The Pursuit of Happiness🥕

"There is no path to happiness, happiness is the path" - Buddha

Life for many is viewed as an ordeal. With it's constant trials fuelled by fear, uncertainty and doubt. People often seek respite - Happiness becomes their purpose.

Their meaning to life: The Pursuit of Happiness🥕

I Sing Because I'm Happy

Happiness is something the majority yearns for, however the definition of happiness differs greatly between individuals.

Happiness is quite an umbrella term. To one it may be enjoying positive healthy relationships and to another it be feelings of accomplishment and general satisfaction. It even covers a broad range of feelings, including: joy, pride, contemptment, amusement, comfort and many others. Either way, the state of happiness is attributed by having more positive feelings and emotions than bad ones.

Feelings of happiness are elicited from positive experiences such as: getting a new job, joyful interactions with loved ones, graduating university, reaching a goal and many other common examples. Even eating our favourite foods on a bad day could provide feelings of happiness (my secret obsession is HaagenDaz - "I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream").

Seemingly, happiness is omnipresent and quite easy to attain. We've all experienced it before! But why is the feeling so short lived?

Emotions are irregular and fleeting and are controlled by a union of hormones. Dopamine is well known as the "Happy Hormone" and Serotonin, the "Feel-Good Hormone". These are chemicals that send messages of reward and pleasure to an individual's brain in response to certain positive stimuli. They spike and return to normal levels shortly after.

*Craving has entered the room*

Individuals begin to seek these dopamine highs in the pursuit of happiness...

Chasing the (proverbial) Carrot

The key word here is pursuit.

I'd argue that maybe happiness is something you can only ever pursue, maybe you can never actually "have it". Just as there is no end of a rainbow. No fairy-tale land of happiness. Just an endless chase, filled with dissatisfaction from incompletion. What a sad way of life/living.

Stop chasing carrots - you're a human not a mule.

The desire for happiness is by no means a bad thing, but with the infinitely moveable goal posts, it becomes almost impossible to achieve. We will always want more. The grass is ALWAYS greener. Or so it seems!

Why is it that everyone but ourselves seem to be happy and living a great life? Everyone but ourselves supposedly has everything in order and are content (newsflash, they are also looking outwards thinking the same thing). We are all just winging it. In this world of social media, everyone has become the world's greatest pretenders. Sadly, it has lead to an even bigger game of keeping up with the Joneses with more and more unrealistic standards.

Life undoubtably has its ups and downs, some accept it for what it is, and others refuse to give in. You can chase that new job all you want, but you will adapt and it will soon become normal. Funny enough, the novelty will wear off (generally speaking) & you will begin to dread the job. That's just how life goes.

Hedonic Adaptation🥕

Hedonic adaptation is a psychological term that refers to the tendency of humans to return to a set "normal" of happiness despite life's ups and downs. It is also called the hedonic treadmill.

Hedonic adaptation stems from the concept of Hedonism which was introduced by the Greek philosopher, Aristippus. He believed that happiness is pleasure and pleasure is the highest good. In his theory, pleasure and suffering are the only two components of well being, and thus humans should behave and optimise for activities that increase pleasure and decrease pain. Essentially, indulging in short-term/instant gratification without regard of the consequences over a larger time frame.

Hedonic adaptation is almost the antithesis of this. The word treadmill perfectly describes the state of being in motion, but ending up right where you started... there is no gain in happiness or well being.

Hedonic adaptation also goes the other way too! The chart below depicts life's cyclical nature, the same way happiness is temporary, so is pain. Stellar examples of this are those who, through bad fortune, get into life changing accidents, consequently losing a limb. The loss is initially greatly devastating but they generally tend to return to their previous levels of happiness after a period of time has elapsed. This too shall pass!

This is why it is important not to make any rash decisions when unhappy. The tide will change and some decisions are long lasting and often irreversible. The same goes for the opposite, don't move so swiftly in happiness, the happiness seesaw is always swinging, and unhappiness will likely follow. You never know how hard the blow may be.

Another concept proposed by philosophers for the meaning of eudaimonia (well being, happiness & flourishing) is virtue. This ideology teaches that happiness is based on purpose and fulfilment. Aristotle said that an eudemonic life is one of "virtuous activity in accordance with reason". Another philosopher, Epicurus, who like Aristippus, believed that pleasure constitutes happiness, had the stance that a certain degree of moderation was required in order to circumvent the suffering associated with overindulgence. So which one is it?

Pleasure vs Purpose

Pleasure is not happiness. Pleasure is dopamine. Dopamine wants more dopamine - it is the molecule of more. Dopamine is the primary driver for all addiction. Too much of anything is good for nothing. Besides, you can't buy a yacht off of your dopamine reserves.

Leading a life of virtue is not one fuelled by neurobiological molecules. Delayed gratification is the practice of resisting the impulses of immediate reward (pleasure) to reap a larger, more valuable one. Here self-control and discipline are key.

As mentioned in the very beginning, pleasures can lift moods on a bad day or in a stressful situation, such as eating ice cream after a long day but this does not constitute happiness. Setting shorter and longer term goals will produce fulfilment, which is a more wholesome and deeper emotional experience. Thinking on a grander scale like this allows a buffer for shorter term fluctuations in pleasure or suffering. Pain is part of life and understanding the hedonic treadmill allows an individual to process the changes that are promised by life.

Solution

Happiness is fleeting, you’ll be chasing forever. The results of a constant chase of pleasure makes it quite apparent that it is not worth the effort. Choosing a life of virtue however, where one practices delayed gratification and thinks on a bigger time scale reaps much longer lasting results!

Yet there is still a pursuit...

What keeps us suffering is the constant longing for happiness (read that again)

"I want to be happy" creates a barrier between yourself and happiness until you achieve said thing. It highlights that you and happiness are separate and thus you focus on your lack of happiness. Placing focus on the lack of a thing creates a want for more. No material thing or money in the bank will satisfy this want.

Instead, focus on what you have, being appreciative for the things we are privileged with. It is a mindset switch. This is not to say you can't set and aim for goals and dreams, you just need to remove the contingency of happiness.

Without pain there would be no happiness, happiness only exists relative to pain. A balance between the two is required - yin and yang.

We must retrain our brains to find joy in challenge and enjoy the process. End the pursuit. When we do this, our attitude towards challenges evolve.

"There is no path to happiness, happiness is the path" - Buddha

SN: I think its important to explore that money/finances is not the highest form of purpose or happiness. You wouldn't take $1m today if you had to die tomorrow. Similarly, you wouldn't take $1m today if you would be sick for the rest of your life. And finally, you wouldn't take $1m if your daughter had to die tomorrow. Thus, Time, Health and Relationships all preside Money on the scale "of purpose".

🥕

Why would you chase a carrot anyways, they aren't that tasty ;)