Keys to Happiness

(This blog was originally posted on September 18, 2014)

Photo courtesy of Sara Fogan

     I recently saw a trailer for a new film titled Hector and the Search for Happiness.  In it, a psychiatrist travels around the world to discover the true meaning of the apparently elusive emotion in his life. The premise of this movie intrigued me, and I started to think about the sources and definition of happiness in my own life. For example, Spending time with my friends and family and riding and hanging out with my horse makes me very, very happy. The sound of raindrops beating on the roof and against my windowpanes makes me happy. So does chocolate ice cream and the idea of Thursday night (because I have the whole weekend to look forward to). 

    But are those things true happiness? Is it the blush of first love, a new baby, an expensive car? How do you recognize it when happiness is in your grasp to experience? Maybe it has a smell or sound or texture that I have never consciously noticed. If so, how do you or I know if we have missed our chance to be happy? Or, do we only know that you are happy because we are not experiencing other emotions that we associate with experiences that we associate with familiar, challenging negative experiences in our daily life? In that case, the subconscious mind would likely associate financial insecurity/unemployment, physical illness, etc. as a part of your subconscious life script. No matter how challenging and stressful these experiences may be, the SCM will accept them because they are familiar, comforting and known; conversely, will likely reject or avoid any other experience that evokes an opposite emotional reaction such as happiness, which is unknown and therefore painful.

    These questions let me to consider that more existential question which would likely be addressed in the film: How did I (or anyone) even know what happiness is, to be able to identify any emotion as such? Even talk-show radio personality Dennis Prager addresses how hard a person must work to achieve this state in his self-help book titled Happiness is a Serious Problem. To be honest, puzzling over this question began to make me feel agitated, unsure and uncomfortable—the opposite of happy.

    Eventually, my thoughts drifted to Hypnosis Motivation Institute founder Dr. John Kappas and his Theory of Mind concept. It posits that human behavior is based on the subconscious mental scripts that we create during early childhood. Furthermore, since fear of falling and fear of loud noises is the only emotion (or reaction to emotions) that human beings are born with, we must learn what happiness is and create our own and individual associations with it. Put in this context, I concluded that there must be countless definitions of and explanations for happiness—which made me feel much better.

    Dare I say it? It made me feel happy.

Sara R. Fogan, C.Ht. is a certified hypnotherapist based in Southern California. She graduated with honors from the Hypnosis Motivation Institute in 2005. For more information about Calminsense Hypnotherapy® and to set up an appointment, please visit http://www.calminsensehypnotherapy.com/.

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