Rules of Happiness

I found these spreading around on Facebook. And they sound great and Zen like and all, basically telling us to let life flow.

But I dunno. If I did all this, I imagine myself being a robot.

After all, a robot cannot:

1. Hate 
2. Worry 
3. Give 
4. Expect 
5. Live simply (since it's not alive to begin with) 

How do you not hate if that emotion just sprouts in your heart in the wake of anger?
How do you not worry when you can die at any random moment in time?
How do you give when you don't have much to begin with?
How do you stop expecting when you want to live the best life possible?
How do you live simply, when you're not sure how to live in the first place?

Maybe this post sounds negative. But I think an oversimplification of things also dulls life's many beautiful "edges." The fact is, the majority of us aren't monks cooped up in a temple. We're out in the crazy world of traffic jams, polluted cities and crowds of people. Things happen and you won't always be happy. But you can think about what happened, what could be done better, learn from it, and then move on.