[qbit]

Another perhaps more esoteric approach is pointed to by Ramana Maharshi (and others) who encouraged people seeking happiness to inquire into "the one who is unhappy". In other words, to ask oneself, "Who is it that is unhappy?" The idea being that the independent entity that most of us take ourselves to be is just a fictional story (an I-thought) with no real existence, and that it comes about from an erroneous identification with thoughts. Once that is fully realized, the problem of happiness is permanently solved because the "I-thought", as he calls it, is the real root of the problem. In fact, according to him, it's the root of all of our problems. ;-)

[rusk]

Oh for the luxury of an internal locus of self evaluation! Repositioning my perspective on who I was - changing the goal posts of happiness as it were was all so easy once upon a time and then I got married! I find this kind of transcendental juggling a good bit harder now that it’s not just my own happiness that needs to be accommodated ... anyone got any tips?