It’s about whatever makes you feel good.
That’s one of the last lines of the song, “There’s a Boat Dat’s Leavin’ Soon for New York,” as sung by Kurt Elling.
Isn’t that true? Doesn’t that seem to be the one thing, the most important thing, that people care about?
One popular topic of conversation that is discussed now, and has been on people’s minds...forever…is the question of “The Pursuit of Happiness.”
What feels good, truly? And how on earth do I get it?
A lot of people have tried to find an answer. Will and Jaden Smith made a great movie about it; Thomas Jefferson made sure that we had it as an “inherent & inalienable” right; and Kid Cudi and MGMT came together to record a song about it. It doesn't seem like we have an answer yet, but it's worth looking.
We'll start with the last one:
I'm on the pursuit of happiness and I know,
Everything that's shine ain't always gonna be gold (hey)
I'll be fine once I get it, get it in, I'll be good.
There are plenty of “answers” out there; people seem to find new ones every day, and one of them is absolutely along the lines that Cudi wrote about:
Crush a bit, little bit,
Roll it up, take a hit,
Feelin’ lit, feelin’ right.
That’s certainly an answer. Albeit a temporary and fleeting one, but, nonetheless, it gets dopamine in the system, and it does the job quickly and efficiently. And, in regards to happiness, dopamine seems to do the job well.
Peter Smith wrote about it in an article titled "Balancing Brain Chemistry":
“Both dopamine and serotonin elevate one’s psychological mood producing an antidepressant effect… influences feelings of excitement, pleasure [and] euphoria, which can be addictive, [and it] gives one the feeling of reward that creates motivation and drive. In a single word… [it] gives us pleasure.”
So, it’s an option. Pleasure…happiness…they seem to be fairly interchangeable. But is that the answer?
Working backwards (and assuming you're in the U.S.), our Constitution (almost) guarantees “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness", so that, undeniably, we can enter the rat race alongside everyone else and chase that cheese with every penny we’ve got.
That, supposedly, is also an answer.
Oliver James discusses this in his book, "The Selfish Capitalist - Origins of Affluenza," and does so very well:
“What does the damage is... placing a high value on money, possessions, appearances and fame when you [only] have enough income to meet your fundamental psychological needs.”
Essentially, James says here that we have a big appetite for “stuff” – a nice car and a nice watch and a nice nose – but we don’t have the financial means to satisfy the materialistic end, thus we’re unhappy.
You could argue that that is a byproduct which our constitution has created.
It's Capitalism; it's the American Dream; and it's that same pursuit of happiness that Jefferson may or may not have been talking about, but is it enough? Is every American you see walking down the street exceedingly happy?
... maybe that isn’t the answer. Maybe “stuff” and the pleasure that's associated with both ethical and unethical dopamine isn’t the answer.
We tend to associate “Dopamine” with slightly indecent things (sex, food, etc. – all things which are, sometimes, also associated with obsession and addiction, thus detriment), but the truth is that, while dopamine is involved in the “pursuit of pleasure," just about anything you do that feels really good, feels that way because of dopamine.
So, yes: drugs, sex, vice, etc., but also innocent things like chocolate, coffee, sugar, etc. Some of dopamine-inducers are bad, but some are actually good.
Dopamine’s basic design is to reward us for doing good things for our body, and to encourage the continuation of that action, whatever it may be.
But the real question here isn’t what gives us pleasure, it is a question of sustainability. What endures and is sustainable, and what isn’t? What leads to a flourishing life, and what steals from that?
That is for each of you to answer for yourself.
For some it is religion. In Christianity, God promises transcendent peace, and many find it in Him.
For philosophers, pleasure is reduced to a fairly simple view. We should seek to maximize pleasure and minimize pain, while also seeking altruistic good. Their ideal is a balance of self-seeking happiness and an unselfish happiness.
For others (non exclusively), the answer is it's love and belonging––family, ideally, being a great example of a "sacred & undeniable" source of happiness. Let's talk about that.
At last, we have the wise and prophetic words of Will Smith in the movie, "The Pursuit of Happyness":
“It was right then that I started thinking about Thomas Jefferson on the Declaration of Independence and the part about our right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And I remember thinking how did he know to put the pursuit part in there? That maybe happiness is something that we can only pursue and maybe we can actually never have it. No matter what. How did he know that?”
Huh.
One of the last things that’s narrated in the movie is:
“This part of my life... this part right here? This is called "happyness," which was referring to this line:
“I met my father for the first time when I was 28 years old. I made up my mind that when I had children, my children were going to know who their father was.”
Love.
That’s the movie’s answer to the question of that notorious pursuit, and that might be the closest we've gotten to the right answer so far.
The questions that that movie arises have to do with what kind of happiness are you looking for?
Ask yourself these questions:
- Is it good for you?
- Is it specifically not bad for others, and can it also be good for others?
- Can it be obsessive; and if it can be, is it for you?
- Is it sustainable? Is it realistic, and is it manageable?
These are really vague, but they only are because it is up to you to govern your own life, identify what your motivations are and whether or not the rewards which you seek are good.
So, as you close your laptop and dive back into the world, I’ll leave you with these:
“Fun is good” - Dr. Seuss.
“Life comes from physical survival; but the good life comes from what we care about” - Rollo May
What do you care about?
