Man sitting patiently on bench in sunset

Patience Is To Be Calm

Enjoy The Pursuit Of Happiness

Surrender and celebrate what happens. With patience I find I am calm in the face of a pandemic sweeping the world. My acceptance and calmness is unexpected but powerful.

I have learned to surrender and celebrate what happens. I celebrate the results as they take me to unexpected places. My acceptance and calmness is unexpected but my reaction improves in the situation.

Feeling Calm

I am six weeks into the lockdown in Spain, and I feel strangely comforted by my patience. Why when we are subject to the severest restrictions I have ever encountered? The Coronavirus pandemic is sweeping its way across the world leaving Covid-19 patients in its wake. Many people are scared and even more people are either angry or fed-up. They are either buying into the alarmist response from the media or they simply do not like being told what to do. They have no patience.

Normally I am one of the latter people. My life has been littered with my rages against those trying to force me to do something I do not want to do. It has seemed sensible to be this way otherwise totalitarianism takes over and we lose our rights and freedoms. You can see this response every day in the USA at the moment. The right-wing Trump supporters hate being told that government, of any type, knows better than they do.

Yet right now I feel calm and happy with the way the Spanish government is exercising absolute control over how we should all react to the the spread of the virus. It is not that they are necessarily getting it all right, they are not. But they are being open and logical in their approach. They seem to be exercising compassion and understanding, as far as they are able to. They certainly have a handle on things and are now showing some hopeful and positive results.

But that is not why I feel calm about what is happening. The calmness is coming from within me and is about how I feel about life these days.

My life is developing a spiritual depth that it never had before. This is happening without me even making it happen. I have come to the realisation that life—my life as well as life in general—is about more than me and my concerns. This is such a shift from how it used to be. In my mind I was the most important person in my life, and I had to make sure that this continued to be.

Patience is not the ability to wait. Patience is to be calm no matter what happens, constantly take action to turn it to positive growth opportunities, and have faith to believe that it will all work out in the end while you are waiting.

Roy Bennett

My Life is Unimportant

The shift has created a situation where my life is actually unimportant, to me or anyone else. I love my life but I am now happy to let be part of the flow of life. This does not remove any agency from how I live my life, but it does subsume that into the general flow from Spirit.

I have learned to surrender and celebrate what happens when I do that. I celebrate the results as they take me to unexpected places. Where I am now is unexpected. My acceptance and calmness is unexpected. But I hope that my reaction contributes to the improvement in the general situation.

How does this improvement come about? Firstly I am not a burden or an interference in the fight to contain the virus and its consequent disease. Secondly by my energy of positive resignation contributing to the overall uplighting of the reaction to what is going on.

Whatever the situation I am using the time to do more writing, and that can only have a positive result.

So here's to the future improvement in the current situation and to my calm acceptance of it so I can find happiness.

The Pursuit of Happiness

Reading Brendon Burchard's book 'The Charge' I came across this,

Nothing, and I mean nothing, provides a greater charge in life than a lit-up love life. Psychologists have found that the happiest 10 percent of people on earth have one thing in common: they all have rich, fulfilling social lives and intimate relationships.

This seems to be a great focus for men, a way to help them seek the answers to how to love and find happiness. Perhaps the need and desire for happiness will move men to find ways to improve their intimate relationships.

But how can men create happiness in their lives? I suggest that the following 10 ways can be used as a starting point to achieve happiness. I dare you to practice them and see where it leads:

The Pursuit Of Happiness – How Men Can Be Happy

1. Relationship

Creating social connections opens you out into the world and helps you see where you stand as a man. This brings personal growth, contributing to your self-esteem and therefore your happiness. Intimate relationships create the most happiness through their combination of emotional and physical energy.

2. Achievement

Whether it is through work or other pursuits, achievement ranks high on any man's list. Living life to your full potential is enormously satisfying when it is directed towards fulfilling your purpose. Adding creativity to the mix makes this extremely powerful.

3. Positive Thinking

Focusing your mind on positive thoughts shifts how your brain works. Living a life of acceptance and gratitude enables you to see the best in people, including yourself. This brings about a level of contentment that allows the troubles of the world to recede in importance.

4. Freedom

When the pursuit of freedom allows and seeks freedom for all it is powerful. Choice is an essential element that sees its main expression in self-control. The exercising of control over yourself, rather than others, is a hallmark of justice.

5. Contribution

Seeking to express yourself through what you do for others has always been as sign of a man. Giving either yourself or your abundance to others with humility moves you towards a sense of oneness. The ability to feel that oneness gives you a sense of yourself in context.

6. Empathy

Empathy comes from vulnerability, from a willingness to step forward and understand others before yourself. It comes from a willingness to give with no thought for any return. Love has empathy at its core.

7. Movement

Exercise creates endorphins, making you feel good. Filling your body with oxygen through deep breathing creates a feeling of energy. The flexibility that comes from good exercise produces a sense of lightness and happiness.

8. Stillness

In contrast the ability to be still can produce a deep sense of yourself, a deep sense of your inner core. Through meditation and mindfulness you can let the world fade away while you connect with yourself. This can bring such a sense of peace that there can be nothing to interfere with your happiness.

9. Authenticity

The ability to not only be yourself but also to be seen to be yourself is a key component of authenticity. When you trust and are trusted you are respected by others. Respect in a quiet way, respect with a sense of gratitude that you put others before yourself. Being authentic takes courage and authenticity, exposing everything and showing all aspects of your character.

10. Confidence

When you practice these you will feel confidence in a powerful way. Using that confidence intelligently you can pursue the ambitions you have for yourself and those you have a responsibility for, be they friends, family or colleagues. The leadership you show, the leadership they bestow on you, will create a happiness that encourages to go further, enables you to create more.

Happiness

Happiness is often portrayed as a light, simple concept. One that merely involves laughter and enjoyment. Whilst they are vital components they do not show a full picture. The Pursuit of Happiness can be done but there are many factors to it.