This happened during my eighth or ninth plant medicine journey, when I was getting a real sense of freedom. I was “on the moon,” both literally and figuratively. I was feeling so elated that I that told the moon I had a special request, and the moon typed, “What is it?”
I explained that this life had been so full of pain for me that I didn’t think I could do it all again. So I asked the moon if in my next life she could make sure that I found the plant medicine as soon as possible, so I didn’t have to go through everything again.
Her reply floored me. She typed, “Gerry, that’s a request about next time, but it’s the same one you used last time.”
Does what you’ve just read make any sense to you? Plant medicine? The moon? The moon typing? It probably seems incomprehensible. In fact, I hope it does—because maybe it also seems intriguing. Maybe it catches your interest enough so that you’ll read on. If you do read on, I can promise you two things. First, by the end of the book the paragraphs above will make perfect sense to you. Second, how you look at your life—and perhaps how you live your life—will never be the same.
ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS
Let’s start with three essential questions:
1. WHY DOES THIS BOOK NEED
TO BE WRITTEN?
That’s an easy question. The Declaration of Independence, written in 1776, states that “the pursuit of happiness” is a fundamental human right. No other country has ever referenced happiness in its core documents. So let’s go for it.
But if we’re all pursuing happiness, as is our right, do we really know what happiness means? And what about pursuit? What exactly does that mean?
In the context of the Declaration of Independence, with its eighteenth-century language, pursuit means something more than chase. It’s something beyond pursuing the baseball that’s been hit over your head in the outfield or pursuing the best deal on a new car.
The Founding Fathers used pursuit to mean a continuing enterprise, as in a career or even a way of life. In this sense, you could say someone “pursued” a career in law or medicine. Pursuit, therefore, is quite a substantial word.
Now, what about happiness?
To the Founding Fathers, I doubt that happiness meant a night out on the town, a day at the beach, or another variation of an ecstatic or euphoric experience. I think it was more than that, and in the chapters that follow we’ll be looking at what happiness really means. And equally important, what it does not mean.
One thing is certain. If we think of happiness as more than a trip to Disneyland, we may be pursuing happiness but most of us aren’t catching up to it, let alone making it the centerpiece of our lives. Instead, we might be catching up to something very different. Unhappiness, the opposite of happiness, or the absence of happiness, is the daily experience of millions of people. I want to change that and I’m confident that I know how to do it. That’s why this book needed to be written.
I do realize that putting an end to unhappiness is an ambitious goal. Can it really be achieved?
Sigmund Freud didn’t think so. Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis and probably the all-time most influential investigator of human emotion, stated that the most he could offer was relief from phobias, obsessions, and other clear forms of neurotic behavior.
No, psychotherapy can’t bring happiness, according to Freud. We have to settle for much less. Maybe we just have to be content with a lower level of misery.
In his book Studies in Hysteria, Freud wrote: “Much will be gained if we succeed in transforming your hysterical misery into common unhappiness. With a mental life that has been restored to health, you will be better armed against that unhappiness.”
This means that unhappiness is a permanent and incurable condition. We can make ourselves better able to deal with it, but we can’t get rid of it. Happiness in a truly positive and fulfilling sense—which is something more than just the absence of unhappiness—is not even in the picture. Even today’s huge arsenal of antidepressant drugs can’t promise much more than what Freud offered over a hundred years ago. Those drugs, after all, are antidepressants. They combat misery. They can make you feel less bad, but they don’t make you feel good. They don’t offer happiness. They offer relief.
But again, the Declaration of Independence says we should look for something more than that. We should pursue happiness as a goal, and when we catch up with happiness we should make it the foundation of our lives.
Will we do that? I think we can. We should. We must. Happiness is our birthright. It’s why we’re here.
2. WHY THIS BOOK, WHY NOW?
Strange as it may seem, and despite the fantastic progress that’s revolutionized the standard of living for millions of people, there is more unhappiness in America than ever before. Consider this: Compared to a hundred years ago, America has far less disease, less poverty, less racism, less illiteracy, less hunger, and less violence. There are still plenty of problems, but many of the most destructive issues have been diminished or wiped out. For example:
With all this progress—and there’s a lot more, too—are Americans getting happier? No, they’re not. Not even close.
The World Happiness Report, issued annually by the United Nations, surveys various countries according to citizens’ perception of social support, freedom, generosity, honesty, health, income, and good government in their lives. These are important markers of happiness, and we’ll have more to say about them in a later chapter. In 2007, the United States ranked third in the Happiness Report. But in 2016, America was nineteenth, a significant decline, behind Norway, Denmark, Iceland, Sweden, New Zealand, and many other nations (worldhappiness.report/ed/2017).
Freud may have seemed like a real killjoy when he described unhappiness as a permanent, incurable condition. But maybe his pessimism didn’t go far enough. Maybe unhappiness is not only permanent, but rapidly getting worse.
Why is this happening? In his excellent book titled Iron and Silk (Random House, 1986), author Mark Salzman describes his experience of teaching English composition to a class of men and women in China. In an early meeting of the class, Salzman proposed a writing assignment: the students should describe their experiences during some of the traumatic events in Chinese history. There were many such events, including the so-called Cultural Revolution, as well as earthquakes, floods, and famines. But after making this assignment, Salzman sensed that something was wrong. The students were staring at him in disbelief. Finally, one of them said, “We have all seen terrible things in our lives. But why would we want to write about that? We should write about what made us happy, not what made us miserable.”
Then Salzman realized that what he’d done was a uniquely modern American point of view. Even in the world’s wealthiest country, we’ve become so acclimated to unhappiness that we often think it’s the only truth. We think that if we aspire to happiness, let alone actually experience it, we’re lying to ourselves or sugarcoating reality. We’ve turned unhappiness into a habit, or even an addiction. Breaking free of that is a big reason why this book needed to be written—now.
3. WHY AM I THE BEST PERSON
TO WRITE THE BOOK?
You may be familiar with the phrase “poetic justice.” It means “what goes around, comes around.” Karma is another word for it. You reap what you sow. Do something ill-advised now, and you’ll pay for it later. I experienced poetic justice for many years in my own life, but with a significant difference from the standard definition. In my case, the pleasure and the pain happened all at the same time—all at once, instead of one event after another. I wasn’t punished later for what I was doing. I was punished while I was doing it. I was punished by the emptiness I felt, by the absence of happiness in my life despite my material success. And I did it all to myself. I was my own judge and jury.
Let me give you an idea of what that was like. I was living the American dream, a true rags-to-riches story. I was a high school dropout, but I had a natural ability to manifest great amounts of money. I became a millionaire in my twenties. I was married to a beautiful woman, had two sons, owned several homes, two planes, more than thirty cars, and I possessed riches that placed me in the top 1 percent. All my self-worth was based on creating and selling thriving companies. I had a deep need to be the best at everything and to have the best of everything.
But something was wrong. When I bought a new house, a plane, a car, a boat, or even a racehorse, two things always happened at the same time. There was the rush that comes with an extravagant purchase, and there was also disappointment—every single time. What was so disappointing? Sometimes wealthy people feel that no matter how much they have, it’s not enough. They can’t just have a lot of money, or a lot of the things money can buy. They need to have all the money, and all the things money can buy. That’s impossible, of course, so they’re unhappy. But my problem wasn’t that I needed more stuff. What I really wanted and needed wasn’t “stuff” at all, but I didn’t know that yet. I wanted a new state of being, and instead I was getting new houses, cars, and planes.
My many addictions during those years—drugs, alcohol, sex—were certainly destructive to myself and damaging to the people around me. But if there was anything good about that behavior, it would be the fact that I was seeking a different state of consciousness. I was seeking it in all the wrong places, but at least I was a seeker. Eventually I did find out where to look, although it took a long time.
I want this book to save you all the time I wasted. True, there were some very exciting moments but they came at a high price, and not just financially. I can’t just give you a magic formula, however. I need to paint the picture of my journey, and if I do it right you may find some insights of your own along the way.