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Thank you for you reply. In order for us to be truly we have to let go of materialistic things, such as money, success etc as all of these things are impermanent? Does this mean in essence that absolutely nothing on this earth can bring us happiness? Not even to a level of contentment? If my passion is to build a successful business is this then futile? I am starting to look at people in the street who appear to be smiling & happy & thinking to myself that they are really sad inside? I find myself now more confused & unhappy since I stumbled across spirituality. Is this normal? My passion for fitness & self help which kept me going through difficult times seems pointless. It's as if I now know for certain that I can never ever be truly happy unless I spiritually awake but then I lose the things that are important to me now & that have kept me going & made me a better person than i was before. Thanks, Tony.

I think the answer or opinion I am searching for is to the question Is personal development / self-help a poor substitute for spiritual awakening? If spiritual development requires us to either reject ourselves as a human being or to reject aspects of what we are but personal development concentrates on improving ourselves as a human being will this not result in inner conflict? If we try to improve our fitness, lose weight etc with our personal development hat on will this not conflict with letting go of our ego & false self? When I now think of personal development I feel this uneasy feeling within & find myself asking why should I concentrate on developing myself when the self that I am trying to improve is false? Thanks, Tony.

Thank you all for your replies. So does this indicate that when we come to the end of our life in this body, we will all leave this body at different levels of happiness but never trully happy unless we are enlightened? Imrovments to our life situation can only increase our level of happiness? The majority of us are wondering about throughout our existance in a delusional state? It appears from what I have learnt so far that the false self (ego) is basically to blame for all the upset, destruction & confllict in the world? If this is true & we can learn to manage the ego then surely all other self help / personal development / life coaching etc etc are pointless? Is it the collective ego which does not allow the general population to see this destructive flaw in the human being? Again, these are just questions that I have pondered & not statements. Thanks, Tony.

Hello all, I have been suffering from depression for almost 5 years & have over 15 years of alcohol abuse. 4 years ago I started a fresh start & decided to improve myself. I followed the self-development path. Improved my fitness & general health along with my relationships. I became really passionate about self-help / personal development to a point of writing my own book etc. Although I had vastly improved my overall situation I still had a type of uneasy feeling, as if something was still missing from my life. I think this is because I was still searching for happiness in external forms. I realised this may be the case when I stumbled across spirituality. I read a couple of Eckhart Tolle books which I enjoyed. This progressed into me having a bigger interest in spirituality especially the subject of the ego & non duality. The problem is now that I have an interest in spirituality & understand that in order to have a fulfilling life we need to live in the present, realise we are not our body & mind I find myself not interested in personal development any more. It feels as if now that I know enlightenment is the final goal then any personal development is useless. So the passion which improved my situation has now gone & I feel as if I am not making much progress in spiritual path. So overall I feel a bit diminished & sort of lost. For example, I lost 80lb in weight & started weight training to improve my health & body image. I really enjoyed this but now consider this to be part of my Ego wanting to be better than other people who once made fun of me for been over weight. Also I was hoping to start my own business helping others with personal development but now also consider this to be part of my ego. Any advice or guidance would be really appreciated. Thanks, Tony.

thank you cetus56 that made perfect sense & good advice. Thanks again. Tony.

Thank you for your reply Capethaz, i will look into samatha-vipassana. Thanks again. Tony.

Thank you Prabhaker that makes sense. So it is not wrong to be passionate about work etc as we need a livelihood within this modern society to provide us with food & shelter etc? Thanks again. Tony.

Thanks for taking the time to give me some valuable advice. Is it normal to feel deflated because you realise happiness cannot be achieved from external sources? I am now worried that the happiness that external things such as my passion for fitness etc brought me is false. I now feel like I will never be happy or content unless I can become totally conscious. I sometimes now feel worse than I did before I stumbled upon spirituality. Should i make meditation a big part of my life? Would this help? I see people at work looking forward to the weekend & holidays etc. which I also did, but now I don't as I now see it's just a momentary spell of happiness. So on the one hand I am glad that I know the workings of our mind & how to achieve a happy & fulfilling life but on the other hand I feel down because I am not at that point in my life. But feeling down is part of me not accepting what is. This is really confusing haha Thanks again. Tony.