The November 1, 2010, issue of The Watchtower published by the Jehovah’s Witnesses contains a worthwhile article on the five secrets to contentment. They are:
- Love people, not money and possessions
- Resist the urge to compare yourself with others
- Maintain an appreciative attitude
- Choose your friends wisely
- Satisfy your spiritual need
It’s a short list, but a lot to consider. As you would imagine, the original article takes a Biblical approach to provide support and recommend action for each secret. I’ll take the approach of these secrets applied to the quest for awakening, as I believe the spiritual need is the ultimate source and solution of our discontent.
- Love people, not money and possessions: As you choose friends wisely, likewise be a wise friend. Love does not mean attachment and neediness, otherwise it is symptomatic of the same illness as love of money and things. As Richard Rose said, “This love can be expressed as friendship of the most unselfish type.”
- Resist the urge to compare yourself with others: Such comparison may bloat the ego, sends us spiraling into futility, or detour us down a path not meant for us. This doesn’t mean we can’t learn from others. It does mean that our path is unique and built from our own needs. It is also built to our abilities – meaning we have the internal resources to succeed, though it may far surpass what we believe we are capable of.
- Maintain an appreciative attitude: Be thankful when the roll of the dice falls your way. This helps us remember our apparent place as actors on a stage. There is a magical blend of humility, perspective, and honesty that grows in us as we live the paradox of free will and destiny. Rose hinted at this paradox when he said, “Yet the real teacher is not a man, and is known only in that circumstances befall us.”
- Choose your friends wisely: Find people who share your spiritual interest and value the truth even above friendship. Old friends often support old habits which may not be conducive to a life of spiritual search. Yet good, honest people come clad in many colors and you can often learn a lot from those whose wisdom is as much from living a thoughtful life as from pursuing a spiritual search.
- Satisfy your spiritual need: Some feel or suspect that permanent satisfaction of their spiritual longing is the only hope for contentment in this life. This secret is the linchpin. It is possible to have all the advantages of life yet feel a deep longing and emptiness inside. Likewise, it is possible to feel complete inside, yet have little or nothing in the material world. The other four secrets are practices that support this one as well as natural responses that flow from it. As you seek to satisfy your spiritual need, the other four secrets become obvious responses to life.
Popular themes for Christian sermons, there are many other lists of “secrets of contentment,” with everything from one to a dozen secrets. Most of the secrets are really tools, designed to achieve a goal; the satisfaction of that goal bringing permanent contentment. Contentment itself is a byproduct of an achievement of perspective. Otherwise, we are always working, doing something, to try to maintain our contentment. The lists with a single secret have a spiritual goal. “Where do you stand with Jesus?” is one phrasing as well as “to give your self over or become connected to a higher power.” The real secret is to identify and satisfy your deepest longing which is always, at root, a spiritual longing.