When I meet with people, that is, when I meet with people to do psychotherapy together with them, I try to focus that meeting. The focus is not what I want out of the meeting but what the client wants. What does any given person think he or she might accomplish by coming to a therapist? Just as therapists know that therapy is the client's workthat the client must do personal work and work hard to face things previously unfaceablethe goal or hope in doing such work must also belong to the client. That is why I try to focus and even re-focus as the work unfolds, to make sure the client gets where he or she wants to go.Whenever I have asked people what they want in life, many people say they want to be happy. Only a few know clearly what that means for them. Regardless, various psychotherapists would attempt to work with the client to reach the desired goal.A cognitive therapist would explore the way the client thinks in order to detect faulty thinking patterns interrupting the client's happiness. A relational psychoanalyst would explore the connection between the client and him or herself, under the assumption that the way the client relates to the therapist is the way the client will relate to others, and relationship, going way back to an infant's first attachment, is the bedrock of happiness.A behaviourist will utilize and multiply those activities and behaviours that bring the client pleasure and shape the client's life through reinforcement.A solutions focused therapist would fantasise with the client what might make the client happy, and then together they would devise a plan to travel the shortest distance to that goal.A gestalt therapist would establish a meaningful relationship with the client within which to explore the client's subjective experience of life, how the client makes meaning out of experience, how the client connects with others in relationships, and to bring to the client's awareness the patterns by which the client does whatever he or she does, trusting the client to make creative adjustments, with increased awareness, that would lead to happiness.None of those approaches is guaranteed to produce happiness.The psychiatrist and the drug dealer have another answer, though, and that is to alter the brain chemistry. “Take this Valium, and then you'll be less anxious, and perhaps then you will be happy.” “Take this Lithium, and then you will be less given to mood swings of mania and depression, and then perhaps you will find happiness.” “Take this Zoloft and over time your mood will be less depressed; you will be happy.” “Smoke this weed.” “Sniff this cocaine.” Many people who cannot afford prescription drugs self-medicate through the use of street drugs, but these “solutions” are not long-term solutions; at best they manage a given disorder that remains intact. Just as a diabetic must take insulin to maintain metabolic equilibrium, some people with mental disorders must take their medications to stay in balance. But does that make them happy?Happiness is more than getting by.Jesus claimed that He came that people might have life, and that they might have it in abundance. What does THAT mean? Will going to church every Sunday make you happy? We just had Easter. I loved the sunrise service at Elbow Beach with the hand bell choir from Christ Church, Warwick, and Barry had a spot-on appropriate message, but I have to tell you that I felt pretty happy sitting down with my wife and a couple of friends for Sunday brunch at the Four Ways Inn. The food they laid out was splendid; I think they outdid their Christmas performance, but is that what an abundant life consists ofendless feeding of oneself?One of the maladies I encounter in people from time to time is what has become known as “existential depression.” It's feeling empty and lost in a life that has no consequence. Recently, Oprah interviewed a successful movie producer who walked into the sprawling house he had just bought, with all its splendid furnishings, and realized that he felt no “bump” in his happiness. It made no difference, and eventually he gave up trying to get more; he realized that his happiness depended on the quality of his life and not on the quantity of his possessions.That is how the Bible describes the way Jesus focused the discussion when He said that He came into the world so that people might have abundant life; he focused the discussion by saying that God his Father had given Him the power to bestow upon others eternal life, and then He defined the abundant, eternal life by saying, “This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.”For Jesus and those who believe in Him, the abundant, significant, eternal life is not a matter of longevitysimply living forever. Some have joked that heaven would be hell if all we had to do was sit around playing harps in old bodies forever. Rather, eternal life is made qualitatively abundant in the knowledge of God, in the awareness of the presence of God, and in the companionship of the savior of humankind.Haven't you ever met someone so amazingly interesting and compelling that you just wanted to ditch whatever plans you had going at the time and hang out with that person? That is the effect Jesus had on people. The woman He met at a well one day is a great example. She ran back to her village and told everyone, “Come meet a man who told me all about myself. Could this be the Messiah!?”The abundant, significant, eternal lifehappinessis found in companionship with God through relationship with Jesus. I know that that is not everyone's answer, not everyone's focus. I know that others have found significance in other places.I also know that it is not my job to make other people believe and experience what I know about this. It's not my agenda. It's between these other people and God, and it's their work and their business. Still, I notice when it seems that God is in the process of focusing His conversation with them, saving their lives, and ultimately giving them peace and happiness.