It seems to me there are two paths to most emotional “gestalts”, which work in tandem with one another. One is the Cognitive Behavioral Therapy approach, in which you consciously work to change thoughts and behaviors. You reinforce on a daily basis what you are grateful for. You have a gratitude jar, or a daily practice, or try to remind yourself as often as possible how many things are working, how much is going right, how much you take for granted that need not be there (food, sleep, companionship, work).
This in my view is a useful practice. I can say with certainty that “Learned Optimism” is one of the most useful books I have read, because it taught me a habit I have retained across many years of making the difficult temporary and local, and in assessing with great care both my actual responsibility for mistakes and failures, and emphasizing the degree of control I actually have.
At the same time, I would say that within my psychological worldview, anything short of radiant happiness, spontaneous gratitude, abundant health, and the ability for the effective work that always leads to success in a reasonably just society–such as we have had for some time, and which may yet survive Obama’s patent assaults on it–is a result of a sort of knot deep within the spiritual body or psyche. We are meant for happiness, but we tie ourselves up, we disrupt energy flows, we prevent the spontaneous emergence of order and everything that comes with it.
This is the level I am trying to work on. I can feel, at times, huge amounts of energy flowing from me in clouds, but I can’t maintain this. I shrink back, become sullen, irritable, fearful, none of which are attractive traits. I can and have tried to simply maintain a facade, but it doesn’t feel right for me. I feel like I am going to get stuck in a perma-smile of the sort one sees on long term car salesmen.
My sense is that gratitude is a natural result of unveiling a deeper wisdom. It comes naturally, unbidden.
The other day I had overindulged in drink the night before, and thankfulness came to me for my hangover, or what passes for one with me, my apparently substantial ability to process alcohol being what it is.
And it hit me that experiences all contain something interesting in them. I would use the metaphor of someone deeply thirsty drinking dirty water. It still tastes amazing, because you are thirsty. Likewise, that ability to react with glee, with happiness, is still latent even in a time when you are NOT thirsty.
Or imagine not having seen a human being for weeks. When you finally run into someone, will you not overlook virtually all their flaws, unless they out and out try to kill you? Was this capacity for appreciating human contact not already there?
Few thoughts.