Mar 17 2011: you can't be happy 100% of the time; if you were it would become meaningless. Happiness is only happiness because its opposite exists so if there was only happiness all the time it wouldn't really be happiness. It is a very spiritual question and some religions in particular seem to gel with the true meaning of happiness. Take Buddhism, you do not seek happiness necessarily, or seek money or people or objects. You look inwards and accept that you are suffering, and we all are according to the philosophy, and by accepting this suffering and learning to be there for yourself and your negative emotions and treat them with love and smile on them you can start to become joyous or content or happy or whatever. It seems to me that buddhist monks who spend every day in meditation, and walking meditation absorbing the natural beauty of the world and smiling on it probably are close to happy and fulfilled a great deal of their lives. While it seems against the point of the religion to declare yourself happy and stop WORKING towards happiness, I would say that many of the followers probably are happy. But what I'm saying is that even though apparent happiness and fulfillment probably CAN be achieved, you can't simply shut out your negativity and be happy your whole life. Even if that worked, there is no happy without at least occasional other emotions, in my opinion.
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A comment on Conversation: Do you think it's even possible to be 100% happy and fulfilled?If yes, what's your way to do it? If no, why is it so deeply essential to us?