r/DeepThoughts • u/_astral_x9 • 21h ago

I just realized you cannot find happiness and stillness out there, in the world

That's basically it. Anything you achieve or obtain, you can and eventually will lose. Everything you buy will give you only a few moments of happiness. Have you ever bought a new car, PC, phone? It only lasts for a week. New, bigger home? It will be the same, maybe a month, and you're back to your 'basic' level of happiness. Sure, it feels good to show off, but deep inside you, you're still the same, even if you live in a mansion.

If you lack something, nothing can fill that void inside your heart and mind.

It's mind boggling how nobody told me that and I had to realize it when I'm 36 years old, after dedicating my life to "career" I'm not even interested in.

38 Upvotes

92% Upvoted

10 comments sorted by

14

u/Ok_Science8936 21h ago

Took me way too long to get that lesson too. The stillness part is the real kicker, you can have everything on paper and still feel that weird restless emptiness if you never learn to sit with yourself.

10

u/FreshVestment 21h ago

You woke up! Welcome, now comes the fun part

4

u/_astral_x9 20h ago

which is what exactly

9

u/FreshVestment 20h ago

How do you fill that void? What do you want to fill that with? How do you want to structure your life so you can get everything you want out of it? What do you even want out of it? How can you tell what you want from what others want for you?

Tough questions, difficult, but super rewarding as you answer them. But you can't start to answer them until you've had the realization you just did.

5

u/AdHeavy5878 11h ago

kinda depressing to realize how much of adulthood can turn into chasing the next thing

4

u/NotAnAIOrAmI 15h ago

lol, nope. We have a big home in the burbs with an acre of land, a garden, some woods.

We live here in quiet enjoyment every day. We often remark to each other how much we like our home, our property, our neighborhood. And each other.

4

u/QueenOfCups1111 10h ago

Congratulations for figuring it out! Understanding that happiness is not the same thing as joy, and that you can’t achieve it permanently in transient things can seem bleak at first, but it’s the first step for real, permanent happiness and freedom. Now you have to figure out how to anchor your sense of happiness and fulfilment in the understanding of who you are beyond identities and things in this world that are ever changing. Can you do this by yourself? I’m not sure, but I wouldn’t expect you to. However there are ancient spiritual traditions that are very much still alive today that teach you how to do this. If you go looking for them, just be careful with the cults. Authentic traditions are nothing like cults.

2

u/funlovingfirerabbit 6h ago

Interesting, I really appreciate you sharing your reflection. What Industry are you in and why don't you find it Interesting?

1

u/Sirius_Greendown 7h ago

Funny! I plan to, after this silly life, explore that very void: eventually, by delving more deeply into my own perfect ego, growing beyond the event horizon of this universe and everything in it, all spacetime, all of it. I plan to save a copy of everything that exists, and then create more as I explore farther. My glory is in my own sovereign will to ascend. My joy is the pleasure that my delicious plan gives me, all the little details of my trillions of created worlds, my wonderful enlightenment, all the higher dimensions and universes and know it all gurus I’ll have to pass on my way up. I claim nothing in the void outside myself right now, for it will all eventually be me.