Imagine, if one day, the sun was bewildered, and asked the people on Earth “I want fire.”
What would one think of the sun?
Does it not know, it is an oozing ball of flames? Why does the sun need fire when it is fire itself?
Imagine, if a wave in the ocean said, I want water.
Does it not realize that it is an ever-flowing stream of water?
Yet we, as divine beings fail to see who we are and continue to feel like the circle that completes us is broken. We believe that we want something that will make us happy without realizing that we are happiness itself.
Many philosophers have said that happiness is found within. So, we are conditioned to believe that joy is within us. I am here to tell you that these states of being happy, content, or at peace band together with the same concept of defining one’s identity.
· I am Happiness
· I am Contentment
· I am Peacefulness
· I am Leadership
· I am Divinity…
Let me try and define the unlimited source of happiness that we are…
The man who was granted eternity
During the late Middle Ages, specifically in the year 1389, Dream walked into a pub with his sister, Death. There, at a table nearby, they overheard a man named Hob Gadling talk about the tragedies inflicted by death.
Hob: “Look, I’ve seen death. I lost half my village to the Black Death. I fought under Buckingham in Burgundy. It’s not like I don’t know what death is. Death is… Stupid.”
Another friend at the table: “You’re a fool, Hob.”
Hob: “Nobody has to die. The only reason people die is… is ‘cause everyone does it. You all just go along with it. But not me. I’ve made up my mind. I’m not going to die.”
Friend: “Hob, death comes for every man.”
Hob: “You don’t know that. I might get lucky. There’s always a first time. There’s so much to do, so many things to see…”
Dream, surprised at the man’s foolishness to think he could escape Death wonders why any mortal human would want to live forever. Wouldn’t they want death as a permanent escape from the disasters and tragedies of life, losing a loved one, and putting someone out of their misery? So, he turns to his sister and asks her a question.
Dream (watching from afar): “Why would any sensible creature crave an eternity of this?”
Death: “You could find out. I could grant him his wish.”
Dream: “Do that, and he will be begging for death within a century, I assure you.”
So, Death grants the man eternity, which means that the man never dies and always stays young. Dream walks up to the man and challenges him that he will see what happens to Hob and how he feels by the end of the next hundred years.
Year 1489:
So, a century later, Dream met Hob at the same pub to talk about how he felt and whether he would have death instead.
Hob gets into the business of printing. Dream asks him what his life is like now.
Hob: “All right, I’ll tell you what it’s like. It’s brilliant.” Smiles in amazement, “It’s all changing.”
Dream: “In what way?”
Hob: “Chimneys. Not having your eyes watering all the time from the smoke. And now we have these little cloth pieces for your nose. In the old days, we just used our sleeves. Oh, and playing cards.”
Dream: “So, you still want to live?”
Hob: “Oh, yes.”
Year 1589:
Hob becomes a Knighthood, and his name is modified to Sir Robert Gadlen who earns a good fortune in his time.
Hob: “That’s not all. Here…” Hob pulls out a painted picture of his wife and first son, “My fair Eleanor and little Robyn. My first son, born in over 200 years on this earth. It’s funny. This is what I always dreamed Heaven would be like, way back. It’s safe to walk the streets. Enough food. Good wine. Life is so rich.”
Year 1689:
Hob becomes homeless and loses his family. As it is the next hundred years and it is time to meet his friend, he barges into the pub while the restaurant staff tries to push him out.
Dream: “Let him be. He is my guest.”
Hob grabs a chair and sits next to Dream. Drinks some wine and eats the bread in front of him, voraciously.
Hob: “I knew you’d be here. Do you know how hungry a man can get? If he doesn’t die but he doesn’t eat? I lost it all. My land, my gold, my Eleanor; She died in childbirth, the baby too. My boy, Robyn, died in a tavern when he was 20. I didn’t go out much after that. They tried to drown me as a witch. I’ve lived there 40 years, overconfident…. Then it got worse and worse, and… worse. I’ve hated every second of the last 80 years, every second.”
Dream: “So, do you still wish to live?”
Hob: “Are you crazy?… Death is a mug’s game. I’ve got so much to live for.”
And so, the years continue upon Hob’s insatiable hunger for life. 1789, 1889, 1989, and so on. Dream meets him century after century, to learn more about the human way.
This was an interesting chapter where the fictional characters in The Sandman written by Neil Gaiman played a unique role of the beyond. A realm where humans never went but Hob Gadling experienced a gift of eternity given by Death herself. Hob embodied the stubbornness of happiness in this chapter.
If you look closely, Hob was a man who lived for so long, well beyond what regular human years can endure, that Dream was waiting on him to say, ‘Please God, bless me with death’. But Hob never asked for death, not even in his darkest times when he had lost everyone and everything.
For Dream, this side of Hob was interesting compared to other people who craved immortality but after a point of time, wouldn’t want it anymore.
Such is the role of happiness. Its unlimited source cannot be snuffed out like the flame of a candle in a blazing wind.
Transcending mind-made limitations doesn’t mean you stop being yourself. On the contrary, you become more yourself than ever before.
~Steve Ross
Are we what we want or what we already are but cannot see or feel?
To Want, To Be
Here is a little secret of life that is not so much a secret but just waiting outside the door of ignorance. Unlock and open this door, and you will find realization. This realization will say, you are what you want.
Therefore, it is not like you lack something but it is what one already is but cannot realize.
A client who recently approached me was talking about how he wanted to achieve certain objectives in his life. ‘I want this, I want that’ – was the direction of our conversation. He talked about how he was disappointed with the way things were going in his leadership journey. He felt like his circle of completion had broken as he lacked a few specific aspects in his life.
I often find it interesting when people lead themselves to believe that they are lacking in certain aspects. Their idea of lacking may be true in the reality of the physical transactions of this world. However, in spirit, it is possible in every way.
What would it feel like if a wave asked for water or if the sun asked for fire?
It would seem that the request is made by elements that have not yet realized their identity.
The core of you is you, your being is your identity. It is just a matter of leveraging realization to help you shift in your journey from ‘I want’ to ‘I have’ to ‘I am’.
When you HAVE something, it is in your possession. An object that can be separated from you. You may own it but also lose it, you may control it or it may control you. You may have a red car but may sell it the next day. You may be happy because you have someone who makes you feel happy, but what if this special person left you?
Then the happiness that you experienced is gone. But there is a permanence to happiness when you are HAPPINESS itself.
You don’t become happy, you are Happiness.
~Krescon Coaches
That said, BEING refers to a deeper connection. One where you identify with the characteristic or concept of things. What you think you don’t have is already who you are and it connects with your inner qualities, beliefs, and skills. It is part of your essence or nature. You are the core of your being.
Therefore, when you come upon this realization, there is no further search for happiness, for solutions, or for anything that makes you feel like you are incomplete. You are complete!
However, my dear friends, it may not be entirely possible for me to illustrate this concept of being or explain it to you in one newsletter. Just like Dream and Hob, we may meet some time or somewhere during our leadership journeys together where I can share the depth of who one is and never lacks.
So, you operate from a state of ‘I Am’
· I am Happiness
· I am Peacefulness
· I am Contentment
· I am Divinity
Therefore, just like happiness, WHAT YOU ARE is a commitment to yourself. It’s like this song called Happiness by Rex Orange County, a few lyrics of which could also mean YOUR ‘BEING’ asking for your commitment to believe that you are!
I’ll be the one that stays till the end
And I’ll be the one that needs you again
And I’ll be the one that proposes in a garden of roses
And truly loves you long after our curtain closes
