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Is Happiness a conservative, status-quo concept?
"Money can't buy happiness". Many of us think this statement is more or less true. But what are the broader implications of this statement? After all, if "the pursuit of happiness" is delayed by acquiring wealth, than why should the government be promoting initiatives to raise the economic tide through assistance to business OR welfare policies? In other words, is the pursuit of Happiness a fundamentally conservative, status-quo idea? An interesting article on this subject is posted below - but what do you think?
http://www.spiked-online.com/site/article/13233/
Topics:
conservative consumption economic happiness
Cedric Charlier
Cos Mo
In any case, for the great majority of people, happiness cannot possibly come from poverty. So, as Fritzie R also said, considering the pyramid of human needs, I believe that only those who managed to climb (quite) a few steps, and reached a certain degree of financial comfort, can stop and ponder if EXTRA money is necessary and apt to buy FURTHER happiness. I very much doubt that one living in cold, famine and sickness out of sheer poverty will ever concur that "Money can't buy happiness".
Regarding the promotion of welfare, I think that, based on the above, for economical, educational, intellectual, emotional (and other) causes, the great majority of people are more likely to experience happiness (even if only as a projection) while in a state of prosperity, rather than poverty.
Andrea F below is also right, I believe. The exhaustive explanation of the why? should not matter too much, if at all. It is a psychological feature meant to ensure a state of equilibrium, even if fragile and dynamic most of the time. Accepting a state of happiness for what it is may much better serve the purpose of the happiness, than trying to explain it.
I do not have enough chars left for the main question :) I do believe, however, it is not rightly asked. Conservative and status quo are not synonyms here, as implied by the question. So, conservative - yes. Status-quo - no. Or so I think, at first glance.
Gail . 50+
How many older people would want to go back to being who they were as a teen or younger? Teenagers don't even know how miserable they are by comparison.
People who are afraid of change/evolving are not pursuing happiness. They are pursuing fear. Great difference.
W. Ying 10+
(1) It is conservative rather than adventurous.
That is why VALID happiness is MERELY a-step-better for keeping our DNA alive.
(2) "Why should the government be promoting initiatives to raise the economic tide"?
The answer is that the government policy is determined by its electorate。 And the electorate does not know what the INVALID happiness is.
Wrong?
(For INVALID happiness, see the 1st article, points 1-3, 14, at https://skydrive.live.com/?cid=D24D89AE8B1E2E0D&id=D24D89AE8B1E2E0D%21283&sc=documents)
Andrea Flores
I will offer my reason. It is just one reason... It may mean something or nothing, but for me, my reason to seek happiness is because with it I get to enjoy having fun while living. I get to enjoy laughter, eating delicious food, having conversations... and on and on and on.
And, again Why? comes up again for me. Why should THAT matter...? (yes, we could go ad nauseum! ;)) But, it matters, because it simply does. And, I have found that the moment I completely come to terms with the fact that it does matter and I DO care about how I feel, what I think, how my health is and what I seek, it is then that I actually see the enjoyment in what is occurring in that particular moment. It is then that I reach the conclusion that I am willing to do absolutely anything in order to maintain and sustain that happiness. It is then that I stop riding the waves and drowning in the depths. It is then that I release all worry and anxiety and fully live. It is then that I find true happiness.
Have you ever thought about why it matters to you?
Lee-Anna Johnston
Happiness is a fluid concept. For me, it is about finding satisfaction in what I do, being content with my life, but still dreaming and wanting and experiencing those things that mean the most to me. If I can travel, read books, eat well, laugh regularly and have someone to bitch to when things go awry, I am happy; for I expect my happiness will have occasional rainy patches, financial woes and people I want to smack upside the head, but as long as I have the good with the bad, I'm content.
Mathew Naismith 10+
We are lead to believe that we can only find happiness through consumerist materialism which keeps the big boys happy to some extent. The trick is we are made to feel unhappy & discontent as well at time because then we buy something to make us happy again, it’s a multinational nightmare we live in.
Happiness certainly exists but not through consumerist materialism but through acceptance of one’s lot in life without conflict & once we have no conflicts left to wallow in we automatically become happy. You see it’s the never ending conflicts that we are subjected to in life that make us unhappy.
Love
Mathew
Daniel London
Another model of happiness - that happiness should incorporate certain material standards of living, such as decent food, shelter, etc - would be quite revolutionary, because it implies that a government or society which doesn't guarantee these things to their population is actively preventing their happiness. But the definition of happiness being peddled today seems to justify non-action to help the less fortunate, because the less fortunate are, under this definition, actually MORE fortunate. Sick logic, but there you have it.
Mathew Naismith 10+
Yes deffinently.......Acceptance means being accepting of consumerist materism as well however when one becomes accepting of one's lot in life it doesn't mean you can't change your way of life it just means your less conflictive & happier with your enviroment.
If you are born into circomstances that won't allow yourself to become wealthy trying to have what you can't have will make one's life a misery but accepting your way of life will make you happier & through this happiness it is much eaiser to change one's life than being in conflict with your life. Trying to change one's life through conflict has made the world what it is today!!!
I was on a spiritual forum discussing conflicts & found out that most spiritually aware people were at conflict with one thing or another like the ego,consumerist materialsm, judgment & even certain negative words & so on, they weren't at peace or very spiritual at all because they were conflictive with one or more things in their lives, they just weren't very accepting.
What this is saying is be more accepting & less conflictive & through this newly found happiness one can change one's circomsatnces a lot better than through conflict.
Love
Mathew
Cos Mo
Although I can see the reason in what you are saying, our track record as a race tends to argue for the contrary. We strive for more, in a pursuit of what may or may not be happiness. Accepting one's lot in life, while definitely possible for isolated individuals, and very likely apt to bring inner peace, wisdom, and a higher form of happiness to them, is not the way we are built, not in our nature as a race. Our continuous struggle for more, and more, and yet more, is what got us out of the caverns, it's what made us smarter, faster, stronger, better organized, and eventually it's what got people like Daniel, you and me writing to one another in some sort of intellectual and educational pursuit. Sure, it has its great downsides, but the item in discussion is our nature, not its effects on the world.
It's the struggle for the promised happiness (albeit just projected) of a better status that makes us abandon the previous one, I believe. And I think that it is our nature to "run out" of a particular state of happiness and strive for the next, leaving the status quo behind. This can be the source of both great joy and great misery, and my feeling is that misery is more often than joy, but still this does not stop us (as humans) from striving for more.
We ARE a very dubious creation, this much I can say :)
Mathew Naismith 10+
Your right of course, for us to evolve we just can’t sit there & accept our circumstances the way they are & do nothing, however the concept of acceptance is about accepting our present condition in life before we improve it instead of trying to change it through non-acceptance which is conflictive. We have mostly changed through conflicts as most of our advancements for starters have arisen from necessity because of conflicts. What I am saying is how about accepting our circumstances for once without being in conflict with them & then change them more peacefully, at least this way were not taking any leftover portion of these conflicts into the change & messing them up as well.
Love
Mathew
Cos Mo
What you are saying makes perfect sense to me, and seems correct from a philosophical or spiritual point of view; but I am not at all sure you (or us, since I agree) are right from a social and evolutionary perspective. Studies have shown that people are more loss averse than they are risk driven, which in our context means they are more likely to attempt the preservation of a status quo they have come to accept, as you say, and be at peace with, then push forward to new heights and thus, in a way, evolve. I say in a way because evolution in itself does not necessarily mean being able to shop all Sunday long at the mall, yet the mall is a result of evolution.
I believe that your pattern is at this time only available to the masses via education, not via genetic inheritance, which is opposite, and pushes toward conflictive changes. However, I do believe, in an intuitive manner, that acceptance of a status before peacefully moving to the next is also apt to bring evolution, albeit a slower one, following a different pattern than the one we've seen in the human societies. And yes, perhaps a safer one too.
Still, I do not believe we are up to the task at this point in our evolution and structure. I believe that at macro levels, it's either conflictive evolution or status quo, since at this point, it seems to me that the only way to give up the status quo willingly is by need - generated by conflict and in turn generating conflict.
Best,
Cosmo
Fritzie Reisner 100+
Research supports this result.
People use the word happiness differently. Martin Seligman in his TED talk on positive psychology identifies living a life of meaning and feeling good about personal relationships as being the strongest predictors of happiness, but this does not suggest either that happiness is delayed by working or that one is happiest when indigent.
Xavier Belvemont 30+
Because our economies are based on a flawed model that obligates infinite and persistent growth.
If the growth stops, then debts accumulate, the system goes bankrupt and the society (and all the positives) go with it until it can be restarted or replaced.
Inactuality you really can't buy happiness. Studies consistently show that people in countries that focus on material wealth are less happy than those countries who don't.
For some reason we're all just expected to lie to ourselves and pretend like all this around us really matters
*shrugs shoulders*