The Pursuit Of Happiness
“Happiness is an emotion linked to improved health and well-being”
What do you want in life? Some people will say they want wealth, for a few people it will be their health and the list will go on and on, but the ultimate goal of all these wants is “happiness”. You want to be happy and all this health, wealth, and fame are byproducts of it.
We all strive to be happy every time. According to many philosophers, happiness is a direction, not a place. Definitely, it is not a destination, just a journey, if I should say in a layman’s term.
Some will say being content is happiness. Yeah! It is so true in all sense. It will reduce the headache of comparing yourself with others. You will be happy with what you have in life because it is like a road trip you will have people ahead of you throughout your journey. You can overtake one, but after that, you will see another one in front of you. The same is true in life, and happiness is all about being content with what you have in life, whether it is wealth, health, fame, children, relationships, etc. The pursuit of happiness is all about seeking happiness in things you have right now, and you have to feel good about it the way they are.
Your hate can be someone’s love:
At this moment, there are people who hate their job, but for the jobless, it will be their dream opportunity. Some of you might feel bad that you don’t have a car, in contrast, there are people who can afford to buy a car, have sufficient money, but they have no hands to drive it.
A survey was conducted in 2016: it concluded that 81% of Americans want to be happy and only 16% want to achieve great things in life. And another 6% were not sure what they want in life.
Yet there are people who measure life in terms of their contribution to happiness. If your relationship, job, home, body, diet don’t make you happy, society will say you’re a failure. Does it mean you are wrong? No! As I already said happiness is a journey so does your job, relationship, home, body, etc. The obsession of pursuit of happiness is also associated with a greater risk of depression. And happiness is not opposite of sadness or depression. It is all about chemical reaction that happens in your brain. A fewer chemical reaction will make you sad and more of that will make you happy.
Modern society thinks that happiness is about feeling contentment, which makes philosophers skeptical about happiness because it changes based on our mood and it causes uncertainty.
What makes you happy?
So, the final answer to the question: what makes you happy? If you spend doing things you enjoy the most is the one which makes you happy, it will also bring more pleasure to you, a good life. So, what about the pain? Yeah! It is an inevitable one in our lives. We all have pains due to some losses now and then, but you have to follow the ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus’s words “a good life was one in which pain is minimized”.
