SECRET TO BEING HAPPY IS By David E. Shi
Happiness perplexes me. It's not that I don't relish bliss; I love joyful moments and fulfilling experiences. But happiness disappoints because it is so rare, and its uplifting effects are so fleeting. The United States was founded on the now sacred Jeffersonian premise that people should be free to engage in the "pursuit of happiness." Yet despite being awash in smiley-face decals, material delights and "have a great day" urgings, Americans are not very successful in the pursuit of felicity. We rank 46th in the world in our level of self-reported happiness. Only a third of adults claim to be very happy, according to the latest Pew Research Center survey. Embedded in the survey's results are some interesting correlations. According to the Pew Research Center, older adults are happier than younger ones; married people are happier than those who are single or divorced. People who attend church or synagogue regularly and serve as volunteers in their communities are happier than those who don't. People with high incomes are happier than poor people. Whites and Hispanics are happier than African-Americans. Residents of Sunbelt states claim to be happier than those who live in the rest of the nation. Not surprisingly, good health is the factor with the highest happiness correlation. Prolonged happiness is not a natural human condition, nor is it something we can necessarily control. Ancient philosophers wrestled mightily with what Socrates called the "tragic tradition of happiness." They saw little evidence that more than a few exceptional individuals could determine their own fate. Early Christian theologians were similarly grim about the prospects for earthly happiness. St. Augustine insisted in "The City of God" that true happiness was "unattainable in our present life." In light of such attitudes, it is not surprising that clinical psychologists have been more interested in studying depression than happiness. Over the past 30 years the major psychology and psychiatry professional journals have published 46,000 articles on depression and just 400 on happiness. The Viennese founder of modern psychiatry, Sigmund Freud, insisted that we shouldn't expect to be happy most of the time. People "strive after happiness," he observed, but "reality" wars against their achieving it. His objective in dealing with patients was limited to converting "neurotic misery into ordinary unhappiness." Perhaps the rarity of contentment explains why Thomas Jefferson highlighted the "pursuit" of happiness in the Declaration of Independence rather than its attainment. He understood that happiness has always been an elusive ideal. We now know that all sorts of factors affect our moods and outlook: genetics, brain chemistry, and envy. We don't want simply to be happy in our own right. We want to be happier than other people, which is extraordinarily difficult, since we often assume others are happier than they really are. No matter how satisfied we are with our salaries and possessions, vocations and home life, there is always someone else who seems to be doing better. Jefferson himself equated happiness with the living of a virtuous and useful life. "It is neither wealth nor splendor, but tranquility and occupation (meaningful work)," he said, "which give happiness." The lyric intensity of simple happiness, in other words, more often results from how we approach our daily activities than from extraordinary good fortune. Some people are content with very little; others are miserable with too much. Much of the time we are seeking happiness in the wrong places and for the wrong reasons. A wry old Chinese proverb teaches that if you wish to be happy for an hour, get drunk. If you wish to be happy for three days, get married. If you wish to be happy forever, become a gardener. More often than not, happiness is not something to be bought or willed. Enduring gratification can rarely be achieved through direct effort; instead, it is a byproduct of what we do, how we conduct ourselves and how we respond to events. Happiness happens to us, often when we are not looking. As the writer Edith Wharton insisted, "If only we'd stop trying to be happy, we could have a pretty good time." Have a great day!
-- David Shi is a historian, writer and president |