Many of you have probably heard the famous quote by Joseph Campbell to “follow your bliss.” So what is bliss? And how do you follow it, especially at work?
Ecstasy, paradise, heaven are a few of the synonyms used to describe bliss. I’ve heard bliss being described as the ultimate level or intense happiness. We all have had those moments of intense happiness when we feel true joy in all the cells of our body and being. When we are experiencing this blissful state we are fully alive and fully experiencing what makes us most happy. The challenge for many of us is being able to translate the feelings of bliss at work. How can we really do this?
Here is how I’m learning to do just that. If right now I had to put a face on bliss, it would be of my son, Garrett, who is 8 months old. He is pure bliss and emanates bliss from the inside out. Bliss is our natural state of being. It is what we are when we are born and what we can continue to access when we “just be it.” He teaches me how to follow bliss wherever I go pursuing whatever work is in front of me.
I’m learning how to get into the state of bliss more often while working. For me it’s easiest to do so late at night when it’s completely quiet while I’m inspired to write or create. I’m so present and in the moment that I don’t even realize that it’s 2am. I am completely just being and have become one with my work. It’s a blissful state. It’s like being what athletes might describe as the zone or experiencing the flow state.
Deepak Chopra in his book Creating Affluence: The A-Z Steps to a Richer Life, discusses the qualities of the unified field, the self – pure Being, which is the source of all abundance and affluence in the universe. He says that bliss is the most important quality of the unified field, which should not be confused with happiness. According to Chopra happiness is always for a reason. You are happy when you get something. But bliss is about being happy for no reason. “This bliss is where we come from; it is the nature of existence itself. In this state of pure bliss is the expression of pure love. It just radiates from you, like a light from a bonfire or dreams from a dreamer” And I would add like my son’s smile.
How are you following your bliss?
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For more resources, see our Library topic Spirituality in the Workplace.
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