Manifesto for 2012 and Beyond

A Manifesto for Happiness!

OK, so let’s get down to the basics. What really counts in life?

Your health and your happiness

Which means your life and the people you love – and maybe that they love you back?

Of course, you need a roof over your head, the clothes on your back and enough to live on...

But what else really counts? Everything else is incidental.

So much of what we long for really adds nothing to the value of our lives.

We become blind to this fact – or at least I became blind to it!

I don’t know when I started to want more. I know that several times I’ve deliberately chosen to step off the conveyor belt but somehow I seem to get sucked straight back onto it again without even realising it...

Or perhaps because I think it’s the only way to go

I’ve lost sight or lost faith in the other ways ahead...

Or I’ve tried to keep up with those around me who are heading that way – including those I love – I don’t want to be left behind!

And in doing so I start to drag others along with me – two little people firmly on that little conveyor belt and aspiring to all those things that seem to lie up ahead

But what are we heading towards? We are driven by fear, not by desire – fear to be left behind more than desire for those things that deep down we know are not really important at all...

So I have decided that 2012 is the year

The year in which I say “Enough is enough!”

I do not need more

I already have so much!

And I shall learn to LIVE with all that I have (and with all that I haven’t) and to be at peace.

And I shall do my best to pass that message on to all the people in my life.

My epitaph? She was herself. She brought light to our lives! She loved and was loved.

That is all. That is enough!

Does this resonate with you? Please share if it does! 

What to believe?

I am surrounded by believers of all manner of religions – as well as firm and vague non-believers, disbelievers, agnostics and atheists... With so many different influences and ideas to consider is it any wonder that so many of us feel confused?!

But quite apart from the sheer variety of choices on offer, what really baffles me is how so many of these people can become so attached to their particular point of view and really come to believe that theirs is the truth while all others are misguided, deceived or even evil...

I cannot find it in me to discount the views of others but in the end I fall back on my own instincts – that we all have goodness within us as well as the tendency to lapse into selfishness and thoughtlessness that can manifest itself in any number of ways.

When asked by my children on the way home from school about God and religion, I can only say that for me that god is love – and that what we all have in common is a deep, inborn capacity for love as well as a desire to be loved.

I am tempted – had I the time – to look at each religion or set of beliefs in turn and dissect them and find the goodness and the ridiculous in each. But I am sure that that has been done before – there must be countless books on the subject, and then again, who made me the final authority on the subject? Indeed, I do not believe that there is a final authority on this subject, as all the authorities tend to peddle their own particular viewpoint as supreme above all others.

What really matters is that each of us remembers to tap into our own source of goodness while we go about our daily lives and plan for our futures, bring up our children, or interact with others and the world around us. We remember the basic graces of thanks and appreciation that ensure a smooth ride in our interactions with others. We are all equal in spirit, no matter what hierarchies societies try to impose – we are no better or no worse than any other being and we all have an equal right to be here. But do not confuse equal with alike – we are all equal yet all unique – all different and individual.

The trouble starts the minute we forget this simple fact. So engrossed in our own, individual world we forget the worlds of others or see them as less important to us than our own, and in so doing we fail to accord the respect for their lives as we try to get an edge for ourselves and make our own journey more comfortable, all too often at others' expense.

So for today I shall endeavour to live with this in mind and treat everyone I meet with conscious respect in the fullest sense of the word – respect for them being who they are and their right to be that way, and detachment from an idea that I might have about how they should be any other way at all!

I shall report back in due course if I have anything meaningful to share, but in the meantime please share your thoughts with me and the ether...

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