“The best way to cheer yourself up is to cheer somebody else up” –Mark Twain
We all desire to be desired.
We all love to be loved. There is no guilt in admitting either of those facts.
We live in a universe of complement. As such, we are all producers of positive energy as we are consumers.
Deep down, we all want to give to others. We all want to share with others a piece of our spirit, especially when we are in a giving mood.
Just seeing another person’s reaction, no matter how transient, can instill us with the feeling of fulfillment. The acts themselves do not have to be grandiose. They can be spontaneous, and in fact the best ones often are. Most importantly, they are genuine and stem from the heart.
How will you know if it is genuine? That’s easy.
You have no expectations for what you do.
If you believe in karma, consider the warmth in your eyes and the smile upon your face today’s deposits. If you do not hold such belief, don’t worry about it. The fact is you’ve already benefited.
You may ask how. I can think of several reasons.
One. You probably smiled while you proceeded with the good deed, or maybe smiling was the deed.
Either way, using the muscles in smiling has increased the feel-good chemicals in your nervous system. You are now scientifically happier than you were before, and you didn’t even have to think about it.
Two. Biologically, your brain rewards you for helping fellow Homo sapiens. There is really nothing else to this. You WILL feel a rush of good vibes when you aid another human being, guaranteed.
Three. This one is deep. What we feel in our hearts is precisely a calling of the universe. As I have said, the universe is a system of harmony. There is give, and there is take. To act in concert with this pervasive force is to achieve something more than happiness:
Fulfillment.
Remember, a ripple of kindness may create waves of happiness down the road that you cannot possibly predict.
So that leaves us with the how. How do we be excellent to each other and still be true to ourselves?
That, my friends, is for you to find out.
But just remember, there is no better gauge of the universe than your own heart. Follow it, and you will ride time and space as you were meant to:
Truly enjoying every second of every day.
Now go kick some butt.
Until next time.
Your excellent friend,
-Tie
I can’t reconcile your description of humanity with what I see around me.
“we are all producers of positive energy”
“we all want to give to others”
I understand you likely mean this as a generalization, not to be true of all men. Nevertheless, as much as I’d like to believe this, even of the greater part of humanity, it just doesn’t ring true. Not in the age of ISIS; in the aftermath of two World Wars; having witnessed men robbing, enslaving, raping, torturing, and murdering other men; I find it much easier to believe that mankind is horribly broken. Evil seems to be our natural, default mode.
We don’t teach our children to do evil; they find that on their own. We must teach them to be and do good.
>But just remember, there is no better gauge of the universe than your own heart.
What do you mean by this? You said earlier:
> What we feel in our hearts is precisely a calling of the universe. As I have said, the universe is a system of harmony. There is give, and there is take. To act in concert with this pervasive force is to achieve something more than happiness: Fulfillment.
To simplify, you say that our heart is the “gauge of the universe”, but what we “feel in our hearts is… a calling of the universe”, and we should “act in concert with this pervasive force”.
So does our heart judge the universe, or does the universe instruct our heart? These seem to be contradictory…
I’m not trying to be offensive… I’m just trying to better understand what you intended to say.
“I understand you likely mean this as a generalization, not to be true of all men.”
You can understand it that way.
“So does our heart judge the universe, or does the universe instruct our heart? These seem to be contradictory…”
Consider that you are the universe. Problem solved. By the way the word I used was gauge, not judge.
“I’m just trying to better understand what you intended to say.”
I suggest starting with this statement rather than ending with it.