Happiness Is What You Can Do
The Keys to Happiness, and Why We Don't Use Them
By Robin Lloyd, Special to LiveScience
Psychologists have recently handed the keys to happiness to the public, but many people cling to gloomy ways out of habit, experts say.
Polls show Americans are no happier today than they were 50 years ago despite significant increases in prosperity, decreases in crime, cleaner air, larger living quarters and a better overall quality of life.
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Puff warning: This article is mostly news puff. Mental meringue. Looks good but when you bite into it, there is nothing there. Take those polls (please).
I think how I would react if some pollster phoned to ask me if I was happy. “Well, I was happy until the phone interrupted me.” I would explain that my consulting fee for answering silly polls is $100/ hour (or fraction thereof). Payable in advance. If they paid me, I suppose that would make me happy. But I will also be happy if pollsters don’t bother me. And the don’t. So I am happy.
I was also interested to see that happiness comes in an amount. I wonder about the units. Is it in fluid ounces, like Budweiser? If a pollster asked me how happy I was, I would insist on knowing the units. That would probably get them to stop wasting my time.
And how happy are people supposed to be? I don’t know. Apparently, something is wrong with people because they haven’t become happier in the last 50 years. This, of course, is standard popsych. There is always something wrong with people. And in popsych, it is always their fault. Blame the victim. Maybe this sells news.
In case you wonder about those keys, check them out. They are all vague abstractions that roll trippingly off the tongue. And don’t really tell you what to do. Of course, they are not about you. They must be about someone else. Because if you were not happy enough, you would do something about it.
What would you do? You would pick something that made you unhappy. You would start figuring out how to make it better. You would get so engaged in fixing that problem that you would lose track of whether you were happy or not.
After you got it fixed, you might feel happy about getting that problem off your plate. You might feel happy to realize what you can do when you put your mind to it. You might feel happy to think about what you will do to the next problem that gets in your way. You might even feel happy to notice that happiness is not where you go but what you take with you.
By Robin Lloyd, Special to LiveScience
Psychologists have recently handed the keys to happiness to the public, but many people cling to gloomy ways out of habit, experts say.
Polls show Americans are no happier today than they were 50 years ago despite significant increases in prosperity, decreases in crime, cleaner air, larger living quarters and a better overall quality of life.
-----
Puff warning: This article is mostly news puff. Mental meringue. Looks good but when you bite into it, there is nothing there. Take those polls (please).
I think how I would react if some pollster phoned to ask me if I was happy. “Well, I was happy until the phone interrupted me.” I would explain that my consulting fee for answering silly polls is $100/ hour (or fraction thereof). Payable in advance. If they paid me, I suppose that would make me happy. But I will also be happy if pollsters don’t bother me. And the don’t. So I am happy.
I was also interested to see that happiness comes in an amount. I wonder about the units. Is it in fluid ounces, like Budweiser? If a pollster asked me how happy I was, I would insist on knowing the units. That would probably get them to stop wasting my time.
And how happy are people supposed to be? I don’t know. Apparently, something is wrong with people because they haven’t become happier in the last 50 years. This, of course, is standard popsych. There is always something wrong with people. And in popsych, it is always their fault. Blame the victim. Maybe this sells news.
In case you wonder about those keys, check them out. They are all vague abstractions that roll trippingly off the tongue. And don’t really tell you what to do. Of course, they are not about you. They must be about someone else. Because if you were not happy enough, you would do something about it.
What would you do? You would pick something that made you unhappy. You would start figuring out how to make it better. You would get so engaged in fixing that problem that you would lose track of whether you were happy or not.
After you got it fixed, you might feel happy about getting that problem off your plate. You might feel happy to realize what you can do when you put your mind to it. You might feel happy to think about what you will do to the next problem that gets in your way. You might even feel happy to notice that happiness is not where you go but what you take with you.
posted by Selby Evans at 11:58 AM
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