Kindly support my work by buying my books: 'Esoteric Illuminations: Deep Esoteric&Occult Knowledge For Seekers Of Truth,' 'Living in Tune with the Divine Force of Nature' and 'The Magic of Semen Retention'
Last Updated on May 6, 2025 by The Unbounded Thinker
“A tamed mind brings happiness.” – The Buddha, The Dhammapada
In The Dhammapada, we see that The Buddha exposed the secret to happiness by saying, “A tamed mind brings happiness.”
The Buddha always compared an untamed mind to a monkey, which is always restless and loves jumping from tree to tree, because the untamed mind is seldom still. It is always restless and distracted as it jumps from one topic to another. It cannot concentrate and is addicted to overthinking.
This untamed state of mind causes suffering by ensuring that you are trapped in a negative thinking loop. Its tendency to jump from one topic to another ensures anxiety and fear. This mind is clouded with noise, and therefore, it never sees things clearly.
It creates imaginary stories, magnifies problems, and clings to an imaginary future. It overthinks about the past and the future and never rests in the present moment. Even in moments when things are going well, it focuses on what is lacking rather than appreciating what is.
This is why The Buddha urged his disciples to train the mind by taming the wildness within so that they transform it into a calm obedient entity, like a domestic animal.
A tamed mind no longer wanders like a wild animal and so it never succumbs to endless thinking.
In a tamed mind, thoughts no longer enter uninvited. They arise or enter only when consciously allowed, and they are met with awareness rather than attachment. This kind of mind is free from mental chatter or noise. It is detached from thoughts as it watches thoughts as they enter and leave. When stressful or negative thoughts appear, it catches them in their infancy and avoids fueling them with attention or emotion.
This nature of the tamed mind brings happiness in two ways. First, by ensuring that only positive thoughts take root.
Because it is trained to be selective, it only allows thoughts of peace, love, joy, compassion, and gratitude to access it and it quickly recognizes and releases negative thoughts founded on fear, resentment, hate, or craving, before they take root. As a result, this mind becomes a healthy space where joy and understanding dwell.
Secondly, a tamed mind brings happiness by causing a state of stillness. A still mind causes a sense of euphoria and excitement about life. You feel as if you are high on drugs and you start to love life regardless of what happens. A love that is not based on outcomes or possessions, but simply on the joy of being.
A still mind also allows you to see that life has a hidden beauty that you have never noticed before. When the mind becomes still, everything feels fresh, almost as if you are seeing the world for the first time. Normal things like a sunrise, sunset, or a view of the mountains become abnormal and magical. In this new way of seeing, you wonder why you were always stressed.
A still mind sees things clearly and realizes that life is always stressful because we are overly attached to ideas, dreams, big goals, imaginary outcomes, and material things. This mind sees how life becomes an amazing stress-free journey when one becomes detached and lets life unfold the way it wants.
This mind sees how life works and realizes that life always ends any form of suffering. For instance, drought never lasts forever as rains must always come, and pain never lasts forever as it either heals or death ends it. This understanding brings a deep trust in the impermanence of suffering. The mind stops reacting to hardship with despair and meets it with calmness, knowing that change is the law of life.
A still mind enables you to notice the good side of life. Instead of constantly focusing on what is missing or what has gone wrong, you begin to see what is already right. You become aware of the many blessings that surround you at every moment, such as good health, the presence of loved ones, or even just the chance to be alive. These may seem small to an untamed and noisy mind, but to a tamed and still mind, they are great treasures as this mind notices that everything else loses its meaning without these basic blessings.
As this awareness deepens, it naturally leads to an almost constant state of thankfulness. Gratitude becomes a way of seeing the world, not just a feeling that comes and goes. Even in difficult times, the still mind finds something to appreciate. And this grateful approach to life transforms the journey of life into a beautiful experience.
For these reasons, a tamed mind results in a pleasurable feeling that does not depend on material success or external events. When something bad happens, the tamed mind does not allow negative thoughts to dwell in it for long, preventing a state of unending grief and sorrow. As a result, the pleasurable feeling – characterized by a state of near-continuous euphoria that many recognize as true happiness – persists regardless of what happens.
The big question then is, how do you tame the mind? In my experience, the mind becomes naturally tamed if you are obsessed with spirituality. Even without spiritual practices like meditation or prayer, a strong obsession with spiritual topics attracts life experiences, events, insights, or moments of clarity that tame the mind. These factors quiet the noise and teach the mind to let go. In the end, the mind becomes still, clear, and peaceful through inner transformation. And from this inner transformation arises the happiness we all seek: one that nothing can shake because it arises from within.
