The Pursuit Of Inner Peace: The Contentment Journey

Welcome to the Happiness Podcast.

I'm Dr.

Robert Puff.

I'm going to share something with you that,

Though it may be hard to hear,

If you're able just to listen and really go with me through this podcast,

I'm hoping you'll find what I share right now,

Even though it sounds almost unconscionable,

You're willing to open up your heart and say,

Maybe there's some truth in what he's saying.

If you chose to listen to this podcast,

There's a high probability that you want to make your life better.

Yet,

There's so many obstacles that get us in the way of finding peace and happiness in our hearts.

Right now,

You might be going through a divorce,

And divorce is hard on us.

Right now,

You might be unemployed,

And being unemployed is very challenging.

Right now,

Someone you love,

Dearly love,

May be suffering,

Perhaps even dying,

And it's so challenging to go through these times.

Or perhaps,

Even you are personally facing some very difficult health choices that are causing fear and trepidation in your heart because you don't know the outcome.

But here's the hard part that may be difficult to hear.

The circumstances in which you are struggling right now aren't that relevant.

What is relevant when it comes to happiness and peace in your hearts is how we engage with these challenges.

Of course,

When we face challenges,

We're going to do everything in our power to try to rectify them,

Try to make them better,

See if we can fix them.

But the truth of it is,

If we want to be at peace,

If we want to find happiness in our hearts,

Even in these difficult times,

We have to at some point say,

I accept this challenge and I may not be able to fix it,

And that's okay.

But that last statement I made is so challenging.

And yet,

Acceptance,

Contentment are the key component of a peaceful life,

Of a happy life.

Because the truth of it is,

We all face challenges,

Yes,

In differing degrees,

But we do face them often throughout our lives.

And the difference between a person who faces challenges and struggles and a person who faces challenges with equanimity and contentment is the latter will still do things to improve their lives,

But when they realize at this moment there's nothing they can do,

Then they just rest and say,

Okay,

Right now I accept this challenge,

I embrace this challenge,

And I will find joy and happiness even with this very difficult thing I'm facing right now.

And instead of putting all of our energy into worrying about,

Fretting,

Being obsessed over this challenge that's before us,

We look around for the beauty and the wonder in our lives,

Which is always there.

There's just always something we can be with,

And we let go of our need to change the challenges of our life right now.

It doesn't mean tomorrow morning we'll get up and do something to rectify it,

But right now at this moment,

When there is nothing we can do,

We take a deep breath and we just work on living with what's before us,

Accepting what we are facing right now and looking for the beauty that is there.

There's just always something beautiful to be with.

We struggle,

We suffer because we're fighting life.

We scream out to the universe,

To God,

And say,

This isn't fair.

Why are you doing this?

Stop,

Please stop.

And yet,

If we really want to find peace in our hearts and contentment in our lives,

We need to stop fighting that.

We cannot win.

We need to relax and then look at ways to say,

I accept this.

I embrace this.

But Dr.

Puff,

What if I'm going through a divorce?

But Dr.

Puff,

What if my child is dying?

But Dr.

Puff,

I don't have a job right now,

And I'm not sure how I'm going to support my family.

I know these are the hardest times to find contentment,

But even in these moments,

We can.

Again,

It doesn't mean that we don't tomorrow morning get up and do things that we can make things better in our lives.

But at this moment,

When there truly is nothing we can do,

We focus on living,

On being alive,

On finding the joy and beauty in our lives.

It may be only the sun shining on our face as we go outdoors,

But that only is a big only.

There are just so many beautiful things when we let go of our attachments that things have to go a certain way.

And instead we say,

I realize there's so much I don't have control over,

But the one thing no one can take away from me that I am in complete control over is how I choose to engage mentally with my thoughts,

With the things that are happening in my life right now.

Yes,

I can focus on the darkness,

On the pain,

On the suffering that I'm going through,

Or I can focus on the things that are still the gifts that God is giving me.

Because I believe we are loved in so many different ways.

And life has this ability to always give us sunshine when it's very dark outside.

We just have to look for it and we have to pay attention to our thoughts because our thoughts are what are causing us to suffer right now.

And when we realize that,

We realize that we really don't need to make that many changes in our lives.

What we need to change is how our thoughts are engaging with what's happening in our lives right now.

Are we fighting life?

Are we screaming out at the universe and saying this is not fair?

Is it fair when it happens to someone else,

But it's not fair when it happens to us?

Everyone goes through life with challenges.

If we live long enough,

We will go through bodily aches and pains of getting older,

But that doesn't mean we have to suffer.

The suffering comes from what labels,

What thoughts,

What attachments we create about what's happening in our lives.

When we say this isn't fair,

This is wrong,

It may be,

But giving that energy,

Feeding that can cause us to suffer.

Instead,

We say,

What can we do to fix this?

How can we make this better?

But when we can't,

And there's a lot of things in life that we really cannot change,

Then we say,

Okay,

How do I embrace the fact that I'm a five foot four man and other men around me aren't as tall as I am,

Or I'm a woman who has a thyroid problem,

And right now I'm struggling with being overweight?

How do we learn to love that person that we may not be able to change at all in the circumstances that we're going through?

It's all about how we interpret it,

And when we interpret it with equanimity,

With peace,

With acceptance,

What we'll find is our hearts will get lighter,

They'll get softer,

And we'll see all around us the beauty.

I say this so often,

There's really always something beautiful to be with.

You may have heard this story before,

But there was a man that lived in prison,

Solitary confinement for many,

Many years,

And when he finally got out,

He got together with his old friends and said,

You know what I discovered,

Is how beautiful it could be seeing the sunshine just creak through the window above me.

I learned to see the beauty even in the darkness.

I'm in no way negating that our challenges aren't challenges,

They are,

But what makes us unhappy,

What makes us not find peace in our hearts is the fact that we're fighting these challenges.

It doesn't mean we can't try to make them better,

But when we fight them to the point that they cause us discontent because we're screaming out,

This isn't fair,

This isn't right,

It may not be right,

It may not be fair,

But what are we going to do to make our lives shine?

We're going to find the beauty that's still there.

There is just always something beautiful to be with.

Our energy should go towards that.

The truth of it is,

When we're going through challenges,

Maybe 10% of our time and energy should be going towards rectifying the challenge that we're going through.

90% of our time should be correcting,

Modifying,

Changing our attitude,

And working towards acceptance,

Working towards contentment,

Even as we go through this challenge,

Because the truth of it is,

Which we all know,

That we all go through challenges.

It is part of our human condition.

Are we going to truly spend our lives fighting what is just part of life?

Because people do,

They really do.

That's why so many people in life suffer,

But we don't have to suffer.

Yes,

There's going to be pain,

But pain is just the experience of life.

Suffering is a story that we put onto that pain.

When we're unhappy,

It isn't about the pain,

It's about the suffering.

If we are causing the suffering,

Then we have the ability to heal it,

Because it isn't the events that are causing us to suffer,

It's our thoughts.

The way we're saying,

This isn't fair,

This isn't right,

That's what causes us to suffer.

If we don't want to suffer,

We need to stop doing that and do these things instead.

We need to practice gratitude for the things that we do have in our lives that are good.

There are always good things in our lives,

Always.

I don't care how dark,

How bleak life seems,

There's always something beautiful that life is giving us.

The other thing is just being mindful,

Being present.

Get out of the thoughts,

Get out of the thinking,

And be present with what's before us right now.

When we focus our attention 100% on what's before us and stop getting stuck in the past or worrying about the future,

We'll find that our hearts get lighter,

They get more peaceful,

They get better.

And then also,

Working on acceptance instead of fighting the things we're going through,

Saying,

You know,

Maybe I'm not supposed to fight this so hard,

Maybe I'm just supposed to accept this.

There's a lot of things in life,

Once we accept them,

It's just better,

Particularly when we really can't change them.

Like again,

Let's say we love someone and they don't want to be with us anymore.

We can fight that,

We can do things to numb that,

But if we say,

Well,

I'm glad I had the journey with them and now I wonder what life's going to bring next,

I wonder what new adventures will be next in my life.

Do you know in many ways,

This is what I do all day long when people come see me as a clinical psychologist,

I help them find the beauty in their lives and to get out of the negativity that they're stuck in.

And they'll find that with that hope and with these changes,

Their lives get so much better and very quickly.

When we change how we engage with the world,

When we look for acceptance and contentment as the key factors of our life,

Then the struggles that we have become much less.

They diminish,

They evaporate,

And we find that,

Oh,

I'm actually blessed in so many different ways.

And if I do certain things,

My life even gets better,

Positive,

Supporting things that I'm in control of.

Yeah,

I may have had this loss or this setback,

But there's other things I can do to improve my life right now and I'm going to start doing them.

We have so much control over how our lives go and the circumstances,

To be honest,

Aren't that important.

What is important is how we choose to address these challenges,

How we choose to work through them,

And how we choose to live well as we're going through them.

We can all have beautiful lives,

No matter what.

It does take work,

And sometimes it takes a lot of effort,

But it's worth it.

Let us all move in the direction of finding peace in our hearts through finding contentment and acceptance in our hearts.

Thank you for joining me on the Happiness Podcast.

Until next time,

Accept what is,

Love what is.