Choices: Barrier to happiness?

We scream and sulk when we're not given a choice to anything. "I don't have a choice", you've probably heard this line a million times over. Just like being forced to do something. A lot of people probably realize this deep down: choices make people unhappy instead.

Suppose you have a free gift of a key chain. Now the key chain has many varieties of shapes, you have a choice of bicycle, palm tree, monkey, crocodile, and key. The catch is there are five crocodile-shaped ones, three bicycles, two palm trees, 1 monkey, and 1 key-shaped ones. Let's say you're most attracted to crocodile-shaped key chain because the design is the best of the lot. At this point, the mind obviously wanted the most 'unique' ones (read: the least quantity), namely key and monkey - it reflects the demands of the market (what else explains the quantity of 1?). It's inescapable that we have a herd mentality, we follow the crowd. Four in five experiences of given a choice, I think people would hesitate, ponder, repeat the same process, and eventually would choose either the key or the monkey.

Choosing an outfit, choosing a footwear, choosing a travel destination, choosing a phone model...you name it, we've all been through it! I believe we also went through a process of narrowing down, eliminating the obvious unwanted alternatives first, then compare benefits of the remaining ones side by side. It's a tedious task and is rewarding at the end (hopefully). Yet I can't help but think, given just one path to follow, one gift, one travel destination, one university to go to, however unfavorable the 'offering' may be, we may be happier, knowing that there's no other choice. Acceptance comes easily at that point, and we move on. With acceptance, we cease to be bothered, we cease to spend time in comparing, we cease to have worries or troubles, we cease to ponder, and we begin to be 'happy'. I'm probably using the word 'happy' too liberally here, but you know what I mean.

So, choice, or no choice?

Utter bliss (almost)

Let me start by asking you a question, what is utter bliss? Your own version.

To me, part of my imagination for utter bliss involves beach, waves, sun, bluest sky, and ocean wind. The other involves picnicking with your family and little children playing in a park. Another is bumming around the house and the neighborhood doing nothing. There could be zillions of other scenarios. Yet a complete bliss (for me, at the moment) is one without any thoughts.

At all.

Now that's hard. Meditation is something that's really new to me. Thoughts crossed my mind at all times; my palms have the most lines among the people I know. A fortune teller once told me that I'm prone to depression. I could be swimming and have already been thinking hundreds of thoughts in 1/2 lap. Okay - this paragraph is depressing.

Well, I'm sort of doing the third kind of bliss, bumming around with nothing to do. It's a lovely time so far. Yet as human being, I can't escape these thoughts; memories, worries, what ifs, regrets, what I should do today... To be able to clear my mind, thinking nothing, is utter bliss. It happens - maybe for a second, for the mind to bounce right back. The onslaught of thoughts just kept attacking. I shouldn't be complaining, maybe I should. I have to escape duality and let everything in. One thing for sure, it's lovely to wake up late on a Monday morning.

I wish you a pleasant week.

Randomness

Do you believe things are random? Random thoughts cross your mind at random hours, coincidences happen on a random day, inventions made out of random device found on a random street, defeating science, bending our strict mechanical workings.

Throw all rules.

We happened to be born to random parents, chosen by some random supreme being. We happened to be born in this random skin, on this random continent, on that random date, hour and time. Consider this, I am stating the irony, the rule of chaos rules the universe. No one really knows what's happening or what will happen in the next instant. There's no such thing as logic. You can fly, I can walk on water. People laughed when you told them one day you'd be afloat in the air without suspension. Look what a random Yuri Gagarin did.

Here we are. This world, sputtered out of randomness.

Delightful read: 10 Most Amazing Coincidences

Compassion

Dalai Lama said,

Genuine compassion should be unbiased. The closeness we feel towards our friends is usually more attachment than compassion. If we only feel close to our friends, and not to our enemies, or to the countless people who are unknown to us personally and toward whom we are indifferent, then our compassion is only partial or biased.

This is hard. I had to look up the meaning of compassion. Merriam-Webster's entry on "compassion" reads "sympathetic consciousness of others' distress together with a desire to alleviate it." Only one source at this time, and I already feel the toughness of this quest. To be compassionate to strangers and enemies alike.

We will, occasionally, meet with people whose personalities we find unfit with ours (to put this mildly). How many times do we stop and seek to understand these individuals? Some don't, they naturally drift away. Some would go further and try to 'correct' (read: change) the part of the other's personality that is considered unfit to their own. Some just accept them for whoever they are and do nothing about it. What is compassion, I ask of you?

It's easy to blame other people, much easier to think that what we did was the best at the time, and the right thing to do. Yet everything we do is not without flaw. We are afterall, human. But to be compassionate to others does not mean we have to accept things the way they are, especially when they are not right. Again, it's easier to shut up when we find people close to us doing something that wasn't right, just as it's easier to be mad when a stranger or an enemy violate your rights.

The world will undoubtedly be a better place if people seek to understand and be compassionate to each other. Such a cliché I know...But true nonetheless. I have yet to achieve this stage, to have an unbiased compassion. Will I? I don't know.