Happiness Is To Be

This story has a happy ending. It just didn't start out that way. I don't think anyone's story ever started out that way. But that's how any story goes. Mine isn't quite different. I think it would be easier to describe my situation based of prior analysis of it. I've got a lot of experience under my belt as a twenty year old American male, with nothing but a pure intention to be free from all mental and physical sufferings. This story is about just that, going through various mental and physical sufferings of many kinds. And I don't mean in the external sense as I'm working hard in a field generating energy and getting pain. I'm talking about introspection through insight of Vipassana Meditation. So I guess I'll just go out and say that I never knew anything in my life would get the way it did as it is now, or at least I didn't plan for it to become like it is now. The truth is that I don't think anyone "plans" for their lives to become how they are, they just seem to become that way. I think my version of that tale is that, I've always felt different in the sense that my physical body and mind have some very different modes of perception which have made my experience not relative to others who seem to stray and sway in the directions towards the highest desirable. To me, I have felt like an outsider of fun and wholesome activity. I have felt like a viewer of the lens through which is so thick that I am trapped in it's view and I can't get out of it's file of vision. I feel stuck with the same old pair of glasses that won't come off no matter how I try to pull or blink them off. I've been told this is because of a Bi-polar disorder. I was diagnosed at a behavioral center when I was 17 years old after a hardship at a college dorm. I was so tired and upset at a certain time in my life, that I was willing to smoke weed and become numb to everything that was happening to me. That was the wrong thing to do, so everything has become jaded. Jaded in the sense that behind this body and mind I have, there is about 10 years of negative exploration of some sort of problem within myself. Some sort of disease or word to call suffering, which has dulled my perception of being able to cope with everyday life the same as others. How many days will you live life happily if you are told you are different, and diseased. You need to be medicated in order to function, and your emotions are a result of some problematic dysfunction within the brain. What a load of junk. To tell this to these young kids who know nothing of mind or matter, who go one helplessly and eventually fall victim to these accusations of disease calling. Like the child on the playground with a dirty mouth, calling one name or the other. How long will American society see people as a disease and not as divine? Where does the human become a life and not a dying? We seem to adopt words and mental formulations to our habits and routines. I could easily be called dysfunctional in my behavior because of a circumstance within the family life, but the reverse could also be explained thoroughly. A son acts unjustly out of passion against the injustice within the home life and decides to take alms in his own mind and his own desire of purity. The father becomes angry and the mother becomes depressed. The siblings distract themselves with games and entertainment as if nothing were happening, and the dogs roll on the floor as if one more day of belly rubbing will put them in the right mind of perfect happiness. There must be a line where enough is enough. If there isn't a line, then there must be a felling. If not a felling then there must be a sensation. I think this is what S. N. Goenka, the main discourse teacher of Vipassana Meditation is saying. In the life, the mind, in reaction to experiences of people and situations, reacts with craving and aversion towards what is pleasant and unpleasant. This habit reaction creates our misery at the deepest level of our minds, and every day, day and night we become miserable over and over again. Rolling in the same old misery of mind. This habit has been learned, so why can't we become unlearned through this condition? It seems logical that we can easily adopt perceptions and attitudes. Why not just as easily could we come out of this conditioning to become objective and abstract like the Buddha? Where does the mind stop rolling in more misery? Is it the pursuit of happiness which keeps the mind rolling in misery or is there an actual chemical, sensational reaction happening which we're not seeing on the surface. My difficulty lies in my past. The fruit of my past is very strong, potent misery. I have been suffering from an uncontrollable headache for over 8-months and I feel like I've probably reacted and acted in every way possible to do what would be logical for a person to come out of this misery. Yet it still persists and here I am trying to explain my thoughts of over half a year of endless suffering of physical pain. I ask for help from various people, and they give me completely diverse and different explanations of thoughts which have their own roots. Psychology has it's roots in disease, and Western medicine the same. Eastern Philosophy in their spiritual teachings and entities which are invisible, and then the scientific, objective view of Vipassana. The cause and effect of past mental reactions are the result of the present, and the future, which is a child of our past, is up for us to master. This difficulty has set me back a few steps in life. It's like getting punches over and over, and still keeping your teeth clenched no matter how awful the blows get. The first punch was being told that I had a life long disease called Bi-polar disorder, the second punch was mental impurity of aversion realized through deep insight in Vipassana meditation, Then the head busting 8-month long headaches which made me so miserable day and night I would actually lay awake at night staring at the ceiling questioning weather my life was worth living, and if having a headache every day was enough to die. These three punches to my gut have left me very distraught throughout my days. Because of the roots of all of these views, and their foundations. The Bi-polar theory has it's root in Western medicine, which is based on disease and sickness of the body. Vipassana meditation comes from ancient masters of perfection two thousand years ago who were the perfect models of perfection our world has ever known. So both trains of thought stimulate two very different perspectives of life. One is rooted in birth, death, disease, funerals, dying, sickness, coffins, football, entertainment, culture, habits, and philosophies. The other comes from the wisdom of thousands of people who have experienced the bliss of enlightenment and detachment of nirvana. The difference is that Western Medicine has no model to look at to compare what is not diseased and what is. They only see the human body and it's sickness. Eastern philosophy characterizes the entire physical being as a spiritual, divine being of light which has the capability of full spiritual development. So which path to take, the one that explains that I am going to have a life that is full of disease, misery, suffering, and death, or one that promises that through my handwork and introspection, wisdom will purify my mind at the deepest level and I can experience life without at lens. Without these chains and bondages of mental formulations and mental habits. I think I'll choose the former. But I want you to know this story of coming to this decision means I've let go of the first view, and so long with it all it's containing factors and little details. The people who exist in the society of this view, their families who have destined themselves to this belief, and all the thousands of people who still to this day believe that entertainment and food will bring them to infinite bliss and enlightenment. I think I'll remain equanimous throughout this transition of the clash of views. I'm not going to be part of a play just because everyone else is playing the characters on it's stage. I can watch it from within as just that, a drama or soap box. It's too bad our T.V. inspired, mass media culture has trained everyone's eyes to seek pleasure, because it's such a long road back away from pleasure. Pleasure and pain are so closely linked together. I hope you see this and are done riding the roller coaster. It's time to come back to the calmness that comes from within. It's time to drop the external false belief that happiness is an external, perceptional experience. Happiness is to be attained in the highest through destroying mental conditioning. This is the wisdom. I hope sharing this has helped someone or anyone. If anything it's helped me.