The Quest to Happiness (Nirvana)

We all may have different lifestyles, goals, interests, values, and beliefs and expectations from our lives, however, we all want one thing and we want to be that is being happy.

Happiness is a sense of well-being, joy, or contentment. happiness is a subjective term as we all have different causes and things that make us happy.

The profound way to be in a happy state of being is finding meaning and purpose in your life. You need to understand what is important to you and what matters to you the most in life.

It all starts with defining your core values to find your authenticity and be yourself. You have to ask yourself, if something I am doing currently, is it really adding any value to my life. if it is not adding any value, serving you or enhancing your life, you have to start eliminating it from your life.

Defined your core values

It is really crucial to define or identify and be really aware of your core value system. it could be as simple as how you want to live your life or the way you relate to other people.

People often feel lost in life because they are not living life from their core and are not being authentic, they are sleepwalking through life and have no idea what they want in life and are not conscious of themselves.

Especially younger generations of this era constantly feel lost because as they grow up they learn morals, rules, ethics of defining what happiness could be for them. sometimes or most of the time as they grow up that conditioning does not serve them anymore.

This social conditioning comes from everything external to you, parents, media, news, movies, magazines, friends and family, etc. often at times, it leads people to want to pursue things that are not going to make them happy.  You have to stop comparing yourself with others as everyone is different and we all don’t want the same things.

Life is a journey and not a competition.

You see your friends and family with material things that may look good on the outside, but there is no guarantee that those things add any value to their life, sure those things do make life easy and enhance our lives. However one has to wonder and go deeper and start to question everything.

Now you may ask what are the core values and how do I know mine. I invite you to sit down with a pen and paper and write them down or put them in your journal. You could have a combination of 5-7 core values that are important to you. Here are a few of them.

You can also find any of them that are not mentioned here, it just has to come from your heart and from within. I am putting some of them in BOLD as most of us I believe would resonate with.

Accountability, Achievement, Adventure, Affection, Altruism, Ambition, Amusement, Appreciation, Assertiveness, Authenticity, Balance, Belonging, Calmness, Clarity, Commitment, Compassion, Confidence, Connection, Consistency, Contribution, Control, Co-operation, Courage, Creativity, Curiosity, Decisiveness, Determination, Dignity, Discipline, Duty, Empathy, Enjoyment, Excellence, Excitement, Family, Fame, Freedom, Gratitude, Harmony, Honesty, Humility, Independence, Integrity, Intimacy, Justice, Kindness, Loyalty, Open-mindedness, Peace, Persistence, Privacy, Professionalism,  Punctuality, Reliability, Respect, Serenity, Self-control, Self-reliance, Simplicity, Sincerity, Structure,  support, Truth,  Straight-forwardness, Understanding.

Your core values are your primary values, Your secondary values could be improving your finances, starting that new business, your home improvements, health, and fitness, relationships with your spouse, neighbor, relations with parents, friends, and also working on your hobbies and pursuing your interests.

Get out of the comfort zone

The biggest thing that is holding you back is the Comfort zone: It is a dangerous place to be that sabotages Happiness and keeps you in a limitation created by your mind. Your mind wants to protect you. Overcome and tame your mind to get the desired results out of your life.

Happiness takes constant work and pursuing things outside your comfort zone will help you find your potential and trying new things will eventually lead to a happier state of being. Doing hard things, facing adversity and tackling obstacles and pushing harder, Exploring the unknown, will change your perspective and help you realize your potential and give you new insights.

By doing so you would know what makes you happy and what is worth your energy. Every day we have a limited amount of energy to give it to the things that matter. To manage your energy, you have to start eradicating and eliminating the things that don’t matter and really double down on things that add value to your life. This is how you get enough energy to pursue your happiness.

Indulge in small pleasures

“Learn to let go of anything in life that don’t serve you” –Saif Popatiya

Don’t take life too seriously, find small things that make you happy and something that you look forward too everyday. find the smallest thing that brings joy, pleasure and moments of happiness.

Life is a collection of small moments and the more happy we are, the more we will find those moments of bliss, nirvana. It could be as small as listening to a nice piece of music, reading a book by one of your favorite authors, watching a great film, taking walk around the block, spending time in nature, looking forward to a cup of tea or a coffee. or Just meditating in your room.

Here are a few of the small pleasures that might resonate with you and can indulge yourself in. the following is from

  • Flying over mountains
  • Car dancing
  • When the bass kicks in
  • Drying off the sun after swimming
  • Looking at your pet
  • When you hit the point in the book where suddenly you can’t stop reading.
  • When the mug you are warming up in the microwave stops with the handle pointing towards you.
  • Having a staring contest with a baby
  • That bite with all the toppings
  • The first warm day of spring
  • Baby giggling

You can also explore your interests and try drawing, painting, origami, photography, writing, learning a new language, cooking new recipes, watching birds, team sports, singing and dancing, creative work like gardening, painting, games, reading a nice book or watching that documentary you fascinates you. These activities will help you find things that excite you and also help you find your passion. If you are not sure what you like, try different things and explore to find what you find passion in.

Try new experiences than buying useless things ending up in your closet. Buy more experiences and fewer things. while buying something, question yourself, Does it add any value to my life? or Does it enhances my life and gives me good experiences and make me happy? this is where minimalism comes in, which I will discuss deeply in my upcoming blog post.

When life is hard

But there are times when Happiness really does seem impossible, incomprehensible even. It could be a few weeks of darkness during times of stress after some disappointment, but it continues and grows and the thought of being happy becomes a foreign concept.

The real challenge comes when you feel stuck in a situation that is making you unhappy and you can’t find a way out. In such a case it is really important to have a positive outlook-Perspective and be an optimist and look forward to small pleasures of life.

At times you have to create your own meaning and purpose out of life. Make changes in life and try different things that lift you up and excite you.

Even when you have a job you don’t like, look for the positive side in that job and develop new ways to do a certain activity, that will help you expand your awareness, you can continue to learn new skills while you are stuck in that job while you look for other jobs and career to move on to. For example, you can find ways to help other people who are less able physically or add some value to other people’s lives that will definitely create a sense of fulfillment and eventually you shall find happiness. 

At times when faced by adversity, setbacks and major life traumas, perhaps you lost someone you loved, had a break-up, lost your job or a house may be struggling financially. Any of these things can leave you feeling sad, depressed, lonely and lost and can even make you feel paralyzed and overwhelmed at times.  You may have faced betrayal or someone broke your trust and being unloyal.

Its quite normal to feel those emotions of sadness and disappointment, shock and grief, it may slow you down and make you reflect back and retrospect what went wrong and how you could change your approach, allow yourself to feel the emotions and process them.

Sometimes the hardest but important thing you can do is move on and let go. Let the pain and suffering in the past fuel your journey and create a passion to lead a happy life. Those are the experiences that help you build your character and create a stronger version of yourself in the process.

Reach out to your parents or friends and share with them what you are going through. Tell them you love and care for them, that will make you feel loved and supported. Remember there is nothing like weakness in reaching out, after all, you are just a human, do not ignore or suppress your feelings, that where the message is for your next step.

Gratitude: Appreciate the smallest things in your life that you are grateful for. This one is a deal-breaker and one of the potent things to do that instantly raises your state of being and vibrational frequency. May be your cute pet loves you, you have friends and family that appreciate you, you have the eyes to read this, you have good health, even be grateful for the mistakes you have made that taught you great life lessons that you can’t learn in college or university. Maybe you have a roof over your head, clean drinking water, you don’t struggle for clothes, etc.

Ground yourself: This is the one that has helped me a lot. it is to ground yourself in the present moment because the mind will constantly wander in pursuit of the next thing, once you reach a certain point the mind will create another rule, Once this happens I will be happy. We always put happiness off in the future moment not realizing all we have is now  (present moment).

It is paradoxical, but the truth is being happy right now will put you in frequency and you will attract more of it. you can also call it vibe:)

Be happy and let go of the expectations of things to work in a certain manner.

“Let go of the past, you cannot change it; Don’t anticipate the future, it hasn’t arrived yet, Be present; that’s the only moment you have” –Saif Popatiya

How to ground yourself will be in the upcoming posts so stay tuned.


Happiness is a choice and a state of being which is not determined by external circumstances but the internal calmness and serenity which eventually changes the external. Because external is the reflection of the inner state of being like a mirror.

Published by Saif popatiya


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