We need to take charge of our own happiness. If our deepest desire to be happy remains unfulfilled, no matter how prosperous, powerful, or successful we are, peace will elude us. We must realise that it is not anyone else’s job to make us happy, and if we don’t take this job seriously ourselves, we cannot externalise our blame.

Taking charge of our own happiness simply means that we develop the art and secret of being happy, not because of, but in spite of people and circumstances. We will only be able to achieve this when we keep reminding ourselves of three things in every interaction – uncertainty, unpredictability, and impermanence.

From experience, we know that in spite of best efforts and planning, many times there is no certainty. Things can and will change very quickly, moving from being favourable, to difficult, to becoming favourable again. We may not realise it but in our desire for certainty, we have linked our happiness to favourable outcomes, leaving us unhappy in uncertainty.

People carry their own emotions and thinking and can be unpredictable. When they behave the way we expect and desire, we are happy, but when they become unpredictable and behave otherwise, our happiness disappears.

Things and events don’t last forever. When we have them we are happy, when they are no longer in our life, we are unhappy. Anything that is impermanent, cannot give us permanent happiness.

When we try and gain happiness by controlling uncertainty, unpredictability, and impermanence, we are deluding ourselves. Taking charge of our own happiness means we recognise and realise that we need to shift the source of happiness from out there, to within ourselves.

This does not mean we disengage with the world and become selfish, self-centred, and egoistic. On the contrary. It only means that we make the subtle but most important shift in recognising the world for what it is and engage with the freedom, knowledge, and independence that we are in the world, yet our happiness is independent of the vagaries of life.

Fire is its own source of light, whether night or day. Taking charge of our own happiness is not being dependent on a fire for our warmth, but igniting the fire within and being our own source of happiness.

(Picture-Lake Geneva seen from Caux)