Is Happiness Linked to Success?
Does success bring happiness? When does it? When does it not? Are there different kinds of success?
When a young child succeeds in tying their shoelaces by themselves for the first time, they feel on top of the world. They are grown up, they know how to do it, they have succeeded.
As adults, society places goals and objectives before us, and we all start running. To succeed, to excel, and to achieve, in order to prove what we are worth.
The constant rise in the use of anti-anxiety medications suggests that not everyone is thrilled with life. The problem begins with the fact that we live in a society built on egoistic values: social status and hierarchy, destructive competition, and struggles for power.
Even those who reach the top experience happiness only briefly. Then emptiness creeps back into the heart, the next goal appears, and once again we start running, once again hoping that happiness is just around the corner.
“No person leaves this world having fulfilled even half of their desires,” the sages said. Every achievement is followed by a feeling of even greater emptiness. They also explain that when success is defined egoistically, in the form of “Look how much better I am than all of you,” the happiness it brings cannot last.
True happiness can be attained only through a different kind of success, one in which we succeed together with everyone else, and certainly not at their expense. This requires upgrading our entire approach to life from its very foundation.
Imagine, for example, what relationships between children at school would be like if everyone could feel liked, loved, and wanted, instead of only the king or queen of the class.
The kind of success that can produce lasting happiness is success that others also desire, success that brings happiness and enjoyment to them as well. Only then will no one have a desire to cancel out our success or bring us down in order to climb to the top at our expense.
The only people who naturally relate to us this way are our mother and father. They always look upon us favorably. Their hearts are filled with love and concern. They encourage us, hope for us, and help us, and therefore our success makes them many times happier.
If we can build a society in which everyone feels close to one another and provides one another with this kind of support, it will give each person tremendous confidence and strength. And in today’s interconnected world, where mutual dependence is increasing and everyone is in the same boat, this is becoming essential for our survival on Earth.
Building harmonious connections between people is the focus of the integral approach to education. It can be applied at home, at work, in an apartment building, throughout a neighborhood or an entire country, and in every relationship, field, and at every level. Through special connection exercises, participants build a feeling of mutuality and support among each other.
We learn to place connection as the highest goal, above all differences and divisions. Gradually, we begin to feel a common and special force that stems from the depths of nature and warms us, holds us together, and vitalizes us with a great joy, something that feels almost out of this world.
Success then takes on a new definition: the extent to which we succeed in creating connection among everyone, up to the level of love. The more a person invests in this direction, the more they attain an elevated feeling of happiness and feel that they fully realize the unique gift that nature has given them.
Based on "New Life 230 – Happiness and Success" with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.