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A BUDDHIST VIEW OF HAPPINESS

Matthieu Ricard

Journal of Law and Religion / Volume 29 / Issue 01 / February 2014, pp 14 - 29

DOI: 10.1017/jlr.2013.9, Published online: 19 February 2014

Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S074808141300009X

How to cite this article:

Matthieu Ricard (2014). A BUDDHIST VIEW OF HAPPINESS. Journal of Law and Religion, 29,
pp 14-29 doi:10.1017/jlr.2013.9

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 Journal of Law and Religion 29, no. 1 (2014): 14–29 © Center for the Study of Law and Religion at Emory University
doi:10.1017/jlr.2013.9

a buddhist view of happiness

matthieu ricard, phd
Shechen Monastery, Kathmandu, Nepal

abstract
In Buddhism, happiness is achieved when a person can perceive the true nature of reality,
unmodied by the mental constructs we superimpose upon it. This authentic happiness
comes from having an exceptionally healthy state of mind that underlies and suffuses all
emotional states and that embraces all the joys and sorrows that come one’s way. The men-
tal states necessary for authentic happiness are not simply found or happened upon. Rather,
happiness is achieved through mental training that purges the mind of afictive emotions,
such as hatred and compulsive desire, which literally poison the mind, and above all
through the eradication of ignorance. This article discusses the Buddhist conception of hap-
piness and its attainment. In particular, the article addresses the methods and practices that
Buddhism employs to train the mind to achieve authentic happiness and the recent develop-
ments in contemplative neuroscience that complement and advance these methods.

KEYWORDS: Buddhism, happiness, contemplative neuroscience, meditation, compassion

introduction
In modern societies, happiness is often equated with a maximization of pleasure, and some imagine
that true happiness would consist of an interrupted succession of pleasurable experiences. This
sounds more like a recipe for exhaustion than for genuine happiness. In fact, nothing is further
from the Buddhist notion of sukha, which refers to an optimal way of being, an exceptionally
healthy state of mind that underlies and suffuses all emotional states and embraces all the joys
and sorrows that come one’s way.1 Sukha is therefore a state of lasting well-being that manifests
itself when we have freed ourselves of mental blindness and afictive emotions. It is also the wisdom
that allows us to see the world as it is, without veils or distortions. It is, nally, the joy of moving
towards inner freedom and the loving-kindness and compassion that radiates towards others.
In Buddhism, the word “reality” connotes the true nature of things, unmodied by the mental
constructs we superimpose upon it. Such constructs open up a gap between our perception and that
reality, and hence a never-ending conict with the world. We take for permanent that which is
ephemeral and for happiness that which is but a source of suffering, and we imagine there being
an independent self in the midst of the aggregates of the body and mind.
Under the inuence of habitual tendencies, we perceive the exterior world as a series of distinct,
autonomous entities to which we attribute characteristics that we believe belong inherently to them.

1 Dalai Lama and H. C. Cutler, The Art of Happiness: A Handbook for Living (New York: Riverhead Books, 1998);
Matthieu Ricard, Happiness: A Guide to Developing Life’s Most Important Skill (London: Atlantic Books, 2007).

14 journal of law and religion

 a buddhist view of happiness

This error, which Buddhism calls ignorance, gives rise to powerful reexes of attachment and aver-
sion that generally lead to suffering. The world of ignorance and suffering, samsara, is not a funda-
mental condition of existence, but a mental universe based on our mistaken conception of reality.2
The world of appearances is created by the coming together of an innite number of ever-
changing causes and conditions. Like a rainbow that forms when the sun shines across a curtain
of rain and then vanishes when any factor contributing to its formation disappears, phenomena
exist in an essentially interdependent mode and have no autonomous and enduring existence.
Everything is relation; nothing exists in and of itself. Once this essential concept is understood
and internalized, the erroneous perception of the world gives way to a correct understanding of
the nature of things and being, a wisdom that is not a mere philosophical construct but something
that emerges gradually, as we shed our mental blindness and the afictive mental states it produces
and, hence, the principal causes of our suffering.
Every being has the potential for authentic happiness and perfection, just as every sesame seed is
permeated with oil. Ignorance, in this context, means being unaware of that potential, like the beg-
gar who is unaware of the treasure buried beneath his shack. Actualizing our true nature, coming
into possession of that hidden wealth, allows us to live a life full of meaning. It is the surest way to
nd serenity and to let genuine altruism ourish.3
Yet happiness does not come simply because one wishes or prays for it. It is not a gift that chance
bestows upon us and that a reversal of fortune takes back. Happiness is a skill that requires effort
and time.4
A great majority of the European words for “happy” at rst meant “lucky” (with the exception
of the Welsh word, which rst meant “wise”).5 The happy person is someone who has benetted
from a lucky destiny and from favorable circumstances. In fact, most people instinctively put all
their hopes and fear in the outer world.
As inuential as external conditions may be, suffering, like well-being, is essentially a state of
mind. It is the mind that translates good and bad circumstances into happiness or misery. The
search for happiness is not about looking at life through rose-colored glasses or blinding oneself
to the pain and imperfections of the world. It is about the purging of mental toxins, such as hatred
and compulsive desire, which literally poison the mind, and above all, about the eradication of
ignorance.
No one wakes up in the morning thinking: “I wish I could suffer all day, and if possible my
whole life.” We all strive, consciously or unconsciously, competently or clumsily, to be happier
and to suffer less. Yet we often confuse genuine happiness with merely seeking enjoyable feelings.
To imagine happiness as the achievement of all our wishes and passions—and above all, to see it
from an exclusively egocentric perspective—is to confuse the legitimate aspiration to inner fulll-
ment with a utopia that inevitably leads to frustration. The fact is that, without inner peace and

2 Shantarakshita and Jamgön Mipham, The Adornment of the Middle Way: Shantarakshita’s Madhyamakalankara
with Commentary by Jamgön Mipham, trans. Padmakara Translation Group (Boston: Shambhala, 2005); A. B.
Wallace, Choosing Reality: A Buddhist View of Physics and the Mind (1996; repr., Ithaca, NY: Snow Lion, 2003).
3 Shantideva, The Way of the Bodhisattva: A Translation of the Bodhicharyavatara, trans. Padmakara Translation
Group, 2nd ed. (Boston: Shambhala, 2006); Kunzang Pelden, The Nectar of Manjushri’s Speech: A Detailed
Commentary on Shantideva’s Way of the Bodhisattva, trans. Padmakara Translation Group (Boston:
Shambhala, 2007).
4 Ricard, Happiness; Matthieu Ricard, The Art of Meditation, trans. Sherab Chödzin Kohn (Paris: NiL Éditions,
2008; London: Atlantic Books, 2010).
5 Matthieu Ricard, “A Buddhist View of Happiness,” in The Oxford Handbook of Happiness, ed. Susan David,
Ilona Boniwell, and Amanda C. Ayers (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 344.

journal of law and religion 15

 matthieu ricard

wisdom, we have nothing of what we need to be happy. Happiness is a state of inner fulllment, not
the gratication of inexhaustible desires for outward things. As the Tibetan proverb says, “Seeking
happiness outside ourselves is like waiting for sunshine in a cave facing north.”6 Our desires are
boundless and our control over the world is limited, temporary, and, more often than not, illusory.
If, conversely, happiness is a state that depends on inner conditions, each of us must recognize and
bring those conditions together. Happiness is not given to us, nor misery imposed. At every
moment we are at a crossroads and must choose the direction we are to take.

our own happiness can only be achieved through that of others

Among all the clumsy, blind, and extreme ways in which we go about building happiness, one of
the most sterile is egocentrism. The pursuit of selsh happiness is bound to fail. It is a lose-lose situ-
ation in which we make ourselves miserable and create misery around us.
“When selsh happiness is the only goal in life, life soon becomes goalless,” wrote Romain
Rolland.7 Even if we display every outward sign of happiness, we can never be truly happy if we
dissociate ourselves from the happiness of others. A happiness painstakingly constructed in the
kingdom of selshness is as ephemeral and fragile as a castle built on a frozen lake, ready to
sink at the rst thaw.
Our own happiness is intimately linked to that of others: most of our difculties actually arise
because we lack concern for others’ well-being. As the Buddhist philosopher Shantideva wrote:

All the joy the world contains

Has come through wishing happiness for others.
All the misery the world contains
Has come through wanting pleasure for oneself.8

This in no way requires us to neglect our own happiness. Each individual’s desire for happiness is as
legitimate as anyone else’s. We must realize that in the deepest part of ourselves, we fear suffering
and aspire to happiness. Then, we should realize that all sentient beings want to avoid suffering just
as much as we do. The right not to suffer, though often ignored, is without a doubt the most fun-
damental right that living beings possess. Finally, we should develop the strong aspiration and
readiness to do whatever we can to ease others’ suffering and contribute to their lasting well-being.
The goal here is a deep state of well-being and wisdom at all moments, accompanied by love for
every sentient being and not by that individual love that modern society relentlessly drums into us.
True happiness arises from the essential goodness that wholeheartedly desires everyone to nd
meaning in their lives.9

Happiness and Pleasure

The most common error is to confuse pleasure for happiness. The eeting experience of pleasure is
dependent on circumstance, on a specic location or moment in time. It is unstable by nature, and

6 Ricard, Happiness, 33.

7 Romain Rolland, Jean-Christophe, vol. 8, Les Amies (Paris: Albin Michel, 1952) (author’s translation).
8 Shantideva, Way of the Bodhisattva, 127.
9 Dilgo Khyentse, The Heart of Compassion: The Thirty-Seven Verses on the Practice of a Bodhisattva, trans.
Padmakara Translation Group (Boston: Shambhala, 2007).

16 journal of law and religion

 a buddhist view of happiness

the sensation it evokes soon becomes neutral, and even unpleasant. Likewise, when repeated it may
grow insipid and even lead to disgust; savoring a delicious meal is a source of genuine pleasure, but
we are indifferent to it once we have had our ll and would sicken of it if we were to continue
eating.
Pleasure is exhausted through usage, like a candle that consumes itself. It is almost always linked
to an activity and naturally leads to lassitude by dint of that activity being repeated. Listening to
beautiful music requires a focus of attention that, as minimal as it is, cannot be maintained inde-
nitely. Were we forced to listen to music for days on end, it would become unbearable to us.
Furthermore, pleasure can be joined to cruelty, violence, pride, greed, and other mental conditions
that are incompatible with true happiness.
Unlike pleasure, genuine happiness may be inuenced by circumstance, but it is not dependent
on it. It actually gives us the inner resources to deal better with those circumstances. It does not
mutate into its opposite, but endures and grows with experience. It imparts a sense of fulllment
that, in time, becomes second nature.
In brief, there is no direct relationship between pleasure and happiness. This distinction in no
way suggests that we ought not to seek out pleasurable sensations. There is no reason to deprive
ourselves of the enjoyment of a magnicent landscape, of swimming in the sea, or of the scent
of a rose, so long as they do not alienate us. Pleasures become obstacles only when they are tainted
with grasping and impede inner freedom, giving rise to avidity and dependence.
One may thus understand that even unpleasant experiences, such as sadness in the face of a tra-
gedy, an injustice, or a massacre, are by no means incompatible with compassion, with a sense of
direction and meaning in life, or with inner strength and deep condence in one’s resolve to bring
about a better world. So even in sadness, one can continue to pursue a most meaningful and con-
structive life, which characterizes genuine happiness.

Suffering
Just as we distinguished between happiness and pleasure, we must also make the distinction
between afiction and suffering. We incur suffering, but we create unhappiness. The Sanskrit
word dukkha, the opposite of sukha, does not simply dene an unpleasant sensation, but rather
reects a fundamental vulnerability to suffering and pain that can ultimately lead to world-
weariness, the feeling that life is not worth living because there is no way to nd meaning in it.
Suffering can be triggered by numerous causes over which we sometimes have some power and
sometimes have none. Being born with a handicap, falling ill, losing a loved one, or being caught up
in war or in a natural disaster—all are beyond our control. Unhappiness is altogether different,
being the way in which we experience our suffering. Unhappiness may indeed be associated with
physical or moral pain inicted by exterior conditions, but it is not essentially linked to it.
Just as it is the mind that translates suffering into unhappiness, it is the mind’s responsibility to
master its perception thereof. A modication, even a tiny one, in the way in which we manage our
thoughts and perceive and interpret the world can signicantly change our existence.
Buddhism also speaks of a pervasive form of suffering, which stems from the blindness of our
own minds, where it remains so long as we remain in the grip of ignorance and selshness. Our
confusion, born of a lack of judgment and wisdom, blinds us to what we must do and avoid
doing in order to ensure that our thoughts, our words, and our acts engender happiness and not
suffering.
Is there any way to put an end to suffering? According to Buddhism, suffering will always exist
as a universal phenomenon, but every individual has the potential for liberation from it.

journal of law and religion 17

 matthieu ricard

Despite all that, this vision does not lead Buddhism to the view held by certain Western philo-
sophers who believe that suffering is inevitable and happiness out of reach. The reason for this is
simple: unhappiness has causes that can be identied and acted on.
The rst mistake is to believe that unhappiness is inevitable because it is the result of divine will or
some other immutable principle, and that it will therefore be forever out of our control. The second
mistake is gratuitously based on the idea that unhappiness has no identiable cause, that it descends
on us randomly and has no relation to us personally. The third mistake draws on a confused fatalism
that boils down to the idea that, whatever be the cause, the effect will always be the same.
If unhappiness had immutable causes, we would never be able to escape it. The laws of causality
would have no meaning—anything could come from anything else, owers could grow in the sky
and light could create darkness. If there were no cure for suffering, it would be pointless to make it
worse by stressing over it. It would be better to accept it fully and to distract oneself so as to feel it
less harshly.
But everything that occurs does have a cause. What inferno does not start with a spark, what
war without thoughts of hatred, fear, or greed? What inner pain has not grown from the fertile
soil of envy, animosity, vanity, or, even more basically, ignorance? Any active cause must itself
be a changing one; nothing can exist autonomously and without changing.
Genuine happiness results from creating new causes by cultivating various fundamental qualities
such as altruistic love, compassion, inner peace, strength, and freedom. Instead of being, like plea-
sure, very vulnerable to outer circumstances, genuine happiness gives us the resources to deal with
the inevitable ups and downs of life.
We all have the potential to sweep away the veils of ignorance, to purge ourselves of the selsh-
ness and misplaced desires that trigger unhappiness, and to work for the good of others and extract
the essence from our human condition. It is not the magnitude of the task that matters; it is the
magnitude of our determination.

the four truths of suffering

Over 2,500 years ago, seven weeks after attaining enlightenment under the Bodhi tree, the Buddha
gave his rst sermon in the Deer Park outside Varanasi. There, he preached the Four Noble Truths.
The rst is the truth of suffering. The second is the truth of the causes of suffering—ignorance that
engenders craving, malice, pride, and many other thoughts that poison our lives and those of
others. Since these mental poisons can be eliminated, an end to suffering—the third truth—is there-
fore possible. The fourth truth is the path that turns that potential into a reality. The path is the
process of using all available means to eliminate the fundamental causes of suffering. In brief,
we must: recognize suffering, eliminate its source, and end it by practicing the path.10

contemplating the nature of the mind

The inability to manage our thoughts proves to be one of the principal causes of suffering. Learning
to tone down the ceaseless racket of disturbing thoughts is a decisive stage on the road to inner
peace.

10 Ricard, “Buddhist View of Happiness,” 347–48.

18 journal of law and religion

 a buddhist view of happiness

We need to take a closer look at mind itself. The rst things we notice are the currents of thought
that are continuously owing without our even being aware of them. Like it or not, countless
thoughts born of our sensations, our memories, and our imaginations are forever streaming
through our minds. But there is a quality of mind that is always present no matter what kind of
thoughts we entertain. That quality is the primary consciousness underlying all thought. It is
what remains in the rare moment when the mind is at rest, almost motionless, even as it retains
its ability to know. That faculty, which we may call “pure consciousness,” can exist in the absence
of mental constructs.
When thoughts arise, can we assign them any inherent characteristics? Do they have a particular
localization? No. A color? A shape? Neither. All we nd is the quality of “knowing,” as thoughts
reveal no intrinsic features of their own. In pure consciousness, we experience the mind as empty of
inherent existence, which means that the mind is not a separate entity and is found to be devoid of
intrinsic characteristics such as location, shape, and color.
When we understand that thoughts emerge from pure consciousness and are then reabsorbed
into it, just as waves emerge from the ocean and dissolve into it again, we have taken a great stride
towards inner peace. From that moment, our thoughts have lost a great deal of their power to dis-
turb us.

Emotions
If the passions are the mind’s great dramas, the emotions are its actors. Throughout our lives they
rush through our minds like an unruly river, determining countless states of happiness and unhap-
piness. Should we try to tame this river? Is doing so even possible, and if so, how? Some emotions
make us ourish, some sap our well-being, some make us wither. Love directed towards the well-
being of others, compassion focused on others’ suffering, in thought and deed, are examples of
nourishing emotions that help to generate happiness. The hunger of obsessive desire, greed that
latches onto the object of its attachment, and hatred are examples of draining emotions. How
can we develop the constructive emotions while ridding ourselves of the destructive ones?
Despite its rich terminology for describing a wide range of mental events, the traditional
languages of Buddhism have no word for “emotion” as such. That may be because, according
to Buddhism, all types of mental activity, including rational thought, are associated with some
kind of feeling, be it one of pleasure, pain, or indifference. And most affective states, such as
love and hatred, arise together with discursive thought. Rather than distinguishing between
emotions and thoughts, Buddhism is concerned with understanding which types of mental activity
are conducive to one’s own and others’ well-being, and which types are harmful, especially in the
long run.11 This is actually quite consistent with what cognitive science tells us about the brain and
emotion. Every region in the brain that has been identied with some aspect of emotion has also
been identied with aspects of cognition. There are no emotion centers in the brain. The neuronal
circuits that support emotions are completely intertwined with those that support cognition.12
If an emotion strengthens our inner peace and seeks the good of others, it is positive or construc-
tive; if it shatters our serenity, deeply disturbs our mind, and is intended to harm others, it is

11 P. Ekman et al., “Buddhist and Psychological Perspectives on Emotions and Well-Being,” Current Perspectives in
Psychological Science 14 (2005).
12 R. J. Davidson and W. Irwin, “The Functional Neuroanatomy of Emotion and Affective Style,” Trends in
Cognitive Science 3 (1999); R. J. Davidson, “Cognitive Neuroscience Needs Affective Neuroscience (and Vice
Versa),” Cognition and Emotion 42 (2000); A. R. Damasio, Descartes’ Error (New York: Avon Books, 1994).

journal of law and religion 19

 matthieu ricard

negative or afictive. The only criterion is the good or the suffering that we create by our acts,
words, and thoughts, for ourselves as well as for others. This is what differentiates, for instance,
holy anger—indignation before injustice—from rage born of the desire to hurt someone. The for-
mer has freed people from slavery and domination and moved us to march in the streets to change
the world; it seeks to end injustice as soon as possible or to make someone aware of the error of his
ways. The latter generates nothing but sorrow.
We need to work on our thoughts one by one, analyzing the way in which they emerge and
evolve and gradually learning to free them as they arise, defusing the chain reactions that allow
thoughts to invade the mind. Furthermore, being able to repeatedly free oneself of such afictive
thoughts as they occur gradually erodes their tendency to form again, until they stop reappearing
altogether. Just as our emotions, moods, and tendencies have been shaped by the accumulation of
countless instantaneous thoughts, they can be transformed through time by dealing in a mindful
way with such thoughts.

what we mean by “negative emotions”

The Tibetan word nyön-mong (klesha in Sanskrit) refers to a state of mental disturbance, torment,
and confusion that “aficts us from within.”13 Consider hatred, jealousy, or craving at the moment
they form—there is no question that they make us deeply uncomfortable. Moreover, the actions
and words they inspire are usually intended to hurt others. Conversely, thoughts of kindness, affec-
tion, and tolerance give us joy and courage, open our minds, and free us inside. They also spur us
on to benevolence and empathy.
In addition, disturbing emotions tend to distort our perception of reality and to prevent us from
seeing it as it really is. Attachment idealizes its object; hatred demonizes it. These emotions make us
believe that beauty or ugliness is inherent in people and in things, even though it is the mind that
decides whether they are attractive or repulsive. This misapprehension opens a gap between the way
things appear and the way they are; it clouds the judgment and makes us think and act as if these
qualities were not largely based on how we see them.
On the other hand, positive emotions and mental factors strengthen the clarity of our thinking
and the accuracy of our reasoning, since they are based on a more accurate appreciation of reality.
Seless love reects some understanding of the intimate interdependence of beings, of our happiness
and that of others; it is a notion that is attuned to reality, while selshness opens an ever-wider
abyss between us and other people.
Buddhism’s sole objective in treating the emotions is to free us from the fundamental causes of
suffering. It starts with the principle that certain mental events are afictive, regardless of the inten-
sity or context of their formation. This is particularly true for the three mental processes that are
considered to be basic mental poisons: desire (in the sense of hunger or tormenting greed), hatred
(the wish to harm), and delusion (which distorts our perception of reality). Buddhism usually
includes pride and envy as well; together, these are the ve major poisons associated with some
sixty negative mental states. The texts also refer to “84,000 negative emotions.” These are not
all specied in detail, but as a symbolic gure, the number gives a sense of the complexity of the
human mind and helps us to understand that our methods of transforming the mind must be

13 Dalai Lama and Cutler, The Art of Happiness, 236.

20 journal of law and religion

 a buddhist view of happiness

adapted to the enormous variety of mental dispositions. This is why Buddhism speaks of the
“84,000 doors” that lead to inner transformation.14

Desire
No one would dispute the fact that it is natural to desire and that desire plays a driving role in our lives. But
let us not confuse the deep aspirations of making oneself a better human being, of working for the good of
others, or of achieving spiritual awakening, with the desire that is mere hunger and tortures the mind.
As natural as it is, desire degenerates into a mental toxin as soon as it becomes craving, obses-
sion, or unmitigated attachment. As the Buddha Shakyamuni taught: “Prey to desire, like a monkey
in the forest you jump from branch to branch without ever nding any fruit, from life to life without
ever nding any peace.”15

Hatred
Of all the mental poisons, hatred is the most toxic. It is one of the chief causes of unhappiness and
the driving force of all violence, all genocide, and countless assaults on human dignity. So long as
one person’s hatred generates another’s, the cycle of resentment, reprisal, and suffering will never
be broken. “If hatred responds to hatred, hatred will never end,” taught the Buddha Shakyamuni.16
Eliminating hatred from our mind stream is therefore a critical step in our journey to happiness.
Hatred exaggerates the faults of its object and ignores its good qualities. The mind, steeped in
animosity and resentment, encloses itself in illusion and is convinced that the source of its dissatis-
faction is entirely exterior to itself. We solidify the evil or disgusting attributes that we see in the
object of our hatred as being permanent and intrinsic traits, and we turn away from any reevalua-
tion of the situation. We thus feel justied in expressing animosity and in retaliating; hence discrimi-
nation, wholesale condemnation, persecution, genocide, blind retaliation, and the death penalty,
the ultimate legal retaliation. Caught up in feelings of hatred, we obscure the basic benevolence
that makes us appreciate everyone’s aspiration to avoid suffering and achieve happiness.
Our compassion and love usually depend on the benevolence or aggression of others’ attitudes
towards us and our loved ones. This is why it is extremely difcult for us to feel compassionate
towards those who harm us. Buddhist compassion, however, is based on the wholehearted desire
for all beings, without exception, to be liberated from suffering and its causes, and from hatred
in particular. Motivated by altruistic love, one can also go further by wishing that all beings, crim-
inals included, may nd the causes of happiness.
The only target of resentment left to us is hatred itself. It is a deceitful, relentless, and unbending
enemy that tirelessly disrupts and destroys lives. To be patient, without weakness, with those we
consider to be our enemies, is entirely appropriate; however, to be patient with hatred itself is
entirely inappropriate, regardless of the circumstances.

ignorance: clinging to the notion of self undermines happiness

According to Buddhism, among the many aspects of our mental confusion and ignorance, the most
radically disruptive is the grasping onto the concept of a personal identity: the individual self.

14 Ricard, Happiness, 118.

15 Ricard, “Buddhist View of Happiness,” 350.
16 Ibid.

journal of law and religion 21

 matthieu ricard

The concept of personal identity has three aspects: the “I,” the “person,” and the “self.” These
three aspects are not fundamentally different from each other, but they reect the different ways in
which we cling to our perception of personal identity.
The “I” lives in the present; it is the “I” that thinks, “I’m hungry,” or, “I exist.” It is the locus of
consciousness, thoughts, judgment, and will. It is the experience of our current state.
The notion of the “person” is broader, a dynamic continuum of our experience and history
extending through time and incorporating various aspects of our corporeal, mental, and social
existence. Its boundaries are more uid.17
But there is also a conceptual “self” shaped by the force of habit. We attribute various qualities
to it and posit it as the core of our being, as autonomous and enduring.
At every moment between birth and death, the body is engaged in a ceaseless process of trans-
formation, and the mind is the theater of countless emotional and conceptual experiences. And yet
we assign qualities of permanence, uniqueness, and autonomy to the self. Furthermore, as we begin
to feel that this self is highly vulnerable and must be protected and satised, aversion and attraction
come into play—aversion for anything that threatens the self, attraction to all that pleases it, com-
forts it, boosts its condence, or puts it at ease. These two basic feelings, attraction and repulsion,
are the fonts for a whole sea of conicting emotions.
We imagine that by retreating into the bubble of ego, we will be protected. We create the illusion
that we are separate from the world and hope thereby to avert suffering. In fact, what happens is
just the opposite, since ego grasping and disproportionate self-cherishing are powerful magnets for
suffering.
Each of us is indeed a unique person, and it is ne to recognize and appreciate who we are and to
aspire to happiness. But in reinforcing the separate identity of the self, we fall out of sync with rea-
lity. The truth is, we are fundamentally interdependent with other people and our environment.
Our experience is simply the content of the mental ow, the continuum of consciousness, and
there is no justification for seeing the self as an entirely distinct entity within that ow. We are so
accustomed to afxing the “I” label to that mental ow, however, that we come to identify with
it and to fear its disappearance. There follows a powerful attachment to the self and thus to the
notion of “mine”—my body, my name, my mind, my possessions, my friends, and so on—
which leads either to the desire to possess or to the feeling of repulsion for the “other.”
This erroneous sense of self forms the basis of all mental afiction, be it hatred, clinging, desire,
envy, pride, or confusion. From that point on, we see the world through the distorting mirror of our
illusions, which inevitably leads to frustration and suffering.
Let us consider what it is that we suppose contributes to our identity. Our body? An assemblage
of bones and esh. Our consciousness? A continuous stream of instants. Our history? The memory
of what is no more. Our name? We attach all sorts of concepts to it—our heritage, our reputation,
and our social status—but ultimately, it is nothing more than a grouping of letters.18
When we explore the body, the speech, and the mind, we come to see that this self is nothing but
a word, a label, a convention, a designation. To unmask the ego’s deception, we have to pursue our
inquiry to the very end. If we suspect the presence of a thief in our house, we have to inspect every
room, every corner, every potential hiding place, just to make sure that no one is really there. Only
then can we rest easy.

17 D. Galin, “The Concepts of ‘Self,’ ‘Person,’ and ‘I,’ in Western Psychology and in Buddhism,” in Buddhism and
Science: Breaking New Ground, ed. B. Alan Wallace (New York: Columbia University Press, 2003).
18 Dilgo Khyentse, The Heart Treasure of the Enlightened Ones: The Practice of View, Meditation, and Action,
trans. Padmakara Translation Group (Boston: Shambhala, 1992).

22 journal of law and religion

 a buddhist view of happiness

Rigorous analysis leads us to conclude that the self does not reside outside the body or in any
part of the body; nor is the self some diffuse entity that permeates the entire body. We willingly
believe that the self is associated with consciousness, but consciousness, too, is just a ow or experi-
ence: the past moment of consciousness is dead (only its impact remains), the future is yet to arrive,
and the present does not last. How could a distinct self exist, suspended between something that no
longer exists and something that does not yet exist?
Thus, the self cannot be detected in either the body or the mind; it is neither a distinct entity in a
combination of the two, nor an entity lying outside them. No serious analysis or direct introspective
experience can lead to a reasonable conviction that we possess a self. Buddhism therefore concludes
that the self is just a convention, a name we give to a continuum, just as we name a river the Ganges
or the Mississippi.
When the self ceases to be the most important thing in the world, we nd it easier to focus our
concern on others. The sight of others’ suffering bolsters our courage and resolve to work on their
behalf, instead of crippling us with our own emotional distress.

is it possible to free ourselves of negative emotions?

We might think that ignorance and negative emotions are inherent to the ow of consciousness, and
that trying to rid ourselves of them is like ghting against a part of ourselves. But the most fundamen-
tal aspect of consciousness, the pure faculty of knowing—what we have called the “luminous” quality
of the mind—contains no hatred or desire at its core. A mirror, for instance, will reect both angry
faces and smiling ones. The very quality of the mirror allows countless images to appear, yet none of
them belong to the mirror. In fact, if the angry face were intrinsic to the mirror, the face could be seen
at all times and would prevent other images from arising. Similarly, the most fundamental quality of
cognition, the “luminous” quality of the mind, is what permits the arising of thoughts and underlies
all of them. Yet none of these thoughts belong intrinsically to the fundamental nature of the mind.
The experience of introspection shows, on the contrary, that the negative emotions are transitory
mental events that can be obliterated by their opposites, the positive emotions, which act as antidotes.
We have to gradually familiarize ourselves with each antidote—loving-kindness as the antidote
to hatred, for instance—until the absence of hatred becomes second nature. The Tibetan word gom
is usually translated as “meditation,” but it more precisely denotes “familiarization,” while the
Sanskrit word bhavana, also translated as “meditation,” means “cultivation.” It is about familiar-
izing oneself with a new vision of things, a new way of managing one’s thoughts, perceiving people,
and experiencing the world.
Buddhism teaches various ways of making this “familiarization” work. One method consists of
applying a specic antidote to each negative emotion. Another method allows us to unravel, or lib-
erate, the emotion by looking straight at it and letting it dissolve as it arises. The choice of one
method over another depends on the moment, the circumstances, and the capacities of the person
using them. All methods share a common aspect and the same goal: to help us to stop being victims
of conicting emotions.

The Use of Antidotes

The rst method consists of neutralizing afictive emotions with a specic antidote, just as we neu-
tralize the destructive effects of poison with antivenom, or of an acid with an alkali. One fundamen-
tal point emphasized by Buddhism is that two diametrically opposed mental processes cannot form

journal of law and religion 23

 matthieu ricard

simultaneously. We may uctuate rapidly between love and hatred, but we cannot feel, in the same
instant of consciousness, the desire to hurt someone and to do him good. The two impulses are as
opposed to each other as water and re.
In the same way, by habituating our minds to altruistic love, we gradually eliminate hatred,
because the two states of mind can alternate but cannot coexist at the same time. So, the more
we cultivate loving-kindness, the less space there will be for hatred in our mental landscape. It is
therefore important to begin by learning the antidotes that correspond to each negative emotion,
and to then cultivate them.
Since altruistic love acts as a direct antidote to hatred, the more we develop it, the more the desire
to cause harm will wither and nally disappear. It is a question not of suppressing hatred, but of
turning the mind to something diametrically opposed to it: love and compassion.
It is equally impossible for greed or desire-passion, which has a strong binding aspect, to coexist with
inner freedom, which allows us to taste mental peace and to rest in the cool shade of serenity. Desire can
fully develop only when it is allowed to run rampant to the point where it monopolizes the mind.
As for anger, it will be neutralized by patience. This requires us not to remain passive but to steer
clear of being overwhelmed by destructive emotions. As the Dalai Lama explains: “Patience safeguards
our peace of mind in the face of adversity. . . . It is a deliberate response (as opposed to an unreasoned
reaction) to the strong negative thoughts and emotions that tend to arise when we encounter harm.”19

Freeing the Emotions

The second method consists of asking ourselves whether we might apply a single antidote that acts
at a basic level on all our mental afictions, rather than try to stem with a different antidote each
emotion that aficts us. It is neither possible nor desirable to trammel the mind’s natural activities,
and it would be futile and unhealthy to try to block its thoughts. On the other hand, when we
examine the emotions, we nd that they are merely dynamic ows without any inherent substance
of their own—what Buddhism calls the thoughts’ “emptiness” of real existence. What would hap-
pen if, instead of counteracting a disturbing emotion with its opposite—anger with patience, for
instance—we were simply to contemplate the nature of the emotion itself?
You are overwhelmed by a sudden tide of anger. You feel as if there is no choice but to let it
sweep you away. But look closely. It is nothing more than a thought. When you see a great
black cloud in a stormy sky, it seems so solid that you could sit on it. But when you approach
it, there’s nothing to grab on to. Instead of feeling one with the anger you experience, dissociate
yourself as a person and experience anger as a transient phenomenon. The more you look at
anger in this manner, the more it evaporates under your gaze, like white frost under the sun’s rays.
If we come to see that anger has no substance of its own, it rapidly loses all power. This is what
Buddhism calls liberation from anger at the moment it arises by recognizing its emptiness, its lack of
its own existence.

Ethics as the Science of Happiness

What criteria allow us to qualify an act as good or bad? Buddhist ethics are not just ways of acting,
but ways of being. A human being endowed with loving-kindness, compassion, and wisdom will

19 Dalai Lama, Ancient Wisdom, Modern World: Ethics for the New Millennium (London: Little, Brown and Co.,
1999), 106, 109.

24 journal of law and religion

 a buddhist view of happiness

spontaneously act in an ethical way, because he or she is wise and good at heart. In Buddhism, an
act is essentially unethical if it is meant to cause suffering and ethical if it is meant to bring genuine
well-being to others. It is the motivation, altruistic or malicious, that colors the act as good or bad,
just as a crystal acquires the color of the cloth on which it rests. Ethics also affect our own well-
being, because in making others suffer we cause suffering for ourselves, either immediately or in
the long term; bringing happiness to others is ultimately the best way to guarantee our own.
Through the interplay of the laws of cause and effect—the laws governing the consequences of
our actions, which Buddhism calls karma—ethics are therefore intimately linked to well-being.
In Buddhism, as the Dalai Lama explains, “A meaningful ethical system divorced from the ques-
tion of an individual’s experience of suffering and happiness is hard to envisage.”20 A dehumanized
ethic built on abstract foundations has little utility. Rather, one needs mindfulness, wisdom, and a
basic altruistic disposition that, according to Buddhism, is deeply embedded in our minds but needs
to be cultivated throughout life. This has little to do with applying rules and principles; rather, it
has to do with being of a compassionate nature. One aspect of compassion is a spontaneous readi-
ness to act for the benet of others, and from which altruistic deeds naturally ow.
The two decisive factors are motivation and the consequences of our acts. Even if we try our best
to predict them, we have little control over the unfolding of external events. But we can always
adopt an altruistic motivation, and we therefore need to check our motivation again and again.
As the Dalai Lama explains:

[We must keep] asking ourselves whether we are being broad-minded or narrow-minded. Have we taken into
account the overall situation or are we considering only specics? Is our view short-term or long-term? Are
we being short-sighted or clear-eyed? Is our motive genuinely compassionate when considered in relation to
the totality of all beings? Or is our compassion limited just to our families, our friends and those we identify
with closely? Just as in the practice of discovering the true nature of our thoughts and emotions, we need to
think, think, think.21

Thus, our state of mind is the very core of ethics. The form that an action assumes is merely
supercial. If we relied solely on a deed’s outward manifestation, it would be impossible to dis-
tinguish, for instance, between a white lie and a malicious one. If a killer asks where the person
he is chasing is hiding, this is obviously not the moment to tell the truth. The same holds true
for violence. If a mother violently shoves her child across a street to prevent her from being hit
by a car, the act is violent only in appearance, for the mother has saved the child’s life.
Conversely, if someone approaches with a big smile and showers us with compliments only so
as to rip us off, his conduct is nonviolent in appearance only, for his intentions are actually
malevolent.
It is only at the price of constant cultivation of wisdom and compassion that we can really
become the guardians and inheritors of happiness.

where the path leads

Everybody (or almost everybody) is interested in happiness. But who is interested in enlightenment?
The very word seems exotic, vague, and distant. And yet, ultimate well-being comes from fully

20 Ibid, 151–52.
21 Ibid, 154.

journal of law and religion 25

 matthieu ricard

eliminating delusions and mental toxins and, thus, suffering. Enlightenment is what Buddhism calls
the state of ultimate freedom that comes with a perfect knowledge of the nature of mind and of the
world of phenomena. The sage has come to see that the individual self and the appearances of the
world of phenomena have no intrinsic reality. The sage understands that all beings have the power
to free themselves from ignorance and unhappiness, but that they do not know it. How, then, could
the sage fail to feel innite and spontaneous compassion for all those who, spellbound by ignor-
ance, wander lost in the torments of samsara?
While such a state may seem very far removed from our daily concerns, it is certainly not beyond
reach. But enlightenment does not happen by itself. Milk is the source of butter, but it will not make
any if we simply leave it to its own devices; we have to churn it. The qualities of enlightenment are
revealed through transformation at the far end of the spiritual path. Each stage is a step towards
fulllment and profound satisfaction. The spiritual journey is like traveling from one valley to
another—each pass reveals a landscape more magnicent than the one before it.
In the bosom of enlightenment, beyond hope and doubt, conceptual shadows dissolve in the
light of the dawn of non-duality. From the point of view of absolute truth, neither happiness
nor suffering has any real existence. They belong to the relative truth perceived by the mind so
long as it remains in the grip of confusion. One who has come to understand the true nature of
things is like a navigator landing on an island made entirely of pure gold; even if looking for ordin-
ary pebbles, he will not nd any.

cultivating happiness and the dawn of contemplative neurosciences

In 2000, a remarkable meeting took place in Dharamsala, India. Some of the leading specialists on
human emotions—psychologists, neuroscientists, and philosophers—spent an entire week in dis-
cussion with the Dalai Lama in the privacy of his home in the foothills of the Himalayas. It was
the rst time that I had been able to participate in the fascinating meetings held by the Mind
and Life Institute, which was founded in 1987 by Francisco Varela, a renowned neuroscientist,
and Adam Engle, an American businessman. The dialogues focused on destructive emotions and
how to handle them.22
One morning, during the meeting, the Dalai Lama remarked: “All of these discussions are very
interesting, but what can we really contribute to society?”23 During the lunch break, the partici-
pants engaged in animated discussions that resulted in a proposal to launch a research program
on the short- and long-term effects of mind training, generally known as meditation. That after-
noon, in the presence of the Dalai Lama, the project was enthusiastically adopted. It marked the
start of an exciting research program—that of contemplative neuroscience.
Several studies were launched, notably in the laboratories of the late Francisco Varela in France;
of Richard Davidson and Antoine Lutz in Madison, Wisconsin; of Paul Ekman and Robert
Levenson in San Francisco and Berkeley; of Jonathan Cohen and Brent Field in Princeton, New
Jersey; and of Tania Singer in Zurich.
Following an initial exploratory phase, about twenty experienced meditators were tested; they
included monks and laypeople, men and women, easterners and westerners. All of them had
devoted between ten thousand and fty thousand hours to meditation—to developing compassion,

22 For more on these meetings, see Daniel Goleman, Destructive Emotions (New York: Bantam, 2003).
23 Matthieu Ricard, “Neuroscience and Meditation,” View: The Rigpa Journal (August 2009), http://www.viewma-
gazine.org/index.php/articles/science/102-neuroscience-and-meditation.html.

26 journal of law and religion

 a buddhist view of happiness

altruism, mindfulness, and awareness. The studies led to the publication of several articles in pres-
tigious scientic journals,24 thus establishing the credibility of research on meditation and on
achieving emotional balance, areas that had not been taken seriously until then. Richard
Davidson described the research to a journalist, saying: “It demonstrates . . . that the brain is
capable of being trained and physically modied in ways few people can imagine.”25

A Global Benet
Experienced meditators have the ability to generate mental states that are precise, focused, powerful,
and lasting. In particular, experiments have shown that the region of the brain associated with emotions
such as compassion is considerably more active in those with long-term meditative experience. Such
discoveries indicate that basic human qualities can be deliberately cultivated through mental training.26
Other scientic investigations have shown that one does not have to be a highly trained meditator
to benet from the effects of meditation, and that twenty minutes of daily meditative practice can help
signicantly to reduce anxiety and stress, the tendency to become angry (the harmful effects of anger
on health are well established), and the risk of relapse in cases of severe depression. Thirty minutes a
day of mindfulness meditation (of the mindfulness-based, stress-reduction type) over the course of
eight weeks can result in a considerable strengthening of the immune system and of one’s capacity
for concentration, as well as in a reduction in arterial tension in subjects suffering from hypertension,
and in a faster healing of psoriasis.27 When it comes to practice, what is essential is not to meditate for
long periods of time, but to meditate regularly. In general, if one engages regularly in a new activity or
trains in a new skill (sport, music, etc.), modications in the neuronal system of the brain can be
observed within about a month. The study of the inuence of mental states on health, once con-
sidered fanciful, is now increasingly part of the scientic research agenda.28
Without dramatizing the point, it is important to underline the degree to which meditation and
mind training can change our lives. We tend to underestimate the power that lies in transforming
our own minds and the effect that this inner revolution, which is profound and peaceful, can have
on our quality of life.

Change Can Come at Any Age

The Dalai Lama often describes Buddhism as being, above all, a science of the mind. That is not
surprising, because the Buddhist texts put particular emphasis on the fact that all spiritual

24 See, in particular, A. Lutz et al., “Long-term Meditators Self-induce High-amplitude Gamma Synchrony During
Mental Practice,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Science 101, no. 46 (2004).
25 Marc Kaufman, “Meditation Gives Brain a Charge, Study Finds,” Washington Post, January 3, 2005, A05.
26 Ricard, “Neuroscience and Meditation.”
27 The most important references concerning these studies, especially those of Linda Carlson (Calgary University),
and of John Teasdale (Cambridge) and Zindal Segal (Toronto University), are quoted in Matthieu Ricard,
L’Art de la Méditation, (Paris: NiL Éditions, 2008). In MBSR (Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction), an individual
or group focuses on neutral awareness, identifying thoughts as “just thoughts,” rather than trying to label
thoughts. This approach focuses on observation and can be practiced as a discipline for dealing with general
psychological well-being, rather than with specic problems. See Jon Kabat-Zinn et al., “Effectiveness of a
Meditation-Based Stress Reduction Program in the Treatment of Anxiety Disorders,” American Journal of
Psychiatry 149, no. 7 (1992): 942.
28 A. Lutz, J. D. Dunne, and R. J. Davidson, “Meditation and the Neuroscience of Consciousness: An Introduction,”
in The Cambridge Handbook of Consciousness, eds. Philip David Zelazo et al. (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2007).

journal of law and religion 27

 matthieu ricard

practices—mental, physical, and oral—are directly or indirectly intended to transform the mind.
Nevertheless, as Mingyur Rinpoche writes: “Unfortunately, one of the main obstacles we face
when we try to examine the mind is a deep-seated and often unconscious conviction that ‘we’re
born the way we are and nothing we can do can change that.’”29 The truth is that the state we gen-
erally consider to be normal is just a starting point, not the goal that we ought to be setting for
ourselves. Our lives are too valuable to accept that. Little by little we can arrive at an optimal
way of being.
To what extent can we train our mind to work in a constructive manner, to replace obsession
with contentment, agitation with calmness, hatred with kindness? Twenty years ago, it was almost
universally accepted by neuroscientists that the brain contained all its neurons at birth, and that
their number did not change with experience. We now know that new neurons are produced up
until the moment of death, and we speak of “neuroplasticity,” a term which takes into account
the fact that the brain evolves continuously in relation to our experience, and that a particular
form of training, such as learning a musical instrument or a sport, can bring about profound
change. Mindfulness, altruism, and other basic human qualities can be cultivated in the same
way, and we can acquire the know-how to enable us to do this.30
One of the great tragedies of our time is that we signicantly underestimate our capacity for
change. Our character traits continue so long as we do nothing to improve them, and so long as
we tolerate and reinforce our habits and patterns thought after thought, day after day, year after year.
Studies asserting that 40–60 percent of our character traits are determined by genetics are con-
tested by neuroscientists working in the elds of neuroplasticity as well as by specialists in epige-
netics, the study of gene expression, an area of research that is growing rapidly. Genes are a bit
like a blueprint that may or may not be put into action—there is nothing absolute about it.
Even in adulthood, our environment can have a considerable inuence on the expression of genes.31

Unlocking Our True Potential

We do not consider it strange to devote years to learning to walk, read, and write, or to training for
a profession. We spend hours exercising to stay in good physical shape, pedaling away on exercise
bikes that go nowhere. In order to embark on any task, we need to have at least a small level of
interest or enthusiasm, and that comes from being aware of the benets. So why on earth should
the mind be exempted from the same logic? Why should it be able to transform itself without
the slightest effort, simply because we want it to? Such an assumption makes about as much
sense as hoping to be able to play a Mozart concerto simply by tapping on the piano keys from
time to time.
We are all a mixture of light and shadow, strength and weakness. Our mind can be our best
friend and our worst enemy. But this state of affairs is neither optimal nor inevitable. Each of us
has the potential to free ourselves from mental states that cause suffering for ourselves and for
others, to nd inner peace and to contribute to the well-being of others. But just wishing for this
to happen is not enough. We need to train our minds.32
We devote a lot of effort to improving the material conditions of our existence, but in the end, it
is always our mind that experiences the world and translates this experience into well-being or

29 Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche, The Joy of Living (New York: Harmony Books, 2007), 32.
30 Matthieu Ricard, Why Meditate?, trans. Sherab Chödzin Kohn (Carlsbad: Hay House, 2010), 14.
31 Ricard, “Neuroscience and Meditation.”
32 See further Ricard, L’Art de la Méditation.

28 journal of law and religion

 a buddhist view of happiness

suffering. By transforming the way in which we perceive things, we transform the quality of our
lives, and such a change can come from training the mind through meditation.
In Buddhism, “to meditate” means “to get used to” or “to cultivate.” Meditation consists of get-
ting used to a new way of being, of perceiving the world and mastering our thoughts.
To accomplish this, Buddhist meditation uses two methods, one analytical and the other contem-
plative. Analysis consists of examining the nature of reality, which is essentially interdependent and
impermanent, and honestly evaluating the causes and results of our own sufferings and those that
we inict on others. The contemplative approach consists of turning our mind inward and observ-
ing, behind the veil of thoughts and concepts, the nature of pure awareness that underlies all
thoughts and allows them to arise. This fundamental “knowing” exists even in the absence of
thoughts and concepts.
These recent scientic discoveries have changed our understanding of the way in which the brain
evolves during the course of a lifetime. We are moving towards an acceptance that this evolution is
not fantasy, and that we are getting to the heart of neuroscience and of neuroplasticity, an area that
is itself relatively new. At the same time, increasingly powerful Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI)
techniques and increasingly sophisticated electroencephalograms (EEG), combined with the partici-
pation of experienced contemplatives, have led us towards a golden age of contemplative neuro-
science. It is a fascinating prospect, and there is yet so much to discover.

journal of law and religion 29