concepts

What is your equation of Happiness?

2 +2 = 4

1+1+1+1= 4

3+1 + 4

5- 1 + 4

And many other equations would result into a 4 .  The number ‘4’ stands for what? Suppose it stands for your happiness; then which equation will suit you? If I write the same equations in another form, will it be better understood- Let’s see

Wealth + rich relationship = happiness

Spending + Income + parents+ friends = happiness

Sound, wealthy, rich background + health = happiness

(Educated, rich, healthy, liberal family with some abuses) – abuses = happiness

Your equation of ‘happiness’ might be one of the above equations, or it could be completely different from what I have suggested.

Not only this, you might give different weight to different aspects that would eventually define your happiness. For example,

50% wealth + 50% rich relationship = 100% happiness

30%spending+ 30%income+ 20%parents+ 20%friends = happiness

70% sound wealthy rich background + 30% friends = happiness

10 % educated wealthy rich liberal family without  90% abuses = happiness

Thus it depends on you how much weight or importance you give to your ingredients that form a full picture of happiness for you.

Never the less, it also depends on the right time. You get all well when it is according to the right situation; otherwise it will not be equal to true happiness. Astonishingly, for most of the time, we are not aware of our true equation of happiness; rather we only know when we are happy and when we aren’t. We cannot define our feelings and justify them properly.

If the above is true, you could well imagine how similar you and your friends definitions of the concepts ( HAPPINESS, LOVE, PEACE, HEALTH, WEALTH, COMFORT, CRAZY, FRIENDS, SOUL MATE, SELFISH, HELPFUL, NICE, ROMANTIC, PLEASANT, ANNOYING, IRRITATING, HATERED, STUPIDITY, SHARING, CARING, ETC.) could be!

What We Perceive In Happy Mood?

We all have different kinds of aspirations, perceptions and beliefs. There are many theories about how we form them, modify and re-establish them for our purposes. Among several theories one is that we make them instantly, indirectly, and unconsciously while experiencing a unique situation or event.  This kind of concept usually becomes the base for other future concepts that would be added into it step by step from time to time. Now consider the following concrete examples for clarity purposes:

  1.   Suppose you are happy and in uplifted mood. On the way back to your home, you see a grand parent coming across your way. You smile for a while and he replies with warmth and a nice gesture. You are again on your way to home.
  2. Suppose you are happy and in great unusual spirit due to some reason. Meanwhile, your friends invite you to join to watch a movie in cinema. You go with them and watch the movie (otherwise a boring stuff for you). You come back with the same mood indeed.
  3. Suppose you are incredibly happy and in a pleasant mood. You go for a walk and do little shopping. You enter a shop and the sales person smiles at you with warmth and welcoming gestures. You roam about and come back.

In the first example, the person who came across an old man in the happiest mood ever, would never be able to forget that man in his life. Whenever he would meet someone resembling like him, he would feel a strange kind feelings and love for him. He might have forgotten the reason for that!

In the second example, the person who watched a boring movie in a real great mood, would never be able to forget that movie.  He is more likely to remember all details with good impressions than criticizing and forgetting. Those impressions are now part of that person and he is less likely to believe in the real cause of liking that movie!

In the third example, the person who meets another person while feeling great pleasant emotions would never be able to dislike that specific person. Rather he would go to that shop repeatedly unconsciously. He would love the sales persons of that shop and environment of that shop overall while ignoring the real cause of his liking.

In all of the above examples, things that convey no meanings in it self become specific and significant due to our unconscious emotional life pace. We are likely to behave better in a better mood, and we usually receive all good in return that become part of our personality eventually. So the circle of happy feelings continue to flourish and grow.

With our happy moods, negative experiences are also likely to depress and dim in degree. We usually do not pay much attention to negative people, negative circumstances or negative environment in our happiest ever moments. In rare times, negative events spoil all our happy taste, but that means that negative event has much more potential to destroy our mood than happy ones.

When You Perceive A Negative Belief In The Name Of Positivity

Positivity is a universal trait and a common factor to enhance our well being all over the world. Every day we learn about positivity and try to adopt it as much as possible in our day to day life. We love to be called as positive parents, couples, children and positive members of our society. We by all means, fight with our negativity and try our best to achieve an acceptable level of  resilience. It is our utmost aim to live a happy, positive and successful life.

Unfortunately, our positivity is not a real positive thing  rather a cultural belief. In some of the cultures of this world, people are suffering from their positive (unnatural and false) attitudes.  For example, in the traditional societies of Pakistan, there are many beliefs that are thought as positive and people love to hold them as a symbol of pride and honour whereas they are a source of grief, anxiety, and depression for the other group of people.

Consider the following examples for clarification purpose:

In Pakistan:

  • It is very common to wish a baby boy for a young couple as boys are thought as superior than girls.
  • Baby girls are thought as guests in their own home. It is very much acceptable belief that a girl’s own home is settled after her marriage.
  • They are usually given less priority in almost all affairs compared to boys. It is very common norm to say exclusively to girls to eat after the boys and serve the others.
  • Some household chores like doing dishes, cleaning pots, washing, and dusting, are reserved for girls due to their very nature (low-degree jobs).
  • Many things like riding a bike, playing in a park, running a shop, riding a bike and dressing up like boys, are thought as boys things so the girls are not allowed to do that.
  • Most of the families do not allow girls to select their partner and they consider it a matter of their honor.
  • On the birth of a baby girl, mothers could be divorced, beaten, or verbally emotionally severely abused.
  • Some professions are taken as reserved for girls only (teaching, medical, and artistic) otherwise boys can join any profession they like to be in.
  • A girl has to obey her husband throughout her life (irrespective of his cruelty, tortures and abuses), as divorce is thought as a stigma on a girl’s life.

People do not accept the right of living alone for their girls as it is  too a matter of honor and dignity.

The list is never ending indeed. My purpose is not to highlighting the discrimination against women in Pakistan, rather to emphasize the idea that some of the cultural things are taken as a symbol of pride, honor and respect; people adopt them and feel happy in adopting them blindly as a part of their culture. They have no idea that their acceptance of cruelty would make the counter parts sick, dumb and vulnerable, susceptible, and unfortunate.

In the light of the above examples, girls feel extremely low self-esteem, decreased level of self-worth, lowest level of self-respect, and lose their self confidence in studies, social life, and after that in professional life. They feel homesick in the company of their own parents, they feel rejected and ignored at home and in society, they feel less powerful in the practical life ahead and in the end they compromise for the sake of their own family – usually children.

What is so positive in the eyes of the public (it is better for girls to stay at home) is not a fair decision. What is  so acceptable among society members (girls are guests in their own homes) is making our half of the population feel homeless and homesick. What is taken as a symbol of honor (you are the mother of boys) is making the daughters feel miserable and less worthy. What is  thought as girls’  sole responsibility (to perform exclusively household duties) is an example of severe gender discrimination.  What is  so common and good tradition of our culture (girls leave their parents on wedding day and live at the mercy of their husband and in laws forever) is making our daughters feel segregated and helpless in many ways. Indeed, these are all rubbish ideas, wrong theories, and false practices established in the dark ages when people lived in caves and had no education at all.

My stance is that one must not accept all the positivity blindly until or unless it is proved that the idea is worth accepting as a positive idea. One culture might involve something negative in the name of positivity. It is not always enough to say that hundreds of thousands of people are following one thing so the thing is worth following. NO. Sometimes, a wrong thing is followed by a large group of people, but the thing is wrong indeed. Thus, it is up to you whether you accept the idea as a positive one or reject it as it is. When a positive idea is positive, it spreads positivity. On the other side, when a negative idea is supported by most people and thought as a positive one- it will generate negativity, discrimination, inequality and resentment. There is no such universal formula that could define what is negativity and what is positivity – but you can save yourself from such messages through a severe negation as they stop you from being active, confident, successful, energetic, passionate, vibrant, creative, professional, empowered, assertive, decisive, happy and lively.

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The Secret Behind Your Choice!

Why the Nice biscuits are nice? I do not know if you think they are nice. Anyhow, there could be several reasons for them to be nice :

  • They are sweet
  • They are inexpensive
  • They are available
  • Some has brought them for you
  • Being a child, your mother used to offer them to you
  • Your friend likes them
  • You eat them for your stomach need
  • You think they are light
  • You think they are different in shape
  • You think they taste different
  • You think your mother likes them
  • You got them as a reward

Continue reading →

Do We Perceive Moral Values As Per Our Will?

What we Misperceive through our eyes, is not always restricted to our eyes. You must have seen many optical illusions in your life that represent different perceptions for different people. Nobody is sure for their reality. They change their perception even for the same person. Strange! But it is true. If you have no idea of illusions, then click the link below to learn more about illusions.

http://www.michaelbach.de/ot/

Today my focus is not on illusions rather the secret behind those illusions. First consider the following examples:

  1. Have you ever read a word according to your own mental picture- rice for price, money for enemy, sex for best and many others.
  2. People comment on the same product that vary a lot. For some it is amazing and for others it is disgusting.
  3. For one color, different people have different opinions. Some adore a color and some hate the same!

Thus we can conclude that we have different perceptions of the same phenomena at the same time. Even we change our perception with respect to a little change in time, our experience or age. One idea is brilliant for one person, and the same idea is shit for the other one. One article is worth reading for one, and the same article is rubbish for the other one. One man is the real leader for one party and the same man is a big joke for the other one. We have thousand examples to quote in this regard.

In spite of all that, we cannot say that a man is a women, a killer is a good man, a rapist is at right cause, a child is not innocent, a robbery is appreciable and all other examples alike.

There must be some limit in perceiving a thing in our own way. We can say that we love someone because of his smartness and others can say that they love the same person for his intellect but we cannot say that we love someone because of his cruelty.

In the moral world, things are more complicated and more illusions exist than any other field of life. One moral quote is perceived differently among different people. Usually people act upon moral education as per their own perceptual understanding of that moral thought. They use the context they think is suitable for that quote. They verify the quote in their own brain and act on that according to their own standard.

For example: honestly is the best policy. Now see how people apply this quote in their lives differently while thinking that they are following the message in the same way others are using.

  • A person pays the right amount to his workers and makes sure that there should not be any penny  up or down.
  • Second person thinks he should not get a leave while making any fake excuse.
  • Third person thinks he should not take advantage of his company rules.
  • Fourth thinks, he should be honest in front of his wife and should not hid his feelings at any cost.
  • Fifth one thinks he should not earn a huge profit from the things he is selling- normal profit is OK.
  • Sixth one thinks one should not advertise wrong traits of his products to market them at large level.
  • Another one thinks one should not tell a lie to his family about his income.

There are countless examples to quote.  The crux is that when we start perceiving some information, we interpret it in our own brain, in our own unique way, and apply in our particular circumstance. We definitely perceive very uniquely and claim that we are perceiving something like others. Whereas our perception is very unique by all means. The same concept, the other person is applying in some other field of life and claiming that the concept is his favorite one.

Therefore, belonging to the same religion, we behave differently, react differently, adapt differently to different circumstances, and feel differently on similar occasions. We think we are following the same education and moral values, but our perception is different. The way we adopt the teachings, is very much contrasting to others.

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