Money and Lay Buddhist Happiness

Dharmachari Seven (WQ)

Smile! The spiritual path is inwardly-derived happiness, which flows out. Worldly happiness is trying to feel good based on trying to control ever changing circumstances and conditions. The week in photos

I feel happy. Why? Because I practice. I practice those things that make for happiness. My friend says he's sad. "Why," I ask, "is it because you think you are your feelings?"

"What?" he answers.

"Well," I explain, do you feel sad or are you sad?"

"Same thing!" he hollers.

"Well," I reply, "I feel happiness, I feel sadness, but I never confuse myself with the feelings that pass through me. If I did, that would be giving them too much weight. Not being attached to fleeting feelings (emotions, moods, psychological states, affective tones, whatever), not identifying myself with them, that's just basic. Now that there is happiness -- like a hummingbird residing near the potted flower on my balcony, very sensitive and likely to zip away -- I don't mistake it for more than it is: a conditionally-arisen thing. When this is, that comes to be. When that is not, this ceases. What makes you happy?" I ask him.

"Money. Straight and simple. When I have money, I'm happy."

"And when you don't?"

"I'm sad."

You are the feeling, then, based on what's happening outside of you? You don't generate feelings (consciously or unconsciously, habitually or with new effort), you just ARE whatever feelings pass by?"

"Okay, I'm not my feelings. But they're MY feelings! I'm the one who feels them!"

"They're not just feelings unreliably passing through you? I mean, you order happiness, don't you?"

"Yeah, of course."

"And the waiter/butler/concierge brings you sadness?"

"Well, I don't order it like that. I wish for happiness. And sometimes it doesn't come; most of the time it doesn't come."

"Yes," I say, "but Money = Happiness. So you must be very happy!"

"How do you figure?" he asks.

"Well I only mean, you have money."

"What money?!" he protests.

"I can hear it, jingling in your pockets." I smile.

"Money, you call this money?" he shouts as he turns his pockets out spilling change."

"Careful! There goes your happiness," I tease.

"That's not money," he argues.

"That money on the ground is not money?" I ask incredulously. He's very careful, not so emotional, a lover of logic, who won't stand for contradictions.

"NO, of course not. I'm talking real money, cash, and lots of it."

"Like a paycheck, direct deposit?"

"That's still change. I mean BIG bucks."

"Millions?"

"Yeah, millions. I'm thinking a few billion and I'd be okay."

"Aah, you must be miserable!"

"What do you mean?" he asks, offended.

"I only mean, I know you've never had a thousand-million (a 'billion'), not even a single-million. Goodness, have you ever even had a hundred-thousand at one time?"

"Well, not in cash," he explains sheepishly.

"What misery! How pathetically depressing! How do you get up in the morning?!"

"Yeah, right?" he confirms.

"Smile! Spirituality is inwardly-derived happiness, and it flows out into the world. You generate it inside. Worldly happiness, on the other hand, is trying to feel good, trying to be good, based on trying to control the circumstances and conditions around you but not inside. Circumstances (bank account balances, the value of the dollar, stocks, benefits, deals...) are famous for change. Change is the only thing you can be sure of with conditions."

"I got no time to smile! I gotta go get happy!"

"Make money?"

"Yeah, make money, cash, meet a girl, action, buy something, or things..."

"Do you want me to meditate over your lottery ticket again?"

"No, no, I figured out it's all about the numbers, probability and statistics. I'll be happy when I win. But I need to buy more tickets to do that," and so on and so on, he explained.

"Because, of course, as we all know, everyone who wins has bought a mountain of tickets to do it?"

"Well, yeah, NO, have they?"

"No."

"How am I going to be happy then?"

"Smile?"

"What's that going to help!"

"It's right here," I point to my heart, "the happiness generator. Wag a dog's tail, and it'll bark and romp like it's happy. Smile and you'll feel something. Say 'Aah!' It's hard, if not impossible, to say that and not feel better. Aah and a smile, you're well on your way."

"But nothing's changed! That's not going to make me rich!"

"Will it hurt?"

"Well...no."

"Wouldn't you rather be happy before, during, and after your sudden amassing of wealth? I mean, I can't help but feel you're not going to be happy when you strike it rich."

"OH? You just watch me!"

"Really, is it? You'll suddenly know what to do with all that, how to deal with how you'll be treated, cheated, and lied to by everyone from the banker, to the tax man, from the baker to the candlestick maker?"

"I'll deal with it."

"Did you know that almost all newly rich people, those who make it quickly, lose it quickly? The only thing certain about winning the lottery, or coming into a windfall, is gaining weight. And looks like you got that covered," I tease.

"It's cause I eat right, and when I get rich, I'll start eating right," he fumbles to explain.

"When, or if, you get rich, then you'll eat right -- when it's eating 'right' that got you obese?"

"I'm not obese! I'm just a good eater."

"Hamburgers? What's your BMI?"

"My BM's have nothing to do with it. Yeah, Hamburgers is good food."

We both laugh. Neither one of us believe that.

"Look," I say, "whether you're rich or have 'real money' seems to be on a sliding scale. But BMI is very exact. The scale is very exacting. Either you are obese or you're not. Strangely, 'rich' is not defined. It used to be a million. That's not going to cut it now. You need ten times that, at least. How are you of all people, so independent, allowing outside forces and influences to define you, to make you feel, to tell you how to be?"

"What do you mean?" he asks disarmingly.

"I feel happy because I do happy. It doesn't do me. I choose to be happy, right now. It's as easy as that. Look. I smile. I really feel happy."

"You seem happy."

"It's a choice, often unconscious, often just blind habit. But I don't need to look at something outside to tell me if I am. I'm the one generating the feelings -- how I feel about something, what I stay focused on, what I do, what I read, and so on. I choose, I order from my waiter/butler/concierge [the mind, the heart, the consciousness known as citta], 'Hey, Jeeves, some happiness, pronto.' And it obliges. If you find that hard to believe, do the opposite. Order unhappiness. Order miserable thoughts -- thoughts that make you feel miserable -- like 'I have no money' as you're counting your money. 'I'm not rich' as you stand on your property in the middle of this empire. 'I'm not in a position to be healthy' as you eat whatever you want from a table spread that hasn't been seen since Roman times."

"I get it," he says. "It's like that Buddhist story you told me about the hacking off body parts."

"The Parable of the Saw you mean?"

"Yeah, the sawing."

"The Buddha said that, IF while you were being sawed to pieces by torturers with a two-handled saw, YOU were to generate and express anger and resentment towards them, you would not be following this Teaching. Even then you should generate and emit thoughts of loving-kindness and compassion. Then you would be fulfilling this Teaching."

"That's not serious, is it?" he asks.

"Maybe. The point is not that you won't be upset about being hacked up. The Buddha asked, 'IF you could bear this parable in mind when you weren't being sawed to pieces but only being insulted with words or struck, could you bear it?' Could you?"

"Well, yeah, it's not like being sawed up."

"Exactly! And that's why you should bear that parable in mind at all times. 'It's unwise to be angry and hateful even when I'm being sawed up. So how silly is it to get all bent out of shape when I'm just being accused, insulted, and defamed?' Slander becomes positively easy to bear when you keep the Parable of the Saw in mind. And being happy is quite possible, even if you're being hacked up or fat and dirt poor like you," I tease. "Yes?" I interject, noticing that my friend starts shaking his head.

"I can take being insulted but not being poor."

"You think you can be calm when abused but you can't be happy when you choose?"

"Well..." he smiles.

"There you go! Did your bank balance just shoot up?"

A smile comes over him as he begins to understand a little better: "Maybe I can be happy. But I'd rather be rich! How am I supposed happy just by willing it?"

"Rather be rich than happy? Why do you want to be rich?"

"So I can be happy, of course. Duh."

"I get it. There's something called the Sedona Method. It's in line with Buddhism, maybe borrowing from the Teaching, without calling itself 'Buddhism.' The method has at least five techniques on letting go. And when you let go, when you stop identifying, you can feel your feelings and not be swept away by them. You can make great decisions -- clearheaded just like you think you're doing now. But we see you haven't been doing."

"Then I'll be happy?"

"First of all, happiness is a choice. That's not all it is. Second, happiness is an action; the feeling arises based on conditions you -- not the outside world -- create and maintain. You generate your happiness, and you involve others, and you spread it all around, not the other way around. Don't wait for happiness when it's right here waiting for you."

"Yeah, I wouldn't mind being happy. Just smile, right?"

"NO, choose it, and then do the things that generate it. You can always smile, and that'll always help. But a smile is not happiness any more than money is."

"What are the things that generate it, if not the world around me?"

"That's what the Dharma is all about. Half of life, or more, is how you respond, what you choose, where you put your mind/heart, what you bring in, and what you send out. It's about you, not about this or any other world. For instance, a library is like heaven, so quiet and clean. Very few people are happy in libraries. The problem is inner turmoil and craving, not one's surroundings. Have you ever seen the people of Burma, like after Cyclone Nargis. What in the heck are they smiling about? Are they blind? The same in Africa, American prison, and you name your vision of hell."

"They're miserable, right?"

"No, that's the thing, not all of them. They're all there, but they're not all unhappy. How is that possible? It's proof that it's not about circumstances. If it were, then it would be easy to tell who's going to be happy and who is not. Karma is one thing, we choose that. But consequences are not what we're choosing, not directly; it's what we're experiencing. It's called the fruit (phala) and the mental resultants (vipaka). In Buddhism, good is called 'good' because it results in sukha (happiness, pleasure). Bad is called 'bad' because it results in dukkha (misery, suffering). It's not immediate but it works with amazing regularity. It's impersonal and doesn't care how it works out. It's not trying to teach you anything. It just reacts to your actions. So be happy; it's good for you and everyone else."

"How to be happy?"

"Karma, or action, is physical, of course -- a deed. Equally speaking, it's a word, a verbal deed. And it's a thought, a mental-deed. This is harder to understand. What you think affects things. It affects you immediately. How you look at things, what you expose yourself to, the grudges and views you hold, they're the foundation for your words and physical deeds."

"'As a man thinketh...' Carnegie or somebody once said."

"Yes, as you think, so you do. 'Free your mind, and your butt will follow.'" We laugh.

"How did the Buddha say it?"

"He said it very dramatically in twin verses, as the opening in the Dhammapada:

1. 'Mind (citta) is the forerunner of all conditions. Mind is their chief. They are mind-made. If one speaks or acts with a tainted mind (heart), because of that, sadness follows one, even as the wheel follows the hoof of an ox-drawn cart.'
2. "'Mind is the forerunner of all conditions. Mind is their chief. They are mind-made. If one speaks or acts with a pure bright mind, because of that, happiness follows one, even as one's shadow that never departs'" (Dhp I.1, I.2).