A Monk's Guide to Happiness summary

If happiness is marked by a sense of fullness, presentness and freedom, then unhappiness is characterized by the opposite – a sense of incompleteness, absent-ness and captivity. To better understand the nature of unhappiness, let’s focus on the first of these feelings. 

Where does our sense of incompleteness come from? Well, it’s basically the flip side of our desires. When we want something, it’s usually something that we lack but think we should have. For example, if you want a promotion that you haven’t yet received, but think you’d be happy if you got it – that makes you feel incomplete. In your mind, a promotion becomes one of the missing pieces to your happiness puzzle. Now it feels as though there’s an empty space in your life, and you long to fill the void.

If you want to get out of a trap, you need to know how it works. The same goes for the never-ending loop of desire, so let’s examine the machinery behind it. 

In the modern world, some mechanisms keep this loop moving – advertising, social media and the broader materialistic culture in which they’re embedded. Whether we’re watching TV, browsing the internet or simply walking down a street lined with billboards, we’re constantly bombarded by advertisements. These tell us we need to buy a product to become more beautiful, respected or efficient. These ads hinge on the implication that we’re not already beautiful, respected or efficient enough. 

As we’ve seen, modern culture encourages us to adopt a misguided approach to happiness. But it’s not just our culture that’s to blame. It’s the very act of looking for happiness in external sources of pleasure that’s bound to provide only limited, short-term “hits” of pleasure at best. 

This can be true of any external source of pleasure – even those that seem completely non-materialistic and wholesome, such as a romantic relationship or a beautiful sunset. Part of the problem is that nothing lasts forever. The relationship will eventually end, and the sun will set.

So far, we’ve focused on the pitfalls of looking for happiness outside of ourselves and grasping for things we want. But all the things we don’t want also sabotage our chance of finding happiness. 

These come in many shapes and forms – from particular people, places and situations we’d rather avoid to thoughts, emotions and physical sensations we’d rather not experience. When they confront us, we want to get rid of them and try to push them away. 

If you want to train your body’s muscles, you start working out. By doing certain strength-training exercises, you can target the specific muscles you want to develop.

The same is true when you want to strengthen your mind’s capabilities – your “mental muscles,” so to speak. And when it comes to your mind’s ability to stand back and regard anything that comes its way with a sense of tranquil neutrality, there’s a very powerful mental strength-training that you can start practicing right away.

As a form of mental exercise, meditation is basically practicing the skill of neutrally observing our thoughts, emotions, sensations and experiences. The word “practicing” bears emphasizing here, because there’s no reason to develop a skill we don’t use in our everyday lives! 

How do we do that? That involves applying what we do when we’re meditating to everyday situations. But that raises another question – what exactly do we do when we’re meditating? 

Step one: focus your mind on an anchor. Step two: notice it’s drifted. Step three: bring it back to your anchor. Repeat. Put in this way, meditation sounds extremely simple – and in a way, it is. But as anyone who’s ever tried it knows, meditation can also be really difficult. 

The second phase is the sticking point for many people. Their minds wander, and they think, “Oh no, I’ve messed up! I lost my focus. Quick – return to the breath!” But if we do that, we’re right back to pushing and grasping. We’re resisting thoughts, emotions or sensations, and we’re trying to grasp our anchor.