What are you really chasing in life?

Mental peace ? I really don't know if you all will agree with me or not, but actually we are are chasing mental peace. whether it is about love, adventure, money, lust, education, knowledge or anything, we all are looking for mental peace, self satisfaction, happiness.. so that we can feel good. And trust me,we all want this mental peace so desperately that most of the time we don't even realise that this thing lies inside us. we don't have to case it, or run after it. Something a single piece of bread with happy mind and atmosphere can fill our stomach, and it cannot even compared with a dinner at any expensive or famous place.

Our chase begins from the birth till death. We, Human beings out of contentedness at each phase keep chasing for some or other stuff which we believe will make happier when it reaches us. But it is an incessant phenomenon. From the very birth of new born from the mother's womb who chases for hunger , to the adolescent who chases for education grows up to the man who chases for career, money, life settlement, children, their growth, their career and the anxiety and concern doesn't end here. It haunts us till the last breathe. By the time we realize what we have been chasing for all these years, we miss the actual tranquility that we should have been chased parallelly while fulfilling the material concepts.

As a child, in fact until we become mature adults, you do not think about a purpose to live, or worry about not having one. You just live — exist —, doing what you are told, slowly developing likes and dislikes, loves and hates. Until one day, we get some responsibility, the act you do involves some part of your inside, an emotional and motivational component, like some exam to pass, some race to win, some plant or pet to take care of, somebody to protect, some wrong to set right, or some dream to chase. Then, you discover a ‘purpose’, even though you may not recognize it as such, or name it so. It becomes a goal, even if temporary.

As long as these small goals are unrelated to one another, self-centered, and/or mentally disorganized, they won’t shape your thinking for the future, but will be like the unfocussed moving of a pebble from point A to point B because well, you just wanted to do it. But when you become habituated to see beyond the separate acts, when your decisions are shaped and directed by your past experiences, and you choose to do certain things in certain ways, and choose not to do other things or in other ways, why then, you would have found a purpose.

It may be as simple as doing well in your studies so you could get a job of your choice. It may dawn upon you that to get the girl (or boy) of your dreams, you have to shape up in a particular way. It may be, that after you have achieved all you ever wanted, you find you want nothing more, but to give back to others less fortunate than you. All these are purposes in life. We often make the mistake thinking that only great men had purposes in life, or conversely, only those who had ‘Purpose’ in life (with a capital ‘P’) can become great, or achieve fame and fortune — if those are your purposes in life.

In my opinion, every human being who feels ‘responsible’, first for himself/herself, next for some other or others, then for other living beings, and last but not least for the nature and ecosystem which sustains all humanity and all life — even for a small fraction thereof within one’s ambit — that person has a purpose in life! That slides into the second part, what we are chasing in life. Actually, many do not chase anything; they are too busy with things they have to do for whatever purpose they are doing them, to worry about ‘chasing’ anything else. Of course, one may say they are chasing their ‘purpose’.

I would give ‘chasing’ a special meaning here to imply going after something we cannot expect to get in the normal course of things, even something we may not deserve! Many chase money, name; some get it, but others don’t, and then for the latter there is heartbreak, bitterness, It is good to have dreams and plan and work to realize them, and to that extent, chasing these goals would be positive. But, as in many other thing, one must be pragmatic in understanding and accepting the difference between goals that can possibly be reached, and goals that may just be a ‘pie in the sky’.

Experiment, of course, try and try again, of course, but don’t get obsessed with an impossible dream and waste what is left of your life. Get on with the task of living the life you have, fully! But we are chasing our false dream, our highest dorm of happiness. But the funny thing is that we don't know what this highest happiness constitutes. So, we just end up doing whatever we can thinking we would achieve this perfect state. For some, it's all about sex and fleshy desires; others, it's all about the money; liquor, gambling, cars and others, it's all about material possessions; others, it's about power, etc.

We are trying to chase our happiness, thinking our happiness is materialistic things, for them earning money, chasing money, want satisfaction from all of those things, but overall unable to chase that happiness. Desire of things make us unstable to chase and this is the run a blind run for which we are ruining our life. But finally life is a chase of these breath and calmness, which we have forgotten and remember in last time of our life.

You can buy a house with money but not a home. You can buy bed with money but not sleep. You can buy a clock with money but not time. You can buy insurance with money but not the safety. You can buy food but cannot eat when you are full stomach. Lastly you can buy book but not the knowledge. Ultimately Money is everything but also is nothing in life. And so we find ourselves doing one wrong thing from the other just to achieve this highest happiness. We are chasing Life like a mirage. We are not living it.

We keep on thinking about things and people and the bitter truth is we don't know ourselves.We are just copying others or trying to be better than others .We don't know the actual life we are just running in rat race.We run after Money to fulfil needs than desired and what not. At the end when it's time to say goodbye we are clueless about what we did and what should have done.

I would like to chase happiness and peace in my life. Sense of over well being, sense of satisfaction and love. Remember what you seek is always seeking you. So its important you chase the right things in life; running after money would be a no. But running after creating beautiful memories, after love and tranquility is what i would suggest since at the end this is what matters- How deeply you loved, how deeply you lived and how much of the experiences you undertook!! Cheers!