Sculpting Happiness

How many times have you thought to yourself or heard someone else say, “If I only had (fill in the blank) I’d be happy.” I’ve actually stopped playing that game with myself. The reason is fairly simple. I don’t really know what will make me happy. I might think I know and my vision might make perfect sense when the idea comes into my head but until I get there I have no idea. And therein lies the problem, rarely do I get to the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. I have found it is easy to get distracted by a new dream and a new “if I only had…. ." I have come to find that chasing a fantasy is rarely fulfilling because even if I do attain what I set out for there is always the desire for the next thing which then leaves me dissatisfied with what I have.

It is often said that it is much more difficult to give something up that has given you pleasure than to live without ever experiencing something that you desire. There have been many studies that have concluded that people living in third world countries in extreme poverty perceive themselves to be very happy. Simply it is because they don’t know and can’t comprehend what they don’t have. We on the other hand might have a different take on it. But they literally are blissful in their ignorance. Meanwhile we Westerners get inundated with images of what we should want and we develop this twisted sense of longing that some how what we don’t have is the key to our happiness. I’d like to suggest giving up that ghost and taking a different cut at this happiness thing.

Instead of trying to attain what you don’t have take a look a what you do have and ask yourself a simple question, “Is this serving me?” “Is it satisfying my immediate needs?” The same way it is harder to live without something that you have come accustomed to deriving pleasure from, a short cut to happiness is giving up the stuff that is making you miserable.

Now that might sound selfish but let me put it into a different context. A man is walking down the street in Florence, Italy and sees an artist chiseling away at a block of granite. The artist is standing in front of his gallery and inside are some pretty intricate and impressive sculptures. The man knows this s genius at works so he stops for a while and watches as the form of a majestic falcon comes into shape on this former piece of granite. He then asks the artist in amazement, “How can you create such a beautiful piece of work out of a simple block of stone?” The artist looks at him quizzically and says, “It is really pretty easy. I just chip away at everything that is not a falcon.” For him the artistry is in the act of removal. I urge you to take the same tact with your life.

I submit that the odds are better that you will more accurately identify things that make you unhappy than to identify things that you have yet to experience that will actually make you happy. So go for the low hanging fruit first. Identify the shit list. And ask yourself, can I remove this from my life. If so, drop it. That includes people by the way. I believe there are very definitely people I have kept in my life simply out of habit who were toxic to me. When I finally let them go, I felt lighter and I really didn’t miss them. It is a lot like losing weight. You rarely hear someone complaining because they lost weight. Lightness equals contentment. Even incremental weight loss will feel good – provided you focus on what you lost rather than what you have yet to lose. I find it to be the same for responsibilities that I never wanted to take on in the first place. But that’s a whole ‘nother thread. For now take stock of what you have but really don’t want and commit to doing something about it. Let it go. I know it might not seem easy but there really is lightness to being.

Love Like A Dog

I’ve come to accept that dogs and kids are often my best teachers. There seems to be a lot of wisdom gained from observing those who act from someplace other than their head.
For example, when I get home, regardless of when that is, my 80-pound Labradoodle, DJ, comes bursting out of the house, he is not thinking “you’re late” or “have you been out playing with other dogs?” No, he is genuinely glad to see me. I know this because he shows up every time with two to three tennis balls in his mouth and dutifully stands there until I take them and throw them, over and over again until he just gets exhausted or, on the rare occasion, he finds something else that peeks his interest. Our relationship is in the moment. The best emotional connections are like that. There is no yesterday, no tomorrow. There is just now. And if now feels good, my dog keeps doing it until it stops being satisfying. So imagine your relationships were like that?

Imagine if you gave your self permission to be in a relationship because you enjoyed it. I don’t think DJ feels obligated to chase the balls I throw. I think he does it first because it is something he loves and in part because it gives him a sense of purpose.

Now I know the notion of doing something solely becasue you enjoy it sounds a little hedonistic but there is another side to the relationship. DJ is loyal to me and that loyalty is unconditional. If I chose not to throw him a ball one night he will still follow me into the house and sit by my feet. If I put my face in front of his, he’ll lick it. As far as I can tell, he doesn’t hold a grudge. After all why should he? I know where to scratch behind his ear. I know the little things that make him happy, like spooning peanut butter inside the hollow of his bone. Thee bond of the relationship is he remembers those things I do for him that he loves and more importantly, he quickly forgets those things I do thta he does not like. Again, imagine the way you would view your relationships if you cherished the good stuff and quickly disregarded the bad. After all if you really think about, most of the good stuff is done through intention, while the bad usually stems from some thoughtless happenstance that rarely get repeated.

So how do I know DJ and I have such a great relationship? Well the introduction of a second dog into the house last year didn’t change anything. DJ still comes out hoping I’ll throw a few balls. The little guy, a springer spaniel, has boundless energy but he knows that the ball throwing is something special between me and DJ. All during the back and forth, the Springer, Patsy, just runs around joyously in pointless circles, happy to be there. There will be times when I turn my attention to Patsy and DJ seems happy for a chance to catch his breath. The two of them understand the pecking order and no one is looking to change anything. DJ is still my dog and he knows that I will always be there for him. Our relationship has become a happy little threesome and who can argue with that?.

Honor the Truth

The Code of Honor was created by the men of what was then known as the Sterling Men’s Divisions. It was intended to reflect some very basic core values that all the men could rally behind, support and use as a benchmark for the ways of being we could expect from one another.



Back in the late 1990s some men from the Western Region (the Bay area around San Francisco) created an ark which contained 15 different pieces of wood, one for each tenet. Each stick was made of a specific type of wood and bore a specific design that reflected the way in which the men of the Western Region related to the tenets of the Code of Honor. Charlie Fleischheimer spearheaded that effort. The ark has since made its way throughout North America and men throughout MDI have had the opportunity to connect with it. I had the opprotunity to safe guard it for a while and was moved to write a little about my relationship to each tenet. What follows is the treatise that was created as a companion piece to the ark.


Honor the Truth



Wood: Madrone – The Madrone trees grow on hillsides, intermingled with many other species of tree. They do not dominate their environment and from a distance are unremarkable. They are easily overlooked. But on closer inspection, their bark gives away a hint of the rich beautiful wood that lies within.



Symbol: Sun & Moon – These are universal symbols of light. The sun projects the light and the moon reflects it. Without the moon’s reflection there would be no evidence of the sun’s presence. For this reason Zen Buddhism considers the moon to be the symbol of enlightenment for it captures the light and sends it outward.



The whole notion of there actually being something that is universally true is something of a lie.



Personal truth is just like fingerprints or DNA, it is consistently unique for everyone . So if that is the case why have a tenet that asks men to honor the truth? Well because that is exactly what it is asking you to do. Honor the truth, not just yours but others.



So how do you get there? Start by asking yourself a simple question, Why am I here?

From there the questions peel away like an onion.

What do I hope to get for myself? What do I hope to give back to my family, community, the planet? Who itch do I hope to get scratched from all this giving? What do I really really want?



Asking these questions is in essence what most would characterize as engaging in the search for truth. This search lies at the heart of every religion and drives every philosophical construct.



Buddhist say that when you perceive truth, all else drops away, ego vanishes and there is nothing more than that moment. A passage of the New Testament of the Bible says, “You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.” It really is that simple, so long as you keep it personal.



The complications set in when you try to impose your truth on others. Once you accept that truth is a very personal thing, you come to realize that no one person and no set of people can claim ownership to it.



All of us have experienced moments when our truth about something has become crystal clear to us, sometimes painfully so. I know when I am there not because it resonates in my head but because it resonates elsewhere, in my heart, my guts my balls. Suddenly I feel enveloped with a sense of clarity and for the moment I experience a feeling of exhilaration or of calmness and freedom. Everything falls into place and I see things that I must have looked at a dozen times with a new perspective.



However, just a little word of caution, this tenet does not say “Tell the truth,” rather it says honor it.

Sometimes it is better to hold the truth in your heart than to reveal it to someone who might not be ready to face it.



For example, when you hear the question, “Honey, do I look fat in this dress?”



So when do you speak the truth? You can’t really pick the time, rather it picks you. If we suddenly declared, “It is time to honor the truth.” Each of us would unconsciously or maybe even consciously start erecting internal mazes that would make it exceedingly difficult to get to the truth.



In MDI we strive to create an environment that fosters respect for sincerity, honor and genuineness. To create such an environment is a challenge. In such an environment I have found there is an opportunity to learn something. Often it comes not from something that I say or think I know but from what I hear come out of the mouth of another man. When I am listening to another without judgment, that’s when the truth has a chance to bubble to the surface.

The Hapiness of Contentment

Some time ago a friend of mine asked me a question that haunted me for the longest time. We were walking along the beach in Santa Barbara, California when he asked “Are you happy or content?” At first I found it inconceivable that I could be anything but happy while walking the beach in Santa Barbara. So I took it as a trick question, dwelled on it a bit and came to realize that if I were being honest with myself, for the most part I was no more than content. That of course made me immediately miserable and it took some time before I was able to feel happy about just being content.
Let me explain. Happiness is this sort of abstract state of mind that can really only exist in comparison to something else. To be happy, you normally need to have recently been miserable so that you have something to gauge that happiness against. That or some really good drugs. In both instances though the euphoria rarely lasts. So I have come to view happiness as artificial and very illusory.
Contentment on the other hand requires an answer to a pretty simple question; do I have everything I need? Not want, but need. If the answer is yes, I should be content. That is unless I let the demons of need creep into my psyche and tell me that there are things I should be wanting and things that I deserve to have. Then of course I hop on the merry-go-round of despair, thinking that I can’t be happy because there is more that I want. Then when I get what I want, while I might be happy in the moments shortly after I get it, that is pretty fleeting. Typically I realize that what I thought I wanted is not what I needed to make me happy. So I then go back to being miserable until I eventually think, well if I just had…… and back on board the merry-go-round I go.
So these days I just focus on being content. Do I have a place to live, food to eat, a family that loves me? Check, check, check. Everything else is gravy. And since I am no longer chasing happiness, every so often I am walking along the beach , may be in Santa Barbara or Maui, and there’s this sunset and a cool breeze and the thought creeps into my head, ” It is just fucking great to e alive.” And in that moment I am very happy and certainly content.
Have a great 4th !