What do you mean by happiness?

What do you mean by happiness? Some will say happiness consists in getting what you want. You want a car, and you get it, and you are happy. I want a sari or clothes; I want to go to Europe and if I can, I am happy. I want to be the greatest politician, and if I get it, I am happy; if I cannot get it, I am unhappy. So, what you call happiness is getting what you want, achievement or success, becoming noble, getting anything that you want.

As long as you want something and you can get it, you feel perfectly happy; you are not frustrated, but if you cannot get what you want, then unhappiness begins. All of us are concerned with this, not only the rich and the poor. The rich and the poor all want to get something for themselves, for their family, for society; and if they are prevented, stopped, they will be unhappy. We are not discussing, we are not saying that the poor should not have what they want. That is not the problem. We are trying to find out what is happiness and whether happiness is something of which you are conscious. The moment you are conscious that you are happy, that you have much, is that happiness? The moment you are conscious that you are happy, it is not happiness, is it? So you cannot go after happiness. The moment you are conscious that you are humble, you are not humble.

So happiness is not a thing to be pursued; it comes. But if you seek it, it will evade you.

- J. Krishnamurti, The Book of Life

We don't have to beg for help

To follow another, however great, prevents the discovery of the ways of the self; to run after the promise of some ready-made utopia makes the mind utterly unaware of the enclosing action of its own desire for comfort, for authority, for someone else’s help. The priest, the politician, the lawyer, the soldier are all there to “help” us; but such help destroys intelligence and freedom. The help we need does not lie outside ourselves.

We do not have to beg for help; it comes without our seeking it when we are humble in our dedicated work, when we are open to the understanding of our daily trials and accidents.We must avoid the conscious or unconscious craving for support and encouragement, for such craving creates its own response, which is always gratifying.

It is comforting to have someone to encourage us, to give us a lead , to pacify us; but this habit of turning to another as a guide, as an authority soon becomes a poison in our system. The moment we depend on another for guidance, we forget our original intention, which was to awaken individual freedom and intelligence.

J Krishnamurti

Education and the Significance of Life, p 109

The Secret

J. Krishnamurti, the great Indian philosopher and spiritual teacher, spoke and traveled almost continuously all over the world for more than fifty years - attempting to convey through words—which are content—that which is beyond words, beyond content. At one of his talks in the later part of his life, he surprised his audience by asking, "Do you want to know my secret?"

Everyone became very alert. Many people in the audience had been coming to listen to him for twenty or thirty years and still failed to grasp the essence of his teaching. Finally, after all these years, the master would give them the key to understanding. "This is my secret," he said. "I don't mind what happens."