Once we begin to mature and exert our individuality, we commence to set goals for ourselves. We discover at an early age that such goals are necessary if we wish to accomplish any worthy desire in the material world. As we mature further and come to consider things of the spiritual, we come to realize that here, too, we must set goals if we are to achieve our desired ends.

By such defined goals we are able to map out our future work and plot our progress along the way. Only by such logical efforts are the worthy objectives of both the material and the spiritual world to be garnered.

As we set these goals, we build up within us the anticipation of their fulfillment. We know that once a certain goal is reached we will find happiness and contentment. There is little doubt in our mind that the more difficult the goal the greater will be our happiness and contentment once it is achieved.

Achieving Our Goal

We usually remain of this mind set until we achieve our first goal. Once this has been achieved, however, we find that a strange letdown feeling begins to spread over us. We soon realize that the object of all our efforts is not quite as we expected it to be. We see and experience imperfections that we did not notice before its acquisition. This is true whether our desired object was a car, a house, a job, or some spiritual quality.

What to do? Could it be that we did not choose wisely? If we had set another, a worthier goal, we would assuredly now be pleased.

So we try again. This time a goal of a higher quality is selected. The efforts needed to attain this desire are much greater than before. We feel elated about our efforts. We feel alive and vital. This time there can be little doubt that we have chosen correctly. When this goal is reached, we will be in a state of exhilaration. The culmination of this goal will bring us enormous and lasting satisfaction.

Finally, after much time and persistence, our exalted goal is achieved. We are again elated; for a while we bask in the glory this effort has brought us. We have, indeed, found nirvana; we have reached the goal of peace and contentment all men seek.

Reaction to Achievement

But, what is this? A small difficulty to disturb our perfect peace? Assuredly. It will take only a moment to correct and then our bliss will once again be complete. But, as soon as one rent is repaired another, larger, is found. Then still another and another until our garment of delight is torn to shreds and we are once again filled with that same old letdown, wondering if any goal is really worth the effort.

We are desolate. What possibly could have gone wrong? The answer to this question is simple: Nothing went wrong. We are functioning normally for a human being. Our distress and confusion is due to the fact that we simply do not understand our own nature. Nowhere is it written that we are to feel satisfied after reaching a goal. Neither God nor man has handed down this dictum. In fact, some of the greatest sages of the past have said just the opposite. From Alexander Pope we have the thought,

"Hope springs eternal in the human breast,
Man never is, but always to be blessed."

If God is a good God, full of love and compassion for His creatures, why would He withdraw from us the pleasure of our completed goals? The answer, though simple, is not always readily accepted. If we were ever satisfied with an objective for very long, we would not seek further and advancement in the world and our own development would stop tight there.

If once man had found a warn cave and been completely satisfied, we would still be living in caves. Dissatisfaction is the mother of all advancement. Therefore, we have been programmed by our Creator, who knows what's best for us, to become rapidly dissatisfied with whatever we accomplish. We are allowed only a short time of grace to enjoy our accomplishments before the inner-programmed sense of dissatisfaction again rears its head.

In the material world two built-in factors aid this process. The first has been called by our scientists the Second Law of Thermodynamics of the Law of Natural Entropy. Under this law, it is the nature of all things to revert to their most basic form unless some force acts upon them to reverse this action. This is the reason for rust and corrosion. This is why we cannot reach a goal and expect it to remain the same as we first found it. All things return to a less organized state unless we, by outside effort, exert a force in the opposite direction. Therefore, once a goal is achieved, it can be perpetuated only by renewed effort, such effort actually changing the goal and making it new.

The second factor to be considered is evolution. Nothing stands still. Everything must go forward or die. This is equally true of our goals. Once achieved, effort is required to preserve them, not only from the decay mentioned above, but also to keep them in step with evolution.

We quickly see that the world is not set up for the preservation of goals. Just the opposite. It is so arranged that all goals are but short-lived to give man impetus to constantly seek new and better ones.

How, Then, Can Man Achieve Happiness?

If happiness is not to be found in attaining goals, where are we to find it? Are we never to be happy in his life? And if not here, what assurance do we have that happiness is to be found anywhere?

Answers to these questions lie all around us. Seek, and you shall find. Look at the child waiting for Santa Claus. For weeks he is in a state of ecstasy, anticipating the great day. Of course, once it comes, it is a disappointment, but great happiness was created from the anticipation.

Have we learned something? Is our happiness more in the anticipation of something than in the thing itself? Why not? In our mental anticipation the object of our desire has no faults or weaknesses. In our imagination it is all we can wish. There is no Second Law of Thermodynamics in imagination. Nor are there concerns for the effects of evolution. Controlled anticipation of that which is good and beautiful is very close to Heaven because the mind can concentrate only on what we would have things be, not what they are. Realization never equals anticipation.

For this reason, a book made into a movie almost always disappoints. Each reader has created in his mind the perfect cast of characters. It is not possible for finite actors to fulfill the dreams of every reader and, therefore, the movie must fall short for many viewers.

But is anticipation all the happiness we have to look forward to? Is this not only a shadow of what we have been led to expect? Right you are. The real road to happiness can be given in a single sentence. Man is so constructed that he derives his greatest happiness and pleasure not so much from the capture, BUT FROM THE CHASE.

Eureka! Here is the answer! We are not supposed to gain our greatest satisfaction from the attainment of our goal but from our efforts to reach that goal!

Now, there is a concept we can understand. Because we spend the great majority of our time in the search rather than in the culmination of our accomplishment, we have the opportunity to be happy and joyful most of the time. When we reach that rather troublesome periods of goal fulfillment, we can begin a new and higher goal almost immediately so that the letdown which is a part of accomplishment will be as short-lived as possible.

This sounds strange, doesn't it? Practically a reversal of what we have been taught. But, if our teachers were right, why is there so much unhappiness in the world? Sir Arthur Conan Doyle knew of this way to happiness when he wrote his Sherlock Holmes stories. Was not this great detective most alive when he was able to say, "Come, Watson, the game's afoot." He knew that it is the GAME ITSELF that is our main source of joy, NOT THE SOLUTION.

There is a phrase many totalitarian leaders use to attempt to mollify their populations for the lack of worldly pleasures: "Be happy in your work." As it is commonly used, it is almost a parody, yet it offers some of the best advice possible for the average American. If we do not enjoy our work, we are relegating a great part of our life to the garbage can. The Man who derives no pleasure from the work he puts his hands to is to be pitied. True happiness will elude him and the search for what has been lost will usually lead him into areas of a destructive nature.

If there is a reason for doing anything, there is a reason for doing it well. If it is done well, you can derive pleasure from its accomplishment. Only that which we do poorly produces displeasure.

If we find our job not to our liking, this dislike is because we feel we can do better. This dissatisfaction is essential to the progress of the individual and of society. Once the dissatisfaction is sufficient, a change will be made and both the person and the world are advanced. Only the weakling will be left behind to complain ad infinitum. Nothing can be done for the weakling until hw is able to lift himself out of his miserable state.

Does this principle of goals apply as well to the spiritual world? It certainly does. As a wise man once said, "As you approach your spiritual goal, it continues to recede." Why? For the same reasons as in the material world. Were we able to find any lasting peace or contentment in the spiritual world we, as in the temporal, would tend to cease all future efforts. This is not to be. It is not within the laws of our Creator, who wants us to constantly strive for greater and greater perfection. Here, too, however, we are not denied happiness or contentment, but as in the material world it must be extracted from the GAME and not from the SOLUTION.
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