Happiness: Can you knowingly be happy?
Happiness, what is it? What one person views as happiness another may not. Happiness is
based on peoples personal perceptions and mindsets about happiness. Happiness is defined as: 1
the quality or state of being happy. 2 good fortune; pleasure; contentment; joy.These two
sentences are likely not how everyone would describe happiness, and really there is no right or
wrong definition or thoughts on happiness. Some believe happiness is a mindset, some theorize
that happiness is hereditary, some view happiness as an emotion that comes and goes, others
would say it’s a state of being. Some believe we get happiness from the things around us, while
others say happiness start from the inside. Happiness is something that scientist, psychologist,
religion / spirituality, and everyday people have all thought about and have tried to figure out.
There are certain characters associated with happiness regardless of culture, background,
and mindset; positive feelings, meaning in life, relationships, love, employment, religion,
health, and freedom. This is not to say that these are the only things that lead to happiness or that
everybody thinks of these things when considering what it means to be happy. Some say that you
don’t know if you’re happy unless you’ve been unhappy, several writers have reflected on the
phenomenon that we cease to being happy the instance we realize we’re happy. I believe that you
can know you’re happy, feel you are happy, be happy, and even share happiness.
Happiness should not have to rely on unhappiness, that’s like saying in order to feel full
you have to know what it is to be hungry, or to feel healthy you have to know illness, to know
sadness is to know joy first, or to recognize anger that doesn’t mean you were necessarily
peaceful before. You can know the sensation of being full even if you’ve never been hungry, the
difference is the person who has known hunger may value being full more and not take food for
granted. You can know what feeling healthy is without having to be sick first, because then you
could flip this statement and say that in order to be sick you have to be healthy first; but
everyone has not been born healthy and some struggle with their health and have never been or
felt healthy. In the context of other emotions, you can experience sadness even if you were not
previously joyous or content – your states of being and emotions are not invalid just because
you didn’t feel the counter emotion prior.
Anger does not lean on peace, its likely that the person experienced or felt another
negative emotion before anger was produced. Further, to counter the argument that “we cease to
being happy the instance we realize we’re happy.” Is like saying you stop being depressed the
moment you realize you are depressed, or you stop being angry, content, at peace, sad, etc.
How could we ever define happiness or speak of it if we didn’t “realize” happiness, how could
we feel happy and be happy if there was no recognition of our happiness or what it means for us
to experience happiness. The point is happiness does not solely exist on the basis of unhappiness,
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nor does it fade away just because we reflect on it. If anything, I think we think too hard abouthappiness, what it is, and how to obtain it vs actually acknowledging and reflecting when we arehappy and simply accepting that you are happy. I also notice that society will call you out forbeing angry, comfort you when you’re sad, but how often do people blatantly address us whenwe are happy? Not as often…It’s also thought that to pursue happiness brings misery, but most people pursuehappiness – some find it, others create it, some let it come to them, some don’t focus on it andthen there are those who give up on it. But I don’t think that the process of finding happiness is aone shoe fits all kind of thing. Happiness is so hard to define, understand, and categorize becausewhat makes people happy personally is unique to them. We cease to being happy the instance werealize we’re happy, suggest that maybe we are also obsessed with unhappiness and have thetendency to find something wrong. This may be the case for some, but I don’t think that can beapplied to all.Personally I know when I am happy and recognize it, I am happiest when I travel, learn,and try new things. This is why I try to break up the monotony, go somewhere new, trysomething I’ve never experienced, and really savior the moment as well as the memory.Although traveling to places I am familiar with brings me happiness too, for example I am fromBelize and when I go back home I know I am the happiest their. I recognize and realize I amhappy their and I don’t cease to be happy because of it; on the contrary I accept and appreciate;the happiness it brings me to be back in Belize. I enjoy being back home with my family, friends,the food, culture, beautiful scenery, music, weather; I feel at peace , I feel like my complete self,and like there is a place in the world for me.My happiness isn’t for scientists, scholars, therapist, or random people to define, and noris anyone else’s. Making statements like “We cease to being happy the instance we realize we’rehappy.” Is so board and can’t truly be proven, I mean unless you could do a controlled,consistent, study or experiment on every single person in the world – but that would beimpossible and subjective. How would you even begin to define happiness for the whole world,would you consider culture, would you really access all populations or just base happiness ondominate cultures perceptions? After their findings, then what? Would they strive to bringhappiness to the unhappy, would they define the characteristics of happy people, or only considerthose who are oblivious to their emotions, actions, reactions as those who are happy? I’m suremost of us have heard it before, but maybe the key to happiness is to BE HAPPY, and stop tryingto define your happiness and or others happiness on the basis of what we have been toldhappiness is, or what you should want and do to be happy, or who you should be like to behappy. Just be happy, accept it, express gratitude to those who make you happy, for things youare thankful for, for what you recognize brings you happiness, to your happiest moments,acknowledge when others are happy and appreciate the joys of life – express and define happiness however you like and be that, live that, or accept who you are and what you have already that makes your life full or worth being happy about. It really doesn’t have to be ascomplex and confusing as people make it.
akramtzul152 