We are Canadian, but we are all familiar with the founding premise of the “American Dream” which is “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
There’s very good reason why it is the “pursuit of happiness” and not just “happiness.”
The other day, as I was sifting through the hundreds of emails I get every day, one caught my attention because it promised an interview with a doctor who says happiness is not a natural state for human beings.
Being as this is a topic I’ve thought about a lot over the years I opened the email hoping (but not holding my breath) that it would be an interesting scholarly treatise on the subject matter.
It was not. This author’s publicist was trying to sell me the doctor’s four-point prescription for achieving happiness.
And therein lies the rub (which is not the actual phrase from Shakespeare’s Hamlet although it feels like it should be).
The pressure to achieve happiness is everywhere we look, giving us the feeling that if we’re not bouncing off the walls ecstatic 24/7 there is something wrong with us.
Happiness is not a natural state for human beings. Or, I should say, full-time happiness is not our natural state.
And, while it may seem reasonably aspirational, it is neither achievable nor desirable.
Our natural state is more like low-level anxiety punctuated by periods of happiness and misery.
Pursuing happiness, and the constant barrage of pressure to do so (such as the doctor’s four-point prescription for achieving it), actually amps up the anxiety and makes us do stupid things such as spend money we don’t have or abuse substances that ultimately leave us anything but happy.
It is ironic how often the pursuit of happiness makes us miserable.
It’s a vicious cycle.
If there is a dream worth pursuing perhaps it is life, liberty and the pursuit of contentment. Contentment seems like a much more realistic baseline state of being than happiness. All it really takes is accepting the good in your life and rejecting the bad.
There’s nothing wrong with not being happy all the time.
If you’re not miserable most of the time and happy some of the time, I’d say that’s a winning combination.
Sorry, doc, not even going to read your book.