The Cost of Waiting to Be Happy

The vague hope of “someday I will be happy” is often nothing more than a promise made to an imaginary future—a way of postponing what truly matters.

The deepest reason people remain unhappy is that they keep looking toward a “someday” that never comes and forget the real work: being with their own heart, right now.

Many people have grown accustomed to unhappiness as if it were their natural state. Yet returning from a state where unhappiness feels normal to one where good fortune feels natural can only happen now—in this very moment.

Because, in truth, all there is is the way it is right now.

What is entrusted to us is just one thing: how we are with the feelings and inner atmosphere arising in this ever-changing moment.

True happiness and real change do not come from events that happen in the future. They arise when we gently notice the emotions and awareness appearing right now, allow them to be as they are, and refrain from interfering with them.

The only essential task of being human is to live while carrying one’s own feelings and awareness, just as they are.

We cannot control the future. We cannot change other people. What is entrusted to us is only our way of being in this very moment.

That is why, regardless of circumstances, what matters is noticing what feelings are present now and what kind of inner space we are inhabiting—allowing this to be taken in as it is and letting natural settling happen in its own time. This alone becomes the path that quietly leads forward.

The past has already completed its role. Continuing to blame it can gently draw our energy away from living what comes next.

Healing is not something given by others. It arises naturally as a quality of how we are standing here, now.

Growth, too, is not an obligation, but a quiet expression of how this moment is being lived.

And yet, there is a difficulty. There are times when the mind cannot be settled intentionally.

When our capacity is exceeded, and emotions overwhelm us, we may feel there is nothing we can do.

At such times, what truly helps is the power of sonomama: letting things be—the capacity to allow what is happening within us without judging it or trying to fix it.

—Before trying to change anything, simply receive this moment as it is. Notice that this very moment is being lived.

When people feel mentally unwell or deeply distressed, the cause is rarely life itself. More often, it is the habit of thinking too much about the past and the future.

In such moments, the simple fact of living this moment becomes the remedy.

Now is a fleeting instant—the moment right in front of us.

If we continue to miss that instant while living our lives, it is only natural that life begins to feel painful.

Words by K E I K O