On Happiness
Are you happy?
This,as always is an interesting question. The answer of course is more interesting still - as the answer rarely gets interpreted in the context of the answer-er, more from the context of the questioner. To answer tactically, I am ambivalent to happiness at this precise moment. But I think the question needs further expansion. How do you define happiness? To me it is just such a fleeting, ephemeral thing - a bit like hunger. It arrives, then goes just as quickly - so to pursue it seems a mistake. It also seems to occur almost naturally anyway, without requiring effort.
One thing I will add though, is that that the absence of happiness, does not automatically indicate sadness.
You say you don’t pursue happiness, why is that?
Happiness is such a natural and relaxed state. Think of it a bit like the wind in the trees; and your’re trying to make sure the wind ruffles the trees in a certain way. That would seem an impossible almost laughable state of affairs. What does happiness feel like? It can be very difficult to describe and often changes in shape and form too. Pursuing such a fleeting thing seems foolish.
Is sadness the opposite of happiness?
I think today there is an almost pathological fear of sadness. Like it must be avoided at all costs. You become a societal weakness if you are sad. But sadness is not the same as depression for example. Sadness is again a perfectly natural and often ephemeral state of mind. It is perfectly normal, natural and healthy to be sad when sad things happen.
Is it the opposite of happiness? There are similarities which both happiness and sadness share that is for certain and it would seem easy in the polarisation way many now see the world, to have happiness and sadness at opposite ends of the spectrum. However, how many times do you laugh at a funeral? Perhaps during the close family words that are often shared? Does that diminish the sadness of the event?
Why do you think others seek happiness?
Do you mean like Will Smith?1 That is a relatively short question with a huge possibility of answers. Clearly all individuals are different.
Victor Frankl2 had a view that if your life didn’t possess a strong sense of meaning, you would essentially distract yourself with pleasure. Now, are pleasure and happiness the same? Possibly. That immediate, short lived joy - perhaps achieved via drink, gambling, consumerism for example. Each “hit” becoming weaker than the last; which as we know ends in something resembling a download spiral.
Of course if you are pursuing happiness, you are by design already unhappy; and likely that unhappiness will deepen if you try and grasp something so ephemeral.
I return back to my point about sadness; many fear it. Frankl would go further on this topic and argue that suffering itself actually has a meaning and how you respond to that with a label,judgement and emotion is more important that trying to avoid it entirely.
So why is sadness to be feared? It seems almost like a human maladjustment - being sad somehow makes you odd, unusual - against the cultural norm. The “instaready” celebrity world of perfect images, events, travel, bodies and such, almost deliver a perma-smile. You have to be smiling all day everyday. Everything must be perfect. Every time. Always. Of course life is not like that. But saying or being so, is not acceptable in many groups.
So sadness is to be embraced?
It is not to be actively avoided. Many people live sad lives - perhaps ironically because they cannot express their sadness. Sadness is a natural part of life. Without sadness how can you possibly even identify with “happiness”?
Enjoyment and contentment are really more sustainable goals. It is never focusing on future improvements - be that possessions, events or outcomes. It is always about embracing what you have in the immediacy, in front of you right now. On what you have, not what you want. The stress of being “here” and wanting to be “there” is a theme that emerges in so many philosophical schools of thought and religious foundations. The removal of want and desire for example. The “sadness” many people experience is more likely associated with unmet expectations or avoidance of the immediate reality. That “reality” is often not fully absorbed or consumed. An avoidance emerges which likely degenerates towards a form of sadness. Which in turn many wish to avoid; and seek something to distract away from it. This in turn amplifies the current feeling.
The best way to get to sleep is not to try to go to sleep. I think the same is so true when it comes to happiness.
Author refers to a 2006 film with Will Smith called “The Pursuit of Happiness” - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pursuit_of_Happyness
Psychologist and philosopher - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viktor_Frankl