nature sustains joy, while rejecting it leads to chronic dissatisfaction. Despite evolutionary theories suggesting that selfish genes prevail, research by psychologist Daniel Batson and others supports the existence of genuine altruism—helping others with no expectation of personal gain. The relationship between having a good heart and happiness grows ever clearer: they engender and reinforce each other, both reflecting oneness with our inner nature. Joy and satisfaction are closely tied to love and affection, while misery goes hand in hand with selfishness and hostility. By generating and expressing kindness, we dispel suffering and replace it with lasting fulfillment.

Summary

Our journey through the landscape of happiness reveals that what we often chase—pleasure, wealth, fame, power—are merely shadows of genuine well-being. True happiness emerges not from external circumstances but from our inner relationship with life itself. It is less a destination to reach than a skill to cultivate through practice and understanding. The transformative insights we've explored show that happiness requires freedom from mental toxins like hatred, greed, and self-importance. By recognizing the illusory nature of the separate self, we can break free from the prison of ego that creates so much unnecessary suffering. Through mindfulness practices and meditation, we develop the ability to work skillfully with emotions rather than being controlled by them. The science now confirms what contemplatives have known for centuries—the brain physically changes through sustained mental training, allowing greater emotional balance and positive states. Perhaps most importantly, we've seen that genuine happiness is inseparable from our connection with others. Altruism and compassion aren't sacrifices we make at the expense of our well-being but are actually the most direct path to it. Each moment becomes precious when we recognize the fragility of life and the profound value of human connection. In developing loving-kindness, mindfulness, and wisdom, we don't just transform ourselves—we contribute to a more compassionate world. The journey toward happiness is ultimately about becoming more fully human, awakening our innate potential for wisdom and compassion that lies within each of us, waiting to be cultivated.

About Author

Loading...

Daniel Goleman

Author of Emotional Intelligence and psychologist Daniel Goleman has transformed the way the world educates children, relates to family and friends, and conducts business. The Wall Street Journal ranked him one of the 10 most influential business thinkers. Goleman’s Emotional Intelligence was on The New York Times best sellers list for a year-and-a-half. Named one of the 25 "Most Influential Business Management Books" by TIME, it has been translated into 40 languages. The Harvard Business Review called emotional intelligence (EI) “a revolutionary, paradigm-shattering idea.” Goleman’s new book, Focus: The Hidden Driver of Excellence, argues that attention — a fundamental mental ability for success — has come under siege. Leadership that gets results demands a triple focus: on our inner world so we can manage ourselves; on others, for our relationships; and on the outer forces that shape our organizations and society itself. His more recent books include The Brain and Emotional Intelligence, and Leadership: The Power of Emotional Intelligence - Selected Writings.

Read more

Related Books by Daniel Goleman

Loading...

Emotional Intelligence

Daniel Goleman

Redefining "smart"

★★★★☆4.3

Loading...

Focus

Daniel Goleman

The Hidden Driver of Excellence

★★★★☆4.3

Loading...

Search Inside Yourself

Jon Kabat-Zinn

The Unexpected Path to Achieving Success, Happiness (and World Peace)

★★★★☆4.0

Loading...

Social Intelligence

Daniel Goleman

The New Science of Human Relationships

★★★½☆4.0

Loading...

Primal Leadership

Daniel Goleman

Unleashing the Power of Emotional Intelligence

★★★½☆3.9

Loading...

Altered Traits

Daniel Goleman

Science Reveals How Meditation Changes Your Mind, Brain, and Body

★★★½☆3.9