Weiner is continuing his research, by staying with a journalist friend from New York; her name is Susan. She invites him to meet with a couple of Swiss people to interview their views on happiness. A wealthy banker, a doctor, and a former Hollywood agent who’s lived in Switzerland for the past ten years. Weiner asks them on a scale of 1-10; “how happy are you these days?”, and the responses are as expected, many eights and nines and even a seven. The Swiss interviewees were as shocked as Weiner to see that they were pretty happy with their lives. During the interview with them, he further asks, “what is it that makes them happy?” , the doctor replies, “ Envy.”, explaining that the Swiss will do anything to avoid envy with each other. They live by rules and judgment. Examples: no flushing the toilet after ten or no laughing after midnight, etc.
He remembers that a certain naturalist named E. O. Wilson claimed that humans have the innate love for nature through evolutionary past. Weiner decides to take a trip to Bern; place so quaint, you might end up leaving from insanity, of it being so quiet and small. He then travels to Zurich for a short while to bask in some culture and chocolate, to see how well people on that side of town spend their happiness. To his shock, it is actually very slow-paced; every person is in no hurry to leave the beauty of the surroundings. Switzerland is a place of rules and morals but full of judgment and monitored actions. Rules do not create more happiness, because it restricts your activities. Nevertheless, keeps you safe.
The controversy of Choice vs. Happiness is divided between fact and idea. Through the second chapter of “The Geography of Bliss”, it focuses on the many choices that the Swiss need to vote on in order for them to maintain ‘conjoyment’. They believe that anything that is worth it should be taken seriously, which leads to their unnecessary voting for everything. Leading to what Barry Schwartz’s book; “The Paradox of Choice”, claims “ There is such a thing as too much choice… A surplus of options (especially meaningless one), we get confused, overwhelmed, less happy” (Weiner, 44). Putting too much choice on people, pressures them, causing the state of happiness
“Happiness Is A Warm Gun” is an extremely complex song with variety in both lyrical composure and musical functionality. In an interview with Howard Smith, John Lennon explains the complexity of the song derivative from the collage-like nature in which the song is formatted. Originally, “Happiness Is A Warm Gun” was not one song but rather four separate songs written by Lennon. In the development of “Happiness Is A Warm Gun”, Lennon combined aspects of all four songs to develop this complex song which he dubbed “It's sort of a history of rock 'n' roll” (Lennon 1972). The patch and sew nature of this song is important to understanding both meaning and composition of “Happiness Is A Warm Gun”.
In 2008 Eric Weiner wrote and published the book The Geography of Bliss, one grump’s search for the happiest places in the world. This paper describes Mr. Weiner’s search for happiness over the course of a year, traveling through ten very different countries, including our own land America. His search has sent him through the darkest corners of the world to the brightest and busiest places of all. “Places that possess, in spades, one or more of the ingredients that we consider essential to the hearty stew of happiness: money, pleasure, spirituality, family, and chocolate, among others” (pg. 2).
Senior compares what people think about people in other states and locations happiness, finding that usually these comparisons are untrue. Different studies and polls found that the Swiss and Canadians rank themselves among the happiest, while the Japanese are less happy. European countries tend to rank themselves the least happy, with Russia coming in last. Is happiness really based on location? I find that just because people don’t like the snowy weather doesn’t mean that they are unhappy during the holiday season. Families seem to come together and rejoice in each other’s company during this bad weather season. “And no matter where they live, human beings are terrible predictors of what will make them happy” (426). Senior discusses how we fill in the gaps, where we tend to remember only happy events and feelings and phase out bad ones. She discuss how our imaginations work in rationalizing situations and feelings, setting ourselves up for big disappointments, but deal with the successfully at the
The point often overlooked is the fact that the idea of happiness seems perfect, specially the happiness of the entire city, which sounded suspecting to me. However, the author insists that people of that city lead complex lives. In
I chose to examine the section on happiness more closely. The happiness section of the chapter discusses the difference in the feeling and the expression of the emotion of happiness in individualistic and collectivistic cultures. I chose this chapter because I see the how obsessive our American cultures is with feeling and expressing happiness. The authors of the chapter described in best when they said “"...
The feeling of happiness is ubiquitous. In the book of “Stumping on Happiness” states, “to choose or want one thing rather than another because it would be more pleasant,” which is to say that the pursuit of happiness is built the very definition of desire” (Gilbert 33). Happiness is a feeling because I can use my eyes to see all the lovely things in the world. I can use my ear to listen to the natural singing softly. I can use my hand to touch the delicate petals. I am happy I can use my nose to smell the scent of grass. Happiness can have endless memories. Unlike a blind man living in the shadowy world, he has to use walking sticks as a guide to precede the life of the road ahead of him. His main support is to touch a person to perceive
Whenever a human in society overly attempts to be content they end up with discontent. Also, whenever a human In society decides to attempt happiness they end up not fulfilling their happiness. The article “In Pursuit Of Happiness” by Darrin McMahon shows how society receives contentment genuinely. Also, how society most often either overcomes happiness the incorrect way or would do anything to develop happiness. Darrin McMahon also explains how society attempts so difficulty to be become happy when it is unimportant.
Everyone wants to be “happy.” Everyone strives to fulfill their desires for their temporary pleasure. What makes this ironic, however, is the fact that most people do not know what the factual definition of happiness is. The article “In Pursuit of Unhappiness,” written by Darrin McMahon, covers this what can be called “issue” in great detail. In this account, the problems with the modern interpretation of how to achieve this mirth are identified as well as the true approach discussed. According to Huffington Post, just one in three Americans are so-called “happy.”
The Science of Happiness is the study of emotions and their cause. Though it mainly studies happiness, other feelings are researched too. Over thousands of years, this topic has evolved and grown, helping us to learn how emotions and feelings affect daily life all over the world. The Science of Happiness is the advanced research on happiness and its causes, effects, and purpose in human life.
Happiness even if identified with pleasure , is analyzed in terms of very little hedonistic Mill distinguishes between higher pleasures and lower pleasures and so introducted a qualitative distinction
(For example) Russia and Latin America share similarities with the United States, including marriage, employment, education, health
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi observes several theories of happiness which ranged from materialistic happiness to the self-contentment practices. He stated that being wealthy or having all the facilities don’t make you happy. Even forcing your body to become happy by practicing different spiritual rituals, yoga or drug consumptions won’t give the real happiness. Csikszentmihalyi did not agree with such solutions and proposes the autotelic experience or flow theory for happiness.
Will Smith, in the Pursuit of Happyness, strives to show audiences across the globe what it takes to maximize one’s own utility (happiness) in a capitalistic nation. The movie depicts the difficulties Will faces in a capitalistic society, when he loses everything he has worked for his whole life. The movie takes us through his struggles of losing his job, house, and girlfriend, but not his pursuit of happiness. The movie has many economic lessons; such as capitalism, budget deficits, unemployment rates, and most importantly how to overcome all of those obstacles to maximize utility (happiness) and reach the “American Dream.”
In Book 10 of Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle argues that the good life is really the contemplative and philosophical life. Before making these claims, he explains how happiness relates to the good life. Happiness is something that humans look for by themselves. In a way happiness is its own virtue and because of this, happiness has to be the highest ranked virtue. Because it is the best virtue, happiness must belong to the most intelligent beings in our society. The most intelligent beings in our society in essence make all the decisions and contemplate about the world, the galaxy and everything in the universe. This is how he makes his first claim. Happiness is correlated with the good life and the good life must involve the contemplative.
Happiness. Is it really as elusive as some might say? Are the problems of the world, or even just the ones in your own life, enough to steal your happiness and joy?