A Monk's Guide to Happiness: Meditation in the 21st century

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Thubten manages to explain his points perfectly with a combination of nature, technology, psychology and science which surprised me for a monk. Thubten’s incorporation of neurological and psychological issues made me respect him so much more. It made the weight of his words feel more considered, unbiased and genuine. Words are nice but action provides better results and Thubten sees happiness not as something to be bought or searched for externally but to be found within our minds. Allowing us the chance to change our perspective on what happiness truly is. Training our minds like a muscle to be more resilient to negative and unhelpful thoughts and learning to keep the mind from wandering resulting in lost focus and harmful distraction. To help us be more present and less influenced by the past, the future and the unknown. Allowing us to maintain a more substantial state of happiness and stopping unnecessary surges of adrenaline and cortisol from ruining our life experiences. I loved Thubten’s view on waiting for example. How waiting for something doesn’t have to be a stress inducing inconvenience but instead a moment to pause, time to just be until it is time to re-engage with your day and hurry off.

That’s just what Buddhist monk Gelong Thubten will teach you in A Monk’s Guide to Happiness: Meditation in the 21st Century ! Gelong Thubten's wonderful book provides a bracing challenge to our search for instant gratification and "instant" happiness, and a lucid, practical, step-by-step path to contentment and a genuine and lasting peace of mind.' As Buddhists have known for a couple of millennia, happiness is not just a dopamine rush in your brain: it is an enduring state of completeness and peace of mind.

In this profound and inspiring book, Gelong Thubten shares a practical and sustainable approach to happiness. Thubten, a Buddhist monk and meditation expert who has worked with everyone from school kids to Silicon Valley entrepreneurs and Benedict Cumberbatch, explains how meditation and mindfulness can create a direct path to happiness. In June 2009 I emerged from a meditation retreat that had lasted four years. It was an intensive programme alongside 20 other monks, in a remote old farmhouse on the Isle of Arran in Scotland. We were completely cut off from the outside world, with no phones, Internet or newspapers. Food was brought in by a caretaker who lived outside the walls of the retreat and we had a strict schedule of between 12 and 14 hours’ meditation per day, mostly practised alone in our rooms. This programme went on in the same way every day for four years. We were allowed to talk a little to each other at mealtimes or in the short breaks between sessions, but things intensified in the second year, when we took a vow of silence for five months. We all go through hard times. We can experience moments when life feels like an uphill struggle, leading to unhappiness and stress. Perhaps we are feeling sad, anxious, or are challenged to deal with something bigger, such as a bereavement, a loss, a painful ending or a broken heart. It is during these moments when life feels difficult that we could do with some help with our thoughts and feelings. Everybody wants to feel good, so it’s no surprise that, nowadays, everyone attempts to sell this feeling. Thubten is able to explain meditation using clear language and an approach which really speaks to our modern tech-infused lives. With openness, humility and humour he delivers a deep message that will resonate in our modern culture.'

In this profound and inspiring book, Gelong Thubten shares a practical and sustainable approach to happiness…Thubten, a Buddhist monk and meditation expert who has worked with everyone from school kids to Silicon Valley entrepreneurs and Benedict Cumberbatch, explains how meditation and mindfulness can create a direct path to happiness…’ this is one way to look at this book, only this is a marketing quote, meant to make you buy the opus, which would not be a bad idea, given that the purpose of the guide to happiness is more than worthy it is ‘the purpose and ultimate goal in life is to achieve eudaimonia ('happiness')’according to Aristotle, who used logic when he said that we try to be happy, when we are not and once we are, we have achieved the ultimate state of grace – not in those words, of course, I have to at least try and make a personal contribution, make an interpretation here and there, try a little flourish and why not, even twist the words of some great sages… Thubten talks about the absolute importance of Interdependence (depending on each instead of ourselves). How working as one improves the flow of Oxycontin. How empathy only gets you so far so practising compassionate behaviour is vital to improving all of our daily interactions. What you will be able to achieve if you learn to forgive yourself and others. Increasing your self confidence and your confidence in others too. Pulling all of these aspects into short (10-15 min) meditation sessions that will lower stress and give you more time to be happy. GT writing is genuine, with heart and understanding, and is a far departure from some of the condescending and basic run-throughs of meditation I have experienced in the past. The state of happiness isn’t something ephemeral—isn’t a hit of dopamine in the brain. The state of happiness, he says, is an enduring state of completeness, a state of peace, a state of no more striving and no more fear. No matter how good you feel, you’ll never be happy if you think of happiness in terms of external things and circumstances. The main brain chemical involved in that kind of happiness “hit” is dopamine, and interestingly this hormone surges before we get what we want and then it drops away. When we are about to have the bite of cake, or when we’re getting ready for the party, we are caught up in the excitement of the chase, and when we actually eat the cake the dopamine drops away; and so our lives are about anticipation. Animals get a big dopamine hit when they think they are about to get fed; “about to happen” is always the exciting part. “When I am rich”; “When I meet the right person”; “When I achieve the body I want.” We never actually get there, as the anticipation leads to a habit of looking for the next thing, which means we never feel we truly arrive. There is always an “if,” “when,” or “because” to our happiness.

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Support the podcast and enjoy Ad-Free episodes. Try FREE for 7 days on Apple Podcasts https://apple.co/feelbetterlivemore. For other podcast platforms go to https://fblm.supercast.com. In fact, one of the Tibetan words for meditation is gom, which literally means “to become familiar with.” His new book, A Handbook for Hard Times: A Monk’s Guide to Fearless Living, draws on what he’s learned over the past 30 years. Its premise is that we can embrace life’s difficulties as opportunities for personal transformation, using hard times to cultivate resilience, kindness, and happiness. So, how exactly are we meant to do this? Thubten explains that one way is through the practice of meditation and learning how to process negative emotions in the moment, rather than only understanding them in retrospect. According to Aristotle (and almost all philosophers after him), happiness is the only thing we desire for its own sake. It is the end-goal of all our endeavors. Whether you want more money or more love in your life, the real reason why you want these things is that you believe they will bring you happiness.