Matthieu Ricard, the happiest man alive, through his talk, juxtaposed, the two ‘synonymous’ feelings, pleasure and happiness and helped clearly set apart one from another. In simpler words, he established that, if chocolate = pleasure, then we ourselves are the chocolate factories[we create and define our own happiness].
The Dalai Lama was once in Portugal, and there was a lot of construction going on everywhere. So one evening, he said, “Look, you are doing all these things, but isn’t it nice, also, to build something within?” And he said, “Unless that — even you get high-tech flat on the 100th floor of a super-modern and comfortable building, if you are deeply unhappy within, all you are going to look for is a window from which to jump.”
When we chase happiness or things that promise happiness, we essentially are pushing it away from us. In the words of Albert Schweitzer, German Philosopher,
Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful.
Matthieu Ricard conveys this wronged notion with a commonly prevalent worldly belief, which in itself is the major downfall in the quest of pursuit of happiness
We think that if we could gather this and that, all the conditions, something that we say, “Everything to be happy — to have everything to be happy.” That very sentence already reveals the doom of destruction of happiness. To have everything. If we miss something, it collapses. And also, when things go wrong, we try to fix the outside so much, but our control of the outer world is limited, temporary, and often, illusory.
So now, look at inner conditions. Aren’t they stronger? Isn’t it the mind that translates the outer condition into happiness and suffering? And isn’t that stronger? We know, by experience, that we can be what we call “a little paradise,” and yet, be completely unhappy within.”
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