How to Shake off Worries and Find a Happy Life
Hanxiao
There is no denying that we all want to live a happy life, having a warm and harmonious family, an ideal job, a good prospect, sensible children and so on. However, in the process of seeking happiness, we are besieged by all sorts of worries. Some people worry about whether their jobs will be threatened in face of fierce social competition. Some worry about their success in competition with their colleagues. Some rack their brains trying to make big money to remain invincible in the business. Some seek every means to attend training classes given by famous teachers to improve themselves constantly, so that they will become the strong of life or social elites. And some worry about when they can pay off their car loan or housing loan and therefore rush and busy about for it. More people can hardly breathe due to hard work or heavy business, and pressures of life have greyed their hair. Others worry about their marriage and family in face of the temptations from the evil trends of the world. Still others worry about how to educate their children and make them stand out among others in the increasingly fierce social competition. … With so many worries in our life, isn’t the happy life we yearn for far from the reality?
Then, What Causes the Worries in Our life?
There are mainly two reasons.
First, our criteria of a happy life are fame and gain. We think we will live happily as long as we succeed in our studies, careers, and marriage, our children become useful, and we become the best of the best and are admired by others. We all live by the rules for survival such as the “wealth and status,” “family prestige,” “rising above others,” “money talks,” “money isn’t everything but without money you can’t do anything.” So we fix our life goals firmly on those which can bring us fame and gain, and fear that something would go wrong in the course of our pursuit and thus we might brush past happiness.
Second, we live in our own worlds and always want to live the life we desire through our own exertion. In fact, we are insignificant in this universe, but we always consider ourselves powerful. We think that our fates can be controlled by our own hands. Only by seizing the right moment and grasping our fate can we succeed, and only by keeping ourselves progressing can we achieve a happy life step by step. For these reasons, we often worry: Should I have done it better? Have I missed any chance?
Can These Things We Pursue Bring Us a Happy life?
In reality, if we think back and observe carefully, we can easily find this fact: Many people try their best to live happily, but when some of them do get fame and gain and position, they find themselves living in a treacherous world where people intrigue against and outwit each other. They are no happy at all. Some people have reaped fame and gain after struggling most of their life, but they do not feel happy within their hearts. For they have seen that there is no justice, no righteousness, and no light in the world—everyone lives for fame and gain and for pursuing fleshly enjoyments, and nobody can find a shred of the value and meaning of life. Some people have successful careers and happy marriages, but in real life, they rack their brains to get money, fame, gain, and position, and are exhausted from the sinister interpersonal relationship. Some people become millionaires, but they die young or commit suicide, for the material wealth cannot fill the emptiness of their hearts. So money cannot bring us happiness, either. Even many elderly people who used to eat bland food say, “Now we are wealthy and don’t need to worry about food and clothing, but we always have a sense of emptiness within. Well, we’re just muddling along.’” Maybe you don’t understand why they say so. Since they had gone through many hardships and now live a wealthy life, they should feel happy. But how come …
Actually, King Solomon’ words in the Bible have given us the answer. He said, “I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and, behold, all is vanity and vexation of spirit” (Ecclesiastes 1:14). This shows that a wealthy life, and fame and gain cannot bring us happiness; they can only make us feel increasing emptiness.
How Can We Shake off Worries and Live a Happy Life?
As a matter of fact, the true happiness comes from God, and only God is the source of our happiness. Only by obeying God’s sovereignty and walking the way of human life in accordance with God’s requirements, can we have the true happiness. The Lord Jesus has said to us, “Therefore I say to you, Take no thought for your life, what you shall eat, or what you shall drink; nor yet for your body, what you shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much better than they? … Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? (For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knows that you have need of all these things. But seek you first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added to you” (Matthew 6:25-26, 31-33).
We were created by God; and in the beginning, in order to make us mankind live better on earth, God created the beautiful Garden of Eden for our ancestors, Adam and Eve, and unconditionally bestowed upon them everything they needed to exist. They were carefree and blissfully living in Eden. Abraham, recorded in the Bible, heard God’s command and went to the place God promised to him. He didn’t worry about his future life, rising up and leaving his hometown. Because he had the true faith in God and true worship of God, he could obey all the orchestrations and arrangements of God. He took no thought of his own future and fate, nor did he have unreasonable requirements or extravagant desires for God. He lived in God’s blessings all his life because of his worship for God. In addition, Job, a character in the Bible that is familiar to us, spent all his life in seeking to know God among His creation of all things and worship Him, so he was blessed by God and became wealthy. When he was stripped of all, he neither complained or misunderstood God, nor worried about his future life, because he knew that everything was in God’s hands. When he absolutely obeyed and offered praise to God, not only did he gain double blessings from God, but also his life was prolonged and he died full of days at last. The Lord Jesus’ words make us understand that in our real life, if we are able to practice the Lord’s words, follow His way, and pursue the truth to gain life and attain fearing God and shunning evil, we will receive God’s blessings and salvation and be qualified to enter the kingdom of Heaven. Only when we love the Lord with all our heart, all our mind, and all our soul, only when we have an obedient attitude to our future life, and only when we receive everything God has arranged and prepared for us and seek to know God through it, can we live in happiness.
Finally, let me share a passage in “God Himself, the Unique III”: “For one sees that when one does not comprehend fate, when one does not understand God’s sovereignty, when one gropes forward willfully, staggering and tottering, through the fog, the journey is too difficult, too heartbreaking. … When one has no God, when one cannot see Him, when one cannot clearly recognize God’s sovereignty, every day is meaningless, worthless, miserable. Wherever one is, whatever one’s job is, one’s means of living and the pursuit of one’s goals bring one nothing but endless heartbreak and irrelievable suffering, such that one cannot bear to look back. Only when one accepts the Creator’s sovereignty, submits to His orchestrations and arrangements, and seeks true human life, will one gradually break free from all heartbreak and suffering, shake off all the emptiness of life.”
Dear friends, I hope this article could help you reflect on life, shake off your worries, and have a happy life.
