Grading Happiness For
Total Stress Management Dr. Shriniwas Kashalikar
Grading happiness is a concept crucial and pivotal to take simple practical steps to make proper choices for assertion, reinforcement and thus maximizing your success and/or happiness through out your life. The practical steps to grade happiness are given below. Steps Do not take up activities inadvertently [without
grading] with the hope of happiness or success, just because they are ordained or advised by some one somewhere. Please realize that happiness is a relative term. What makes one happy may make another sad. Hence trying to do things according to some prescription may not make you happy and may prove counterproductive!
Hence there is a need to learn some general criteria or parameters to grade happiness. The first criterion is durability. That is how evanescent or lasting is the happiness [for you and others involved], derived from the activity. The second criterion is the number of people involved. That is, how many people
you can share the happiness with, derived from your activity. The third criterion is the intensity of the happiness That is how fully you get engrossed in the activity. Using these criteria you can give grades such as A,B,C,D,E, etc. A grade happiness is that of Buddha or any other like him. This happiness is so much
durable that it lasted for the life time of Buddha and his followers. This happiness involved millions of people for millennia of years. The happiness is so intense that Buddha was totally and single mindedly involved in it. B grade happiness is that of scientists or reformers, where the happiness is
durable, but not entirely as circumstances could destroy it. Millions of people, but not the "have not” category would be sharing the happiness. The intensity could be immense but individual concerned may be disturbed by other [material] factors. C grade happiness could be that of parties, get togetherness or other escapist activities
D grade happiness could be born out of material possessions or other successes in petty pursuits E grade could be happiness in harming others to a greater or lesser extent followed by sense guilt or fear. F, G, H and even lower grades of happiness [born out of heinous crimes] could be defined but are
left to the readers' discretion. Tips You become expert in making gradations of happiness, choices, assertions and reinforcements as you grow more and more objective. You become increasingly fearless and single minded as you become objective. Namasmaran helps in this gradation. Warnings
These guidelines are not to be followed obsessively and blindly. They are for consideration and provisional acceptance and verification. Sources and Citations Stress: Understanding and management: Dr. Shriniwas Kashalikar Superliving: Dr. Shriniwas Kashalikar Namasmaran: Dr. Shriniwas Kashalikar