Ancient Yoga writings tell of three types of happiness. Which type of happiness are you seeking? In the first type of happiness you increase the pleasures of life, such as eating delicious food and drink and buying new things. A great example is going on vacation! How much fun it is to be away from home and work, but in the end you have to pay the bill and return to everyday life. What begins in sweetness ends in bitterness.

The second type of happiness is seeking solace in all the wrong places—hanging with the wrong crowd and getting caught up in activities that you think will make you happy but which are only bringing you down. An example of this is addictions and other bad habits. There may be temporary relief from your troubles, but in the end they are still there. Going back again and again the cycle strengthens, sadness and loss increase. What begins in bitterness, also ends in bitterness, giving you a false sense of happiness.

The third type of happiness is different still: By seeking that which is lasting and fulfilling, you guarantee that happiness will blossom and grow within and around you. For example, when you go to college or pursue a trade, you put in a lot of hard work, but when you graduate you can be proud of your accomplishment. When you volunteer for an organization, you have to give up some time and conform to their guidelines, but the joy of helping others is wonderful. And when you commit to practice meditation or Yoga, you struggle to put it consistently in your schedule, but it becomes easy when you experience all the benefits. So this type of happiness can be bitter at first, but has the sweetest outcome.

Which type of happiness are you seeking?

Quantum physics teaches that thoughts and words have physical weight. Oh my, don’t you just know this to be true? Consider the way words like anger, fear and sadness feel heavy in body and mind, while words like peace, love and understanding feel light and free. Respecting the energy in words can change your life.

Many years ago psychiatrist and spiritual seeker David R. Hawkins created a “map of consciousness” that laid out the energy signature of various thoughts, words and emotions. What he discovered, using applied kinesiology and muscle testing, is that concepts like anger, fear and sadness have a very low energy vibration, while expressions of peace, love and understanding have a very high energy vibration. The lowest of all is HATE while the highest of all is UNITY CONSCIOUSNESS.

In the Yoga tradition we have a similar teaching from Patanjali, writing the Yoga Sutras around the first century CE. He offers this gem: When thoughts that are “perverse, unwholesome, troublesome or deviant” arise, “contrary thought should be cultivated.” (Sutra 2.33 translated by SwamiJ) We often call this “opposite therapy” which replaces negative thoughts with positive ones.

It’s important to understand that Patanjali isn’t merely advocating positive thinking as if that would make our problems magically disappear. No, he is not promising that here. Rather, he is calling our attention to the energy signature of our thoughts. We are always in a much better place physically and mentally if our energy is high rather than low. From a higher vantage point we can see our situation more realistically and respond in helpful rather than hurtful ways.

Try it for yourself!

One of our favorite meditations is CPR – Calm Peaceful Relaxed. Tune this simple mantra to your breath whenever you are in need of “opposite therapy.”

Breathe in “I am,” breathe out “calm.”
Breathe in “I am,” breathe out “peaceful.”
Breathe in “I am,” breathe out “relaxed.”

Now you can think clearly. Now you can act wisely. Now you can be of service to the world.