Finding Happiness

It was a Thursday night in July of 1996 when my quest for finding happiness began. I was sitting on the floor of my luxury apartment doing paperwork when it hit me that the path I was on was not the path for me.
I was twenty-five, wealthy (six figures in the bank) and had achieved every single material goal I ever wanted. I literally thought I had it all. My closets were filled with designer clothes and fancy shoes. My bathroom cabinets were filled with luxury cosmetics. Everything was great except for two things: I was miserable and I felt empty.

My childhood and teenage years were very tough and so I channeled all my pain into pursuing success. I thought, at the time, that if I achieved all my material goals, I would be in bliss. I worked very hard and was able to achieve every goal I set. But I started to notice that with each goal achieved, I was happy but it was temporary. I wanted ever lasting happiness and thought that the next goal would bring me that happiness. The irony is that with each goal achieved, I felt more and more miserable.
What made things even tougher was that to the outside world, I had it all so I could not express my pain to anyone out of fear that it would look like I was being ungrateful for my abundance. I was grateful but yet deep inside of me something just felt off.

The Start of My Journey to Happiness

So on that fateful July night, I decided that I would do whatever it would take to find happiness. The emptiness and the misery scared me and I did not want the rest of my life to be a continuation of that misery. Little did I know what life had in store for me.
A few months later, Buddhism entered my life and my world started to unravel. Discovering meditation was amazing and I felt that I had found the path that would help me to find what I was seeking. My hunch was correct because learning about meditation opened my eyes to a brand new way of looking at life.
I devoured spiritual books. I quit my job and started to travel the world. Within five years time, my luxury life was history. I no longer lived in a fancy apartment. My clothes and possessions were all donated. All I had was one suitcase with some clothes and some books along with a passport that proved I had circled the globe at least twice.
It was around this time that a wise monk crossed my path and gave me a chance to be initiated into one of the high Orders in India. I took the opportunity and fell in love with what I learned. My love for the teachings of Vedanta were so strong, I almost took final vows as a nun but decided not to because I was not ready to give up on the idea of sharing my life with a man. So I left the monastic path and re-entered the world. It was tough because the monastic world was just so beautiful and the modern world seemed to be full of pain. However, I continued on my quest for happiness.
A year later, I met my husband and that began the wonderful journey of marriage. I was still searching for happiness and one thing led to another and my husband and I found ourselves living in India for six months. It was one the best times of my life although it was a very emotional time for me because more and more of my family and friends were leaving my life.
When you go from being rich to being “poor”, not everyone gets that especially if you do it voluntarily. People think you are crazy and they think that eventually you will come to your senses. I apparently, to my friends and some relatives, did not come to my senses, so people started to leave and it was painful. My reputation was dragged through the mud. Numerous insults were hurled my way and even one uncle disowned me.
Despite the pain, I knew I was on the right path and was determined to find out all that I could about happiness. Once we were back home in America, my mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer and we moved in with my parents so that I could take care of my mother during the last six months of her life.
I was by her side when she passed on and that was a huge teacher. It showed me that all we take with us when we go is how we lived our lives. All the material possessions stay behind. My mother’s passing just made me more determined to love life and to find happiness.

A Shift in Finding Happiness

In September of 2010, strange things began to happen and it all started with a question my husband asked me. We were talking about goals and I realized that I no longer had any. For a former “Type A” like myself, such a sentence is totally out of character. How can I not have goals? It was very weird to hear myself say those words.
Even though I am a very positive person, my immediate reaction was that I was on the verge of dying because how can you go through life without goals? Was something wrong with me?
To complicate matters, I found myself not enjoying the things I used to enjoy. I used to read spiritual books and found myself not really learning anything new in the books that I was reading. The books were great but it was like reading the same material over and over again. It was getting to be boring.
This only made me more concerned because for the last thirteen years, that is all that I read and loved. What was happening to me? I had no clue. All I knew is that I no longer felt the way that I used to feel and it scared me because it was so different. Blogging became boring because I had no desire to write about the same things that I used to write about because the subjects no longer interested me.
I was having a huge identity crisis but I had no idea why. All I knew was that I truly felt happy. There was no sense of longing for happiness and that one realization made me see that the quest I had been on since July of 1996 was finally over. You would think this would have made me even happier but all it did was scare me.
Why did it scare me? Well…when you spend every cent you have and so much time on a goal—Like finding happiness–you never really think about the time when you actually achieve that goal. In my quest for happiness, I never imagined what would happen if I found the answers that I was looking for because it seemed so far-fetched.
Even more interesting was the fact that happiness looked so different from what I thought it would look like. For example, I still have days where I am cranky and my ego is in full control of my senses. I have days where all I want to do is stay in bed and not deal with the world. I have days when I am so full of joy, I could explode from the immensity of it. I have days where I cry at the pain that I see. I have days where I wonder if my quest was worth it since I spent every cent I had.
Yet despite all of those days, deep in my heart I know what life is all about and that brings me peace. I no longer question what is the meaning and purpose of life. I know what my purpose as a human being is and I strive to meet that purpose every day. Some days I hit the mark and other days I don’t.
You see…you and I are here because sometime ago we forget who we truly are at our core. We get so caught up in the illusion of life, we forget our inherent Divinity. We all have the ability to have lives we love and to be happy; we just need to see the illusions for what they are.
Your worth as a human being has nothing to do with how much money you have or the degrees or any other material item you think you own. You don’t own anything except for how you live. When you pass on, the cars, the money and all the things you own will not go with you. They will stay behind.
Your worth is determined by one thing and one thing only: how much love have you given to life? Have you brought joy to others or just misery? I wish I could tell you that I have only brought joy to others but I have not. I have done things which have hurt people but I vowed to learn from my mistakes and not repeat them. Sometimes it is easy and other times it is hard.
As I realized that my quest had come to an end, I did not know how to proceed with my life and so I took a three month hiatus from being online. It was very apparent that I could not write anything since a new writing voice was starting to emerge. It hit me that I needed to just be present in what was happening and just be.
For an active person like myself, standing still is like pulling teeth. I don’t love it but I knew that I needed to stand still in order to figure out what to do next. So I spent those three months reading, watching movies, traveling and a whole lot of introspection.

Clarity, At Last

By the end of December, a goal began to reveal itself and it was unlike any other goal I ever had. Most of us have goals that are rooted in personal gain. Our goals reflect our desires. The irony about life is that we focus so much on the end result, we lose sight of the fact that the journey is what matters.
Your experience of life is dependent on how you are present in life. Here in the West, we focus so much on doing that we neglect being. Being present in the moment is what determines your life. Are you present? Are you having fun being you? Do you love yourself?
If you are not having fun and if you don’t love yourself, then something has got to change. It is like the old Buddhist joke about a monk who passes away and discovers that the ancient text did not say celibate as he thought but rather it said celebrate.
So celebrate being you and being alive. Enjoy the journey. If you have goals, go for them but realize that the goals do not define who you are. How you go about your day says more about you than what you achieve. How you treat a stranger says more about you than how much money you have in the bank.
Where am I now in my life? Well…with all of these realizations, I decided to shut down my business because it no longer reflects the person that I am now. So I find myself starting a whole new phase and chapter in my journey (Hint: Think Simple Now will be my new home to document this journey).
A new writing voice is emerging as well which I am still honing. All I know is that I am happy and that I just want to do what I can to make other people realize how awesome they truly are. Finding happiness, in the end lead me to a place of service and shifting focus away from myself—for when we give, we truly receive. Amazing.

Forgiveness

Photo by Asaf Einy
Forgiveness is a difficult topic. On one hand, we feel that we have learned to forgive. On the other hand, we find ourselves resisting when we actually try to forgive someone.  Implementing forgiveness into our lives is a process.
Sometimes, things work in mysterious ways. Almost a year ago, I took a workshop on forgiveness. Some days, I would feel that I had learned how to forgive, and other days I felt that I had failed. The following is a story of a casual encounter with a stranger that reminded me of all that I have learned about forgiveness.
The other day I was walking my dog and, as I always do, I gave him a little water from the hose in front of someone’s house. I don’t know the owner of the house well. I met him once and I never asked him if I could do this. I always turn the hose off tightly and roll it back up leaving it exactly the way it was when I found it.
On this particular day, a woman I had never seen said to me, “What are you doing? Do you live there? Why are you using that hose?” I quickly retorted that I left it just the way it was and I wasn’t causing any harm to the hose or the homeowner. She told me I had no right to use the hose and gave me a dirty look and walked away.
I was so annoyed by this event. It spoiled my walk because I felt I had done nothing wrong and it wasn’t any of her business.
I even followed behind her as she kept walking away. But, then I started thinking about this workshop I had taken last April about forgiveness. There were two main points that stuck in my head: you don’t know what the other person is going through and if you hold anger, it takes away from your own joy. It is not just for the other person that you forgive, but for yourself, so you don’t waste your life angry with someone or continue to hold a grudge.
Now, obviously, this was on a much smaller scale than those heart wrenching times where we need to forgive someone in our life and it causes us great pain, but I decided to try the mode of thought recommended in this forgiveness workshop.
I thought maybe this woman is right. If she lives in this neighborhood, she could be protecting a neighbor of hers. I thought maybe she is having a bad day. And, then, I thought I don’t want to lose the joy that I have walking my dog on this beautiful day. I am going to let this go.
The next thing I knew, she was walking towards me and I thought now I am in trouble. Instead she said, “I am sorry. Giving your dog water is not a big deal. It’s just that I am on the landscaping committee of this housing area and so many people who don’t live here don’t clean up after their dogs and I am at a loss to figure out why they can’t be more responsible. It really aggravates me”.
I had already calmed down and told her I had been rethinking things and I was sorry. She had every right to watch out for her neighbors and she had no idea if I would take care of the hose or leave it running and cause problems. In addition, I didn’t live there.
She introduced herself with a smile and I did the same. It was the strangest experience as this is not normally how I handle things or how they work out. Most of the time, I can be a real bitch.
I bring this up in a long winded way because I think the most important thing you can do in 2011 is forgive someone who you feel has wronged or hurt you.
Not all of us, but most of us have experienced pain from a relationship with a friend or family member or someone with whom we work.
The memories of the pain or even continuing meetings with someone sit deep in our souls and eat away at us.
We don’t want to forgive because it feels like forgetting the wrong and we feel like the other person’s behavior doesn’t deserve to be condoned.
The workshop I took was called, “Forgive for Good” by Dr. Fred Luskin. Dr. Luskin teaches at Stanford and this is also the name of his book that I highly recommend to you.
In many ways, I think this workshop was life changing for me and I am still working on incorporating the concept into my life.
Dr. Luskin validates your right to feel hurt. He is not in anyway saying to ignore it. What he says is that dwelling on the hurt is taking away from your quality of life and damaging your health.
There had been someone in my life over the last few years who, although they had been a dear friend in the past, had betrayed and disrespected our friendship. As Fred says, “Forgiveness is making peace with the word No“.
That was the problem for me. I didn’t want to hear “no”. I was angry and I blamed this person, but in the end, I have come to realize that the way I was handling my hurt and anger was really preventing me from truly enjoying my life and moving forward.
And, if I was honest with myself, I would know that there were other issues going on in the other person’s life and it was not all about the problem in our friendship. Outside factors were affecting their behavior and probably mine.
This post is long today because 2011 is in its infancy and all things are possible, even changing our attitudes.
The “Forgive for Good” workshop inspired me to move on from hurt and blame. Forgiving was more for me to make a better life and not so much to absolve the other person of what I perceived to be their wrongdoing. It wasn’t about letting the other person off the hook and forgetting what they had done.
One of the 9 Steps of Forgiveness that is found on Dr. Luskin’s website is the following:
“Forgiveness does not necessarily mean reconciliation with the person that hurt you, or condoning of their actions. What you are after is to find peace. Forgiveness can be defined as the peace and understanding that comes from blaming that which has hurt you less, taking the life experience less personally, and changing your grievance story.”
Finding peace is the key and I found “Forgive for Good” to be incredibly helpful in this process.
I wish you all the ability to find peace in the New Year and I hope part of that process will be forgiving for good.

Dreams Come True: Story of Audacity

What are your dreams? What are you passionate about?
Around the time I graduated University I became fascinatedwith photography. It became my first passion. I dreamed of becoming a professional photographer.
I loved photography, and dove in head first determined to make my dreams come true. I read books, took countless images, invested in equipments, spent countless hours in Photoshop, attended gallery showings, and took classes on specialized subjects.
I loved photography so much that –at one point- I built a darkroom from scratch, rented a large loft space to have my ideal studio setup and eventually married a photographer – who I admired, because he was so confident with his craft and was among the few successful working photographers I’d met. Most other photographers I encountered all struggled to make ends meet.

The thing I loved about photography was that it gave me a tool with which to express myself emotionally, to do something from the heart, to capture moments of truth -powerful enough to bring me to tears. It increased my capacity to feel, and heightened my awareness and ability to connect with other people.
Some of the most blissful, spiritual, loving, heart-felt moments I’ve ever experienced, happened in the dark room, under the amber lights, by myself, as I witness an image come to life in the developer.
I wanted to share that with you, because it is a big part of where I came from, and my foundation for writing. Actually, I stopped taking pictures, after accidentally discovering that the same creative, powerful, spiritual experiences can be evoked through writing – as I do here (which is my other dream come true story).
I also wanted to share that with you, because I want to tell you what I learned through my experiences of going from amateur to semi-pro in the photography world in a short span of time.
I learned these things in making my photography dream a reality:

1. People will have confidence in you if you have confidence in yourself.
2. Persistence pays off.
3. Practice makes you better
4. You don’t need a formal education or years of experience to make it. Passion is more important.
5. It’s mostly about how you view yourself – that’s how the world will perceive you.
6. Re: Confidence. Fake it till you make it.
7. Audacity is important

I just want to spend a moment on Audacity, and the importance of it in seeing our dreams come true.
When you are trying to make it in any industry as a newbie, having the guts to approach people you don’t know –despite fear and insecurities- is probably your fastest route to success in that industry.
When I started pursuing photography. I didn’t have much technical knowledge, I didn’t have the experience, I didn’t have the pro cameras, I didn’t really know what I was doing. I was a computer geek, who had a burning desire to photograph people.
My dream was to capture images that moved people, to capture a moment of truth, and to have my photos published. I knew it was going to happen, someday, but I didn’t know how. In the mean time, I did everything I could to get my self closer to my dream vision.
When Anthony Bourdain visited Seattle on a book/talk tour, I walked up to him and asked him if I could have 10 minutes of his time. And to my surprise, he said yes. Here’s the photo I took from that day:

I did the same with Douglas Coupland. Here’s his photo:

I did the same with Russell Simmons, but the room was too dark, and the photo didn’t come out.
Right after one of Joshua Roman’s concerts, I ran up on stage and asked if I could take his portrait sometime. I gave him my card and thanked him for considering it. I was so nervous, all I remember is my heart beating loudly, and feeling insecure as others watched me from off stage.
He showed up in my studio a few days later, we jammed it out and got some great photos. We became good friends. My husband and I ended up doing Josh’s publicity photos since 2007. And most recently, he hired me to document his wedding, knowing that I’d never done a wedding before. He trusted me more than I trusted myself.
Here are some photos with Joshua from our earlier sessions:

My goal at the time was to be published, and be taken seriously. And I was able to do that within my first year of shooting. The photos of Joshua were later published by over 50 publications and media outlets – they’ve been on the cover of magazines, used in newspapers, promotional materials and graced the center of concert posters.
One of my Tibet travel photos was published in the book “The Best of Photography 2007”. And an image from my Nepal collection was sold and published by the San Francisco Chronicles.
When you believe strongly in something, or some *seemingly* impossible dream, just go after it, and trust that it will become a reality soon. Your faith in yourself and your craft is vital.
Do everything you can now to get one step closer to your dream. Do it despite fear. Do it despite insecurities. Do it despite no one else believing in you. Do it despite a lack of education or experience. Do it despite not knowing how-to. Just start with baby steps.
When we follow our hearts, magic happens.
Do it, even if sometimes following our hearts mean doing uncomfortable things like walking up to strangers, or saying things that might make us look stupid, or potentially getting caught with our “pants down” for not knowing what we’re doing. We all have those insecurities.
From years of developing a thick skin and doing things that scared me, I do know one thing to be true: when you sincerely take steps towards your goal, regardless of what that goal is, the universe will reward you in unexpected ways which will propel you to surpass your original goal and to reach your dreams.
The trick is to keep going, despite not knowing exactly how we will arrive there, and despite all of these mental tricks we play on ourselves.
The only thing we know right now is the next baby step we can take. Don’t trivialize or demoralize the power of baby steps. It’s important.
It’s important, because baby steps in the direction of our dreams, can mean that we eventually get there. And along the road, someone may surprise us and give us a ride in their car, allowing us to get there faster than anticipated.
People tend to give too much credit to luck, and natural talent. And then we judge ourselves for lacking talent and luck, thus, justifying our lack of action and lack of focus.
I love the saying that luck is the intersection between preparation and opportunity. It truly is. Luck is certainly most kind to those who have actively taken large steps towards their desired destination.