Hello Bogdan
Thank you for the welcome back and thank you for posting. I have to say that I haven't managed to rest at all ... between my studies and an overload of work ... things had been piling up ... but I have managed to clear the bulk of it for now ....
However, I have to say that somehow it feels like I have neevr been away ... I have been kept well informed of everything going on here in the community heheheheh
I have to say that I am glad you raised the point about happiness and the Secret. Yes, I have to agree that the Secret, pretty much, revolves around the concept of achievement, i.e. wealth, power, success etc... but as was mentioned in an earlier post, I think it is a commercial venture that caters for the masses and, nowadays, people "in general" seem to equate happiness with all the aforementioned.
Happiness is a state of mind. It is an attitude that we can choose to have or not, as the case may be. We are responsible for choosing how we want to feel in whatever situation.
I agree with you that it is difficult to be positive all the time ... but ... it's not impossible. It's a question of training ourselves to be in control of our thoughts. One very useful way of achieving this is by quieting our mind. Meditation is an excellent means to learn how to do this.
Meditation, yoga, relaxation techinques and other methods, when learnt, and mastered, as an art form, quietens the mind to a point that we learn how to keep thoughts from overtaking us. As Rose mentioned in her post, fear is the main culprit for an overloading of thoughts.
People, all too often clog their mind with fears and worries. They are afraid of not being good enough, not having achieved anough, not having taken the right opportunities, not being in a position to have any advantages in life, not being wealthy enough and so forth and so on. When the mind is steeped with all these thoughts, there is hardly room for positive thinking.
However, when a person learns to silence those inner fears and thoughts, they can choose what to think about and they can choose to shift their attention from the fears to a more happy thought. For example: If someone is worrying about paying a bill and not having the money, just by switching their attention from that thought to one of, perhaps, the day they went for an icecream with their best friend, they can change their frame of mind and, hence look at the problem in a new light.
If someone doesn't have the money to pay the bill, thinking about it in a negative wy is not going to pay it ... so why think negatively about it? ... If, however, they are thinking a pleasant thought, they may find a solution to the problem. None of us can think when we so bogged down with destructive thoughts.
I have read and listened to plenty of works by Esther Hicks and I agree with with her when she says that whatever we keep in our mind will be the thing that will happen the most because we are focusing all our attention on it. It's logical ... If for example someone sets out to be the best in their field ... when they constantly think about it ... they are bound to achieve it because they will focus all their determination in that direction and work harder towards it... the same with happiness ...If someone is determined to be happy ... and they think about being happy all the time ... they cannot fail to be happy because they will be predisposing themselves to the sheer concept of happiness.
Again, logically, having our goals in mind are an excellent way to start the ball rolling for events to take place an, eventually, snowball into what we need and want, whether that be, as you mention: people, circumstances, events etc.
I am sure that there are plenty of people in here in our community who had childhood dreams they realised as adults ... sometimes we just forget how passionate we were about our dreams and sometimes we let the everyday worries of survival get in the way.
Another good point you raised is about not obtaining what you want by hate, envy of others or such like emotions. Of course, this is logical as well ... Hatred, envy and so many other negative feelings against our fellow humans are all negative emotions which feed more negative emotions.
The truth is, though, that when we occupy our mind and focus our attention on envying, or hating others, we are taking time away from developing ourselves. If we are so focused on others we can't be focused on us. If all our emotions and determination is focused on bad towards others, we are taking it away from positively working on what we want to achieve ... and that is what Esther Hicks is essentially saying.
It's ok to have a bad day ... we need those ... without the bad days, we cannot appreciate, and be grateful for the good days ... but even when we are having a bad day ... only we can choose to make it better by, simply, shifting our thoughts and attitudes.
By the same token, we can choose to make it worse by being even more negative.
The basic need here is for us all to start taking responsibility for what we think, how we think it and, subsequently, how we react in our actions.
Take care and have a lovely weekend with the family
Best wishes
Venerina