Hello Genwellers,
I want to applaud you for your initiatives designed to improve the happiness of Canadians and am writing to suggest a way you might expand your message.
I was first introduced to your organization, while out picking bottles as a form of income, via advertisements on the Global News screens located at LRT stops in Edmonton. I was impressed with your message about human connection but, to be honest, a little off-put by the video that said that we learned to connect in kindergarten and that we needed to learn to do that again. I found the video of the group of kids hugging contrived. For many, kindergarten isn’t necessarily a period in our lives when we learn to connect but actually a time when we begin to disconnect and find ourselves moving into feelings of separation. Schoolyard bullying is a major problem, as you’re undoubtedly aware.
I took your Social Health Quiz and correctly predicted that my score would be fair. Mine has been a challenging life of late, what with being ostracized by my family and losing my life savings through manipulation, which has left me living in a homeless shelter. I believe my sense of isolation would probably be worse if I wasn’t actively involved in a spiritual inquiry that has been part of my entire life.
The common thread in your questions is that they all query human interaction in an external world and while positive experiences in these areas can build a sense of well-being and happiness, they become problematic for a person, such as myself, who is not only alone but actually under attack.
Which leads me to ask the question, “Is my happiness, and by extension everyone else’s happiness, dependent on external experience?”
My emphatic answer to this question is, “No! My happiness does not depend on any of these external circumstances and, while I can find them life enriching, they aren’t crucial to my happiness.”
If not, then where is happiness truly found? And, is there a principle at the basis of happiness that is true for all? And, if so, what is it?
And thus, I would suggest your organization look to foster the kind of connection that leads to the unshakeable happiness, commonly known as the “Peace of God” or “The peace that passeth understanding.”
In the presentation, Professor reveals 4 things happiest people do every day, (link follows) author and social scientist Arthur C. Brooks, identifies, as you do, the importance of family and friends and adds work and what he calls Transcendence to the list of things people can do to ensure their happiness.
Transcendence is described as follows: This is the element that reminds you how small you are in the grand scheme of things, whether it’s religious faith, a life philosophy, or just – say – the awe of nature’s beauty. It offers perspective, quietens down the ego and brings a sense of connection to something that’s greater than ourselves. In moments of difficulty, this transcendence can become something of a compass, helping to frame struggles within a larger, more hopeful context and narrative
Professor reveals 4 things the happiest people do every day
And here we enter the world of spiritualism, which might be defined at the realization that at the most fundamental level of our being, we are connected and inseparable, and that this realization is where true happiness lies.
To know the Truth of one’s Self as the sole reality, and to merge and become one with it, is the only true Realization. – Sri Ramana Maharshi.
Let me propose, then, that you consider adding a spiritual aspect to your website and your efforts to engage people in a conversation to consider their place in creation and relationship to each other from this perspective. And, if you are agreeable, I would be pleased to foster that discussion, based on the principles of what is known as Pure Non-Dualism, which essentially states we do not live in a world of opposites but in a state where our Being, our awareness, cannot be threatened or destroyed.
Here is how the spiritual masterwork A Course in Miracles defines this principle:
Nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists. Herein lies the peace of God.
This principle is mirrored in the Bhagavad Gita when it states:
The unreal has no being; the Real never ceases to be. The final truth about them both has thus been perceived by the seers of ultimate Reality.
For a greater understanding of this, I invite you to view the PowerPoint presentation that follows. I delivered this at a World Religions Conference in Prince George several years ago and this summer at the 12th Annual Spirituality Conference this summer, 2025, in Calgary.
Thank you again for your efforts to make Canada and the world a happier place and I await your response.
James Miller 825 343 4068