Shaun Called Someone a F-Stick on Facebook
But really what is happiness?
I’m auditing a class about happiness, and I wanted to share some of the things I learned this week here. I hope you’re cool with that.
It’s especially pertinent because both Shaun (my husband) and I lost our cool yesterday on Facebook after a local man challenged me about my Facebook post about social change and activism. He called me wishy-washy, said I wasn’t taking a strong enough stance because I didn’t react to a Supreme Court decision the way he wanted me to?
I’d have been fine if I shared a meme, I guess.
But instead I talked about how to make lasting change and provided links, and I acknowledged that whenever there is big social policy change, some people will be angry and mourn and some people will rejoice.
He didn’t take well to that.
But I sure am not about to mandate other people’s feelings, even feelings that are the exact opposite of mine. I’m not a tyrant or a god.
I looked up from the post, shaking, because that’s how bad I am about conflict (even conflict on the internet), and Shaun raged and used all the best F-words. He is incredibly creative with those, but he usually doesn’t write them in a Facebook post.
We definitely had a moment of unhappiness there. Totally not our best selves and definitely not happy, which leads me to the point here. What is happiness?
WHAT IS HAPPINESS
Throughout history, different cultures have had different concepts for happiness.
In the 3rd century BC, Greek thinkers debated “eudaimoni,” as good fortune. Did you have a “daimon” or a “guiding spirit” who was working on your behalf. If you did, you had good luck. It was more than that though. The concept also had to do with a person’s own attempts to live a virtuous life, a good life. It was up to you to get that daimon on your side.
The Chinese in the 1st through 5th centuries BC talked a lot about fú (福). This meant to be fortunate, too, and lucky. To have no obstacles.
Though I am no originalist by any means, it’s also really interesting to look at how the Declaration of Independence (in the U.S.) talks about happiness too. It’s a fundamental right. Fundamental.
But what is happiness? Is it harmony? Achievement? Family time? No family time?
According to S. Oishi , J. Graham and I. Galina in their article, “Concepts of Happiness Across Time and Cultures,”
“Across cultures and time, happiness was most frequently defined as good luck and favorable external conditions. However, in American English, this definition was replaced by definitions focused on favorable internal feeling states.”
Arthur Brooks writes:
“In 2013, researchers studied the definition of happiness across the world and found that about 80% of the world’s nations define happiness with some element of luck. However, the places that defined happiness as luck or fortune experienced less happiness than the places where happiness is defined with an emphasis on human agency or responsibility.”
And happiness has had an influence over disciplines like psychology.
“During the time after the second world war, the discipline of psychology focused heavily on healing and repairing damage in human functioning rather than boosting individual strengths. As psychology began to increase its focus on what goes right in people and not just what goes wrong, the field of positive psychology was born and began to grow. Positive psychology is the study of human thriving. It is about valued subjective experiences like well-being and satisfaction as well as positive individual traits like interpersonal skill, courage, and responsibility.”
The Questions
So, happiness.
What even is it?
How do you define it? How is it different from well-being?
How do you live happy?
It’s not all that simple, right? It’s about fortune; it’s about cultural influences, actions, agency, relationships.
Over at that class in the discussion forum, they ask these questions:
“How does the culture you live in or grew up in define happiness? How does that cultural definition compare with how you think about happiness personally?”
There were tons of answers.
Some said it was about big life experiences. Some said it was about being successful you are “automatically happy.” Some said their culture isn’t happy at all. Some said the U.S. is moving away from the concept that money = happiness.
But I didn’t answer. Why? Because I didn’t actually know.
My Relationship With Happiness
I grew up in a family of divorce, a family of secrets. But everyone was outwardly pretty happy most of the time in our daily lives. Their joy was infectious. There was constant laughter, conversation. People absolutely got sad. People became angry, too.
All those emotions were always just out there. There was no repressed emotions in my house. It was pretty all expressed. People danced and sang around the kitchen and living room all the time. It was the norm.
And happiness? It was about a good dinner. Being together. A cook-out. Having enough money to go to the grocery store. A day that creditors didn’t call.
I did, however, grow up thinking that success and money equaled happiness.
I’d hear, “Your brother is so successful. He’s making (insert amount of money) now.”
I’d hear, “Your brother is so handsome.”
I’d hear, “It’s such a shame about that girl’s teeth.”
When I married before Shaun, I was married to someone who was wealthy by my family’s standards. To be fair, most people were wealthy by my family’s standards.
When we visited his parents, who were extremely wealthy (he referred to himself and them as blue blood), there was a stunning difference to me. They didn’t laugh much. They didn’t dance around their posh and massive oceanfront house or their golf-course condominium. Only the dad would occasionally hum out a bar. My ex-husband told me that his family was a happy family and so fun. Not by my standards. I went into shock when I met them.
They were rich, good looking, had successful careers. Everyone in their immediate family was alive and together. What was the difference?
What Does It Mean to be Happy
What does it mean as an American to be happy? (I know someone is thinking, “owning guns.”) Is it now all about being an influencer? Is it about agency? Autonomy? Freedom? Has the pandemic changed how we define happiness? And are we trying to buy a “false happiness?”
Brooks references Tenzin Gyatso, His Holiness the Dalai Lama and says,
“The foundational belief that His Holiness teaches is that we share a common human condition. Our shared humanity allows us to have empathy for each person's existence, and that this is the key to understanding our shared experience of happiness.”
“Happiness,” the Dalai Lama says, “is the very purpose of our daily life. For happy life, firstly, we need some sense of oneness of 7 billion human being on this planet. We have to live together.”
And unhappiness?
He says that’s when center on our own self, thinking of only the me. To fight that, you have to think of others, and you have to put the intellect in the service of the heart and love, not just in the service of the intellect. Unity. Oneness with the world. That’s the big deal thing that make up really happy.
I did not have that yesterday and it got worse with that guy’s comment on my Facebook post. And that’s okay, too. Sometimes we lose our balance. Sometimes things knock us down and make us refocus who we are.
Thank you for being connected to me and letting me be connected to you, too. I really appreciate you being here and reading this.
SOURCES
Oishi, Shigehiro et al. “Concepts of Happiness Across Time and Cultures.” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 39 (2013): 559 - 577.
Brooks, Arthur. “The Human Nature of Happiness.” HarvardX. Accessed June 25, 2022