SESSION 14 - THE KEY TO CONSTANT HAPPINESS .......... 39 - By Lester Levenson
セッション14 - 一定の幸福の鍵..........39 - 最終自由の鍵 (究極の自由への鍵)
SESSION 14
THE KEY TO CONSTANT HAPPINESS
I made the statement that I would give you the key to
maintaining constant happiness. I was aware that
several individuals were dropping in the level of their
happiness and not coming up, which is one of the
reasons why I didn't get here sooner. You see, when
you were down and you were frantic, and you thought
things were terrible; I couldn't have communicated with
you very easily. Also, if I had come and you had
received this lift and gotten out of it, you would have said
that I did it. This develops a dependency relationship,
which isn't good. You can do anything and everything
that you want. You can have, be, or do whatever you will
or desire. And when the disturbance lasts long enough,
you get fed up with it and you let go of it anyway. Then
you do it. It's much, much better when you do it and
don't need someone to lean upon.
What the group would like to know is how to maintain
this new found happiness. Why don't we have it all the
time? We should! And so I thought I would give you the
understanding, or the key to the understanding, that will
help you develop happiness that remains.
All right, now this is the key: When you understand,
when you really know what happiness is, then you're
able to establish it. Then you do it more and more until
it's all the time. But the key is knowing what is
happiness. When you do know what it is, you look for it
where it is rather than where it isn't. Looking for it where
it isn't is what causes you to drop. Is there any question
on what I've said so far?
The key is knowing what happiness is, so that you can
go directly for it. Not recognizing what happiness is
makes it difficult to establish permanently. So when you
get to see what this happiness really is, then when you
become miserable you'll move in the right direction and
establish that happiness.
All right. what is happiness? Most people call it pleasure
but what it actually is, is escape from pain! What most
people call happiness is their getting away from their
pain through socializing and entertainment. It is really an
escape! They cannot stand being by themselves, with
their own thoughts. They have to run to a movie, a
nightclub, visit someone, just to get some action going
so they are not facing their own thoughts. When their
mind is taken away from their own thoughts, they feel
better, and then call that pleasure and happiness. All
entertainment is actually that! A happy man needs no
entertainment and no socializing. He is content.
However, when you become free, if you choose, you
can enjoy entertainment far more than before because
you are free from the hunger-need for it.
The happiness that I'm going to talk about now is not the
escape-from-misery kind. It is really the only happiness.
It's the joy that results from being your own real Self.
The more we are our real Self, the more we feel joyous.
Sense-joy of the world is accomplished not because of
the thing or the person out there with whom we
associate it. It's accomplished by satisfying and stilling
the thoughts of wanting to acquire that person or thing.
When we quiet those thoughts, we feel our Self more so
and are happier. The quieter the mind is, the more we
just be, the more we abide as our real Self and the more
joyous we feel!
But this is something you've got to see for yourself, that
the quieter you get your mind, the happier you are. It's
good to play with this. Experiment with it until you see it.
Whatever that joy was, it always resulted in quieting of
the mind, and then you felt happy. Seeing this, you will
begin to let go of attaching happiness to people and
things. You will begin to see that the joy is only in you
abiding as your very own Self. Then, when you discover
this, you're not going to look for joy where it isn't. You
will immediately let go and just be. And finally, you reach
the place where you need no one and no thing to be
happy, you just are happy, all the time!
Is there any question on that? I guess intellectually it's
seen by everyone? Whether you see it through your own
mind's eye or not, you should have it intellectually at
first, then experiment with it, test it out, and you'll
discover that this is so, that every time you feel happy,
your mind is quiet and at ease, and that what you
attributed to the person or thing outside of you is something going on within you. It is a quieting of your mind so
that you abide more as your Self. Then, when you see
this, you won It bog down anymore, because the
moment you become unhappy, you'll know just where to
look to re-establish the happiness!
Q: That would be within yourself, wouldn't it?
Lester: Yes, but it's first recognizing that the happiness
is not the external person or the thing, but the quieting of
the thoughts of desire for the person or thing, which
allows you to go within and just be your Self, i.e., just be.
When your mind is on things out there, you're not just
being, you're being involved with externals. But I say the
key is seeing just that point, that your happiness is the
quieting of your mind through the satisfying of the
desire, which stills the hunger thoughts for the thing and
allows you to just be. When you actually see that in your
own mind, you can do it directly. (You can let go of those
thoughts without achieving the person or the thing and
immediately you're happy!)
The prime overall thing is that you move toward happiness in the direction of where it really is, in you, not in
the externals. In that way you establish a state of
happiness that is continuous. Did I tell you anything
new, Frank? I did? Was that new, Lil? See, I've told you
this before many times, but it seems new to you!
Q: You told it to us but before it was not received.
Lester: All right, before it was just an intellectual thing or
it did not connect and so it's as though it were new now.
But, as far as that goes, I always feel as though I'm
saying the same thing over and over again, from this
side, from that side, from another side,-but it's always
the same thing. However, until you see it in your own
mind's eye, until you recognize it, until you realize it, it
isn't meaningful to you.
Q: It sounds as though you're saying we should not desire automobiles, we should not desire homes, we
should not desire wives or sweethearts, we should not
desire anything, but become nothing.
Lester: Everything was right but the last part of your
sentence. You become everything instead of nothing.
Become everything and you need nothing. Desire is lack
and the consciousness of separation, the source of all
trouble. If you are everything, the All, you need nothing.
See, everything was right down to that last part of your
sentence, just reverse that and you've got it. O.K.?
Q: If we become everything, then we become the wife,
- 39 -
then we become the world, we become everything.
Instead of separating ourselves, we become the other
one.
Lester: And that is the greatest of all feelings! That's the
highest love, -when you become the other one. That
identity is love in its highest form. In other words, you
think that she didn't break the dish, we broke the dish;
she didn't spend money on a dress, we spent the
money. This is the highest love.
Q: I become the automobile, therefore I don't desire the
automobile. Or, you become everything, you become
Lester: Now, you're going to have to work this out for
yourself. You are going to have to realize that when you
become everything and feel that you need nothing, then
the slightest thought for something will bring it to you
immediately.
Q: The desire is, “I haven't got.”
Lester: Yes! You create an artificial lack, you create a
lie when you say, “I haven't got.” Desire, causing you to
feel “I have not,” will cause you to have not! Let go of
desire and you feel “I have.” This causes things to come
to you.
Q: If I look at the world as though I'm writing a novel and
say I am the characters, I'm all these creatures that I
create in my story. And yet this is what I'm living today,
aren't I? I create my difficulties; I'm writing this story.
Instead of doing that, I should say I am the power, and
why bother creating limitations? I don't need to. So, I
stop it. But what do I have when I don't create?
Lester: What do you have when you don't create? Everything that you really want, our pure Beingness.
Q: I have peace.
Lester: Yes. You are the All, everything is in you.
Feeling that way puts you completely at peace.
Q: Until the phone rings; then I'm right back in my
habits.
Lester: Don't allow a little bell to push you around that
way. Again, I say each one has to realize this for himself
or herself, but when he or she does, then happiness can
be made permanent, because then you look for
happiness where it is and you stop looking for it where it
isn't. There's no happiness in people or things.
Happiness is our basic nature. Happiness is our very
own beingness. And when we are only being, we are
infinitely happy. Yes, when we are only being, and
nothing else, we are infinitely happy!
Q: In other words. when you have these various things,
like you have an automobile, you utilize that automobile
but you have no attachment to it, in order to attain the
feeling of joy. Because if you become attached to that
automobile, then that attachment has some sort of hold
on you wherein you have a responsibility to it.
Lester: Yes. The greater the attachment the greater the
unhappiness. (Likewise, the greater the aversion, the
greater the unhappiness.) It's unfree to be attached to
anything. You can’t have things and not be attached to
them. Be attached to them and you are necessarily
putting yourself through unhappiness.
Q: Now, when you're in a state of beingness, that does
not mean that you 're an ethereal being who floats from
spot to spot. That means that you are in that state where
you know the Truth and thereby don’t have to go
through all the habits that have been piled upon you by
your ego.
Lester: Yes. It's knowing your infinite Beingness that is
eternal and never changes. Then this world cannot
touch you. You see it as a fiction, a dream. You witness
it. You move through life with no attachments and no
aversions. Then no one and no thing can disturb you,
and you have the infinite peace and joy that is constant.
Q: When I try to explain this to people they think that I
become a shadow or substance which vanishes from
the sight of everybody, or something like that.
Lester: The only difference between a fully realized
individual living in the world and one who is not is his
point of view of everything. An unrealized person
identifies with a single limited body-mind. A realized
person identifies with everything, every being, every
atom and sees them as his Self. He sees the beingness
in everything as his beingness.
Q: Therefore getting joy out of everything that happens.
Lester:; No, your very nature is joy. You don't get it out
of everything that happens, your basic nature is
unlimited joy. That is your natural state! No need to get
it!
Q: Therefore being in a state of joy perpetually.
Lester: Yes. As long as you don't lock it onto a person
or thing, it's there all the time. But if you say you can't
have joy unless you do or have something, you limit
your joy. The natural state is unlimited joy. This is the
real natural state. The natural state is being infinite, but
we superimpose over that all these ideas of limitation, of
needs, attachments and aversions that block out this
infinite joy that is natural. If a being would do absolutely
nothing, he would be this infinite Being. He would then
be only a witness.
Q: But you can still put in a hard day's work.
Lester: Oh, yes. You go through life like everyone else.
Q: But it's your attitude.
Lester: Right, you see things differently. You see
yourself as a witness rather than a doer.
Q: It's there but you're detached somewhat from it. It's
an eerie feeling sometimes.
Lester: It's a nice feeling, isn't it? It's eerie because
you're not used to it. When you get used to it, it's dearie
rather than eerie!
Q: Lester: is this thing really easy, and we're making it
hard?
Lester: Yes. You are right! All your difficulty is keeping
yourself limited. You have compounded limitations on
top of limitations and are holding onto them in your
thoughts. Therein lies your difficulty. You must let go of
all your thoughts. Every thought has limitation in it. Drop
all your thoughts and what is left over is you in your
infinite happiness, your Beingness. Then you will realize
that it is as easy for you to discover that you are an
infinite Being with infinite happiness as it is for you to
discover that you are a male or a female!
***
This Session was recorded in Los Angeles, February 7,
1965.
- 40 -
----------
セッション14 - 一定の幸福の鍵..........39 - 最終自由の鍵 (究極の自由への鍵)
SESSION 14
THE KEY TO CONSTANT HAPPINESS
I made the statement that I would give you the key to
maintaining constant happiness. I was aware that
several individuals were dropping in the level of their
happiness and not coming up, which is one of the
reasons why I didn't get here sooner. You see, when
you were down and you were frantic, and you thought
things were terrible; I couldn't have communicated with
you very easily. Also, if I had come and you had
received this lift and gotten out of it, you would have said
that I did it. This develops a dependency relationship,
which isn't good. You can do anything and everything
that you want. You can have, be, or do whatever you will
or desire. And when the disturbance lasts long enough,
you get fed up with it and you let go of it anyway. Then
you do it. It's much, much better when you do it and
don't need someone to lean upon.
What the group would like to know is how to maintain
this new found happiness. Why don't we have it all the
time? We should! And so I thought I would give you the
understanding, or the key to the understanding, that will
help you develop happiness that remains.
All right, now this is the key: When you understand,
when you really know what happiness is, then you're
able to establish it. Then you do it more and more until
it's all the time. But the key is knowing what is
happiness. When you do know what it is, you look for it
where it is rather than where it isn't. Looking for it where
it isn't is what causes you to drop. Is there any question
on what I've said so far?
The key is knowing what happiness is, so that you can
go directly for it. Not recognizing what happiness is
makes it difficult to establish permanently. So when you
get to see what this happiness really is, then when you
become miserable you'll move in the right direction and
establish that happiness.
All right. what is happiness? Most people call it pleasure
but what it actually is, is escape from pain! What most
people call happiness is their getting away from their
pain through socializing and entertainment. It is really an
escape! They cannot stand being by themselves, with
their own thoughts. They have to run to a movie, a
nightclub, visit someone, just to get some action going
so they are not facing their own thoughts. When their
mind is taken away from their own thoughts, they feel
better, and then call that pleasure and happiness. All
entertainment is actually that! A happy man needs no
entertainment and no socializing. He is content.
However, when you become free, if you choose, you
can enjoy entertainment far more than before because
you are free from the hunger-need for it.
The happiness that I'm going to talk about now is not the
escape-from-misery kind. It is really the only happiness.
It's the joy that results from being your own real Self.
The more we are our real Self, the more we feel joyous.
Sense-joy of the world is accomplished not because of
the thing or the person out there with whom we
associate it. It's accomplished by satisfying and stilling
the thoughts of wanting to acquire that person or thing.
When we quiet those thoughts, we feel our Self more so
and are happier. The quieter the mind is, the more we
just be, the more we abide as our real Self and the more
joyous we feel!
But this is something you've got to see for yourself, that
the quieter you get your mind, the happier you are. It's
good to play with this. Experiment with it until you see it.
Whatever that joy was, it always resulted in quieting of
the mind, and then you felt happy. Seeing this, you will
begin to let go of attaching happiness to people and
things. You will begin to see that the joy is only in you
abiding as your very own Self. Then, when you discover
this, you're not going to look for joy where it isn't. You
will immediately let go and just be. And finally, you reach
the place where you need no one and no thing to be
happy, you just are happy, all the time!
Is there any question on that? I guess intellectually it's
seen by everyone? Whether you see it through your own
mind's eye or not, you should have it intellectually at
first, then experiment with it, test it out, and you'll
discover that this is so, that every time you feel happy,
your mind is quiet and at ease, and that what you
attributed to the person or thing outside of you is something going on within you. It is a quieting of your mind so
that you abide more as your Self. Then, when you see
this, you won It bog down anymore, because the
moment you become unhappy, you'll know just where to
look to re-establish the happiness!
Q: That would be within yourself, wouldn't it?
Lester: Yes, but it's first recognizing that the happiness
is not the external person or the thing, but the quieting of
the thoughts of desire for the person or thing, which
allows you to go within and just be your Self, i.e., just be.
When your mind is on things out there, you're not just
being, you're being involved with externals. But I say the
key is seeing just that point, that your happiness is the
quieting of your mind through the satisfying of the
desire, which stills the hunger thoughts for the thing and
allows you to just be. When you actually see that in your
own mind, you can do it directly. (You can let go of those
thoughts without achieving the person or the thing and
immediately you're happy!)
The prime overall thing is that you move toward happiness in the direction of where it really is, in you, not in
the externals. In that way you establish a state of
happiness that is continuous. Did I tell you anything
new, Frank? I did? Was that new, Lil? See, I've told you
this before many times, but it seems new to you!
Q: You told it to us but before it was not received.
Lester: All right, before it was just an intellectual thing or
it did not connect and so it's as though it were new now.
But, as far as that goes, I always feel as though I'm
saying the same thing over and over again, from this
side, from that side, from another side,-but it's always
the same thing. However, until you see it in your own
mind's eye, until you recognize it, until you realize it, it
isn't meaningful to you.
Q: It sounds as though you're saying we should not desire automobiles, we should not desire homes, we
should not desire wives or sweethearts, we should not
desire anything, but become nothing.
Lester: Everything was right but the last part of your
sentence. You become everything instead of nothing.
Become everything and you need nothing. Desire is lack
and the consciousness of separation, the source of all
trouble. If you are everything, the All, you need nothing.
See, everything was right down to that last part of your
sentence, just reverse that and you've got it. O.K.?
Q: If we become everything, then we become the wife,
- 39 -
then we become the world, we become everything.
Instead of separating ourselves, we become the other
one.
Lester: And that is the greatest of all feelings! That's the
highest love, -when you become the other one. That
identity is love in its highest form. In other words, you
think that she didn't break the dish, we broke the dish;
she didn't spend money on a dress, we spent the
money. This is the highest love.
Q: I become the automobile, therefore I don't desire the
automobile. Or, you become everything, you become
Lester: Now, you're going to have to work this out for
yourself. You are going to have to realize that when you
become everything and feel that you need nothing, then
the slightest thought for something will bring it to you
immediately.
Q: The desire is, “I haven't got.”
Lester: Yes! You create an artificial lack, you create a
lie when you say, “I haven't got.” Desire, causing you to
feel “I have not,” will cause you to have not! Let go of
desire and you feel “I have.” This causes things to come
to you.
Q: If I look at the world as though I'm writing a novel and
say I am the characters, I'm all these creatures that I
create in my story. And yet this is what I'm living today,
aren't I? I create my difficulties; I'm writing this story.
Instead of doing that, I should say I am the power, and
why bother creating limitations? I don't need to. So, I
stop it. But what do I have when I don't create?
Lester: What do you have when you don't create? Everything that you really want, our pure Beingness.
Q: I have peace.
Lester: Yes. You are the All, everything is in you.
Feeling that way puts you completely at peace.
Q: Until the phone rings; then I'm right back in my
habits.
Lester: Don't allow a little bell to push you around that
way. Again, I say each one has to realize this for himself
or herself, but when he or she does, then happiness can
be made permanent, because then you look for
happiness where it is and you stop looking for it where it
isn't. There's no happiness in people or things.
Happiness is our basic nature. Happiness is our very
own beingness. And when we are only being, we are
infinitely happy. Yes, when we are only being, and
nothing else, we are infinitely happy!
Q: In other words. when you have these various things,
like you have an automobile, you utilize that automobile
but you have no attachment to it, in order to attain the
feeling of joy. Because if you become attached to that
automobile, then that attachment has some sort of hold
on you wherein you have a responsibility to it.
Lester: Yes. The greater the attachment the greater the
unhappiness. (Likewise, the greater the aversion, the
greater the unhappiness.) It's unfree to be attached to
anything. You can’t have things and not be attached to
them. Be attached to them and you are necessarily
putting yourself through unhappiness.
Q: Now, when you're in a state of beingness, that does
not mean that you 're an ethereal being who floats from
spot to spot. That means that you are in that state where
you know the Truth and thereby don’t have to go
through all the habits that have been piled upon you by
your ego.
Lester: Yes. It's knowing your infinite Beingness that is
eternal and never changes. Then this world cannot
touch you. You see it as a fiction, a dream. You witness
it. You move through life with no attachments and no
aversions. Then no one and no thing can disturb you,
and you have the infinite peace and joy that is constant.
Q: When I try to explain this to people they think that I
become a shadow or substance which vanishes from
the sight of everybody, or something like that.
Lester: The only difference between a fully realized
individual living in the world and one who is not is his
point of view of everything. An unrealized person
identifies with a single limited body-mind. A realized
person identifies with everything, every being, every
atom and sees them as his Self. He sees the beingness
in everything as his beingness.
Q: Therefore getting joy out of everything that happens.
Lester:; No, your very nature is joy. You don't get it out
of everything that happens, your basic nature is
unlimited joy. That is your natural state! No need to get
it!
Q: Therefore being in a state of joy perpetually.
Lester: Yes. As long as you don't lock it onto a person
or thing, it's there all the time. But if you say you can't
have joy unless you do or have something, you limit
your joy. The natural state is unlimited joy. This is the
real natural state. The natural state is being infinite, but
we superimpose over that all these ideas of limitation, of
needs, attachments and aversions that block out this
infinite joy that is natural. If a being would do absolutely
nothing, he would be this infinite Being. He would then
be only a witness.
Q: But you can still put in a hard day's work.
Lester: Oh, yes. You go through life like everyone else.
Q: But it's your attitude.
Lester: Right, you see things differently. You see
yourself as a witness rather than a doer.
Q: It's there but you're detached somewhat from it. It's
an eerie feeling sometimes.
Lester: It's a nice feeling, isn't it? It's eerie because
you're not used to it. When you get used to it, it's dearie
rather than eerie!
Q: Lester: is this thing really easy, and we're making it
hard?
Lester: Yes. You are right! All your difficulty is keeping
yourself limited. You have compounded limitations on
top of limitations and are holding onto them in your
thoughts. Therein lies your difficulty. You must let go of
all your thoughts. Every thought has limitation in it. Drop
all your thoughts and what is left over is you in your
infinite happiness, your Beingness. Then you will realize
that it is as easy for you to discover that you are an
infinite Being with infinite happiness as it is for you to
discover that you are a male or a female!
***
This Session was recorded in Los Angeles, February 7,
1965.
- 40 -
----------
