Seven Steps to Happiness

The Siri Singh Sahib, Yogi Bhajan gave these 7 Steps for Happiness many times over the years of his teaching. 

1. Commitment
2. Character
3. Dignity
4. Divinity
5. Grace
6. Power to Sacrifice
7. Happiness

Here are excerpts from a few of the lectures where he spoke about these 7 steps of happiness:

May 22, 1989 – Healers/ Psychologists Day 1 in Rome, Italy

Dharma is supposed to bring the dignity and Divinity inside the man.

There are seven steps to happiness. Happiness doesn’t come right away. Neither the sadness come right away.  There are always seven step to it. First step is commitment.  That will give you character.  Without commitment, there is no character. Character will give you dignity or self-esteem. That will give you Divinity. Then you will have no duality.  That will give you grace that you can see all equal, better than you and worse than you, but kindly and compassionately. That gives you power to sacrifice for others and around you and for yourself. That will give you experience of happiness.

So what Dharma has to do? Dharma only gives you commitment. Inside out. In this Dharma, commitment is inside out. There are twenty two religions. It is one of them, but unfortunately it’s a way of life. We call it religion but convenience. It’s a science of commitment inside out the same, doesn’t matter what. And the net, net reward of it is, it makes you excellent.

~ Watch this lecture by Yogi Bhajan on May 22, 1989 in Rome, Italy

May 22, 1990 in Santa Fe, New Mexico

Life is a intelligent gift for intelligent purposes, life is fulfillment of our own living, our own joy.  All cultures right from the Indians to the modern day person want to do one thing, happiness.  Happiness is a psychological urge on which our activity is based.  Happiness has seven steps to it.  Happiness you can never get to, if you do not know the seven steps.  First is, what is happiness and how I achieve it?  It needs a commitment.  Your commitment is your proportionate attitude.  You have to commit to something to achieve it. Intellect gives you a thousand thoughts per wink of the eye.  All thoughts you don’t process.  Majority of the thoughts goes in subconscious and loads you and when the subconscious got clogged up, you are mister nobody.  You are mister routine.  Life has no taste for you.  It’s not that you are gone old.  No, no, no, no, no.  That’s wrong.  Nobody is old.  Everybody is ready for mischief.

But if a person is so clogged up in subconscious, life becomes totally confusing.  So basically, a thought becomes feeling, emotion, desire and then you try to fulfill it. That’s your attitude of life.  It’s simple.  You don’t have to go somewhere to learn.  It’s automatic in you.  But understand something.  When you have to achieve something in your life, you do it for happiness; not to feel bad, abandoned, sad, miserable, loser.  That’s not the attitude.  So how to get happiness?

Happiness has first principle:  a) you have to be committed.  Your commitment is not conscious.  Your commitment to happiness is unconscious.  You have to recognize it consciously and twenty five percent people fail even recognizing it consciously.

Number two.  Believe it or not, that subconscious commitment will give you a character, criteria, facets of life and character through which you will grow and that character will tell other people who you are.  You can do your own billboard and PR and whatever, nobody cares.  People care how your actions prove to them and that depends upon your character.  Then among the people, you have some dignity.  Then the dignity brings trust.  That is the divinity. If you live little better than that, you will be respectfully graceful.  Then you will have a very big heart to do things for others, and then you will enjoy happiness out of doing for others.

~ Watch this lecture by Yogi Bhajan on May 22, 1990 in Santa Fe, NM

May 9, 1992 in Barcelona, Spain

There has to be a balance between Earth and heavens. Too much heavens and too much Earth is no good. God made us human, and that is enlightenment when we keep the balance between heaven and Earth. When we live a balanced life we live happily. Happiness is in balance. There are seven steps to happiness. There is no other way. You must commit, which you don’t want to and I am not asking you, I am just explaining you the seven steps. Happiness believes… your commit happiness believes in your commitment, that will give you character, that will give you dignity, that will give you Divinity, that will give you grace, that will give you power to sacrifice and you will experience happiness.

If anybody tells you any other ways, don’t believe, it’s not going to happen. These are the set rule of number seven. That’s why in all religions, seven is very important. Seven steps to happiness. You got to grow, you got to be. 

~ Watch this lecture by Yogi Bhajan on May 9, 1992 in Barcelona, Spain

 March 23, 1997 in Boston, MA

You know destiny and distance has to be completed in a journey, and you know death can be only done within you, because one day you have to drop this body, what will leave? You within you. There is no mystery about it. Where there is a mastery, there is no mystery. You must have intuition to face the non-reality and reality at the same time.  You are the one who should know where north is, and south is. You must know what you want.

Do you want to be a woman of the universe, or you want to be woman of the university, or you have no university or universe at all?  There are only three ways a woman can go through.

You want to be a man of that what there is, or you want to be a man of what there is not? Decide it. Look at your faculty.  You must shine.  You must be warm as a man. And you must be enlightened. Enlightening.

Look at the female.  She should be flexible to wean and wax. Adjust. Reflect the man she loves and should never be subject to time and space or to anything else. Can not you learn from sun and moon? Why you learn from books? Don’t you learn from stars?  They shine right above you.  Because they have height.  You don’t. You talk low, downgraded things.  You do low downgrade work. That puts you down.  Not God.

God gave you a very imperial existence. And it is your privilege, to be a higher man. Bigger you are, higher you are, horizon is good, you are good. Opportunities will be good.  Prospects will be good. The mastermind will fit you in the best place in the world. But you all love to miss the opportunity. You don’t want to commit to it.

Seven steps of happiness:  You must commit.  It will give you absolutely character. Character will give you dignity.  Dignity will give you Divinity and thereafter you must understand, that will give you grace; then give you strength to sacrifice.  And then my dear baby boy, you will find happiness. These are seven steps.

Without grace, you are not a human. Grace is your essence. People will bargain with you. I am not saying that’s wrong. People bargain. People will ask you lot of things.  People will question so many things.  Just ask yourself, ‘Does it add to my grace or does it take away from me my grace?’ If it takes away from you your grace, stop it. If you add to your grace, go ahead for it. You have to have no problem.

~ Watch this lecture by Yogi Bhajan on March 23, 1997 in Boston, MA

May 10, 1998 in Paris, France

“It is so simple; there are seven steps for happiness. First step, the foremost step is, you need commitment. When you have a commitment that will build your character. Once you have a character people will trust you, love you, then thing starts flowing towards you. When you have a character, you will find the other step that is Divinity. But, before that you have enough dignity to be very saintly to all the people. When your life comes to that dignity of self-respect, character, self-esteem, then you will have Divinity, then you can serve anybody and anybody and everybody without question. That is the concept of love; where there’s a love there’s no question, where there’s a question there’s no love, period. When you practice that status, you shall be very graceful, then you will enjoy to sacrifice, for those who you need to sacrifice for. The feeling to sacrifice, give happiness. These are the seven steps. Opposite to it, for worldly opportunity, for anything we can wangle our way through, for our ego, for our attachment. We take away this golden opportunity of the seven steps and ruin ourself and our future.” 

~ Watch this lecture by Siri Singh Sahib, Yogi Bhajan, a Master’s Touch Teacher’s Training Class #2 on May 10, 1998 in Paris, France