Step 2 – Defining my happiness
As a second step, you are asked to learn how to start defining happiness for yourself.
Defining happiness for yourself is important because the word “happiness” often means very different things to different people.
For some people, happiness may just mean feeling good or experiencing pleasure; for others it may mean being at peace without bothersome thoughts and experiences, while for some others it may mean feeling good about oneself or achieving goals and purposes. Surprisingly, many individuals cannot easily define what happiness means to them. Therefore, the Intrinsic Practice proposes that you define happiness for yourself in a manner very personal and specific, from several perspectives that will be referred to as “elements.” The five elements suggested represent who you are, what and whom you care about, what you enjoy and what your values and purpose are.
Thus, the mnemonic for Step 2 is PEACE, which stands for the five elements Purpose, Ethic, Attribute, Care and Enjoyment.
These five elements are essential to the Intrinsic Practice, and you may add others if you wish.
You will use template 2 to learn about the elements and to start defining happiness for yourself.
2. Peace Template
Download template 2. PEACE (.pdf, 94 Kb):
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Template Instructions
This template may be filled out in any order. However, at first, it is recommended that you proceed in the following order: Attribute, Care, Enjoyment, Ethic and Purpose, starting with the fourth column from the left.
The first column to the left entitled “Role” can be ignored at first. As you become adept at listing your elements of happiness, you may also list them role by role, for example, what do the five elements mean to you in the context of being a person, parent, relative, spouse, citizen, worker, believer, etc.?
Watch a general overview of how to use template 2. PEACE.
Transcript (.pdf, 124 Kb)1m 38s
The following pages in this step describe each of the PEACE elements in more detail. You will also be able to download the PEACE template and watch a video or read instructions on how to fill out each element. Let’s begin with Attribute.