The results are in – happiness has little to do with material possessions and intelligence and everything to do with intimate connection, kindness, gratitude and love. Even in today’s society which seems to put a premium on ‘stuff,’ University of Pennsylvania psychologist Martin Seligman and University of Illinois psychologist Edward Diener found that “…the most salient characteristics shared by the 10% of students with the highest levels of happiness and the fewest signs of depression were their strong ties to friends and family and commitment to spending time with them (1).” In addition, “…the cerebral virtues--curiosity, love of learning--are less strongly tied to happiness than interpersonal virtues like kindness, gratitude and capacity for love (2)." Surprised? Historically, we shouldn’t be.
The ancients connected happiness with virtue - Aristotle tells us that happiness is found in “…those who are most highly cultivated in their mind and in their character, and have only a moderate share of external goods (3).” Saint Augustine writes, “The happy life, that is, the disposition of the soul cleaving to the unchangeable good is the proper and first good of man (4).” So, what is the unchangeable good? Perhaps it is easier to understand what it is not.
In the Bhagavad-Gita (5:22), Lord Krishna says “O Arjuna, all these experiences brought about by the contact of one or other of the five senses with their respective sense objects, these experiences are ultimately the source of sorrow.” There is a type of happiness that is like this as well – we’ve all felt it – that sudden glee connected with an event then, once the excitement has worn off, a relapse into a lower state. As my husband always says - there is only so much ‘happy’ available in a day and in the world of duality, he is right. As the high of drugs or alcohol leaves a hangover, our day to day lives can leave ‘happiness hangovers’ too. For example, when our complete bliss at being able to put our entire CD collection on an iPOD wanes upon discovering the requirement for additional storage on our laptop to also hold said CD collection, doubling our projected costs – (harrumph! J).
So, if happiness is really based on connection, love and kindness as recent studies suggest, then why are we always pursuing temporary fixes? This question is easy enough to answer – the senses are powerful things and we strive to satisfy them. Maya or the illusion that surrounds us and keeps us separated from the source of all happiness has confounded even the gods.
A soul might go through many lifetimes before asking what is it that makes us happy at all times and under all circumstances. Surely our past good karma led us to now live in a country where the right to pursue happiness is guaranteed by the constitution. At the same time, I cannot help but wish that the founding father’s had taken this thought further to include the right to pursue happiness individually without impinging on anyone else’s happiness. This is a trickier proposition to be sure - especially given that the European’s very existence on this continent with their conscripted slaves was based on, well, a lot of impinging. But, we see the cost of not adding this addendum on the world scene and our environment. We are now forced to consider how all living beings cannot only live, but thrive together; a not so gentle nudge towards the common good.
Author Andres R. Edwards suggests that we are in the midst of a new revolution – the Sustainability Revolution - one which necessarily takes into account the rights of all people’s, animals and the planet. It is a quiet revolution, peopled by businesses, architects, farmers, fisheries, technologists, government bodies and many other organizations and individuals who recognize that the principles of Ecology, Economy, and [Social] Equity are necessary not only to our happiness but to our very survival (5).
As we wake up in the morning-after of our late 20th century ‘pursuit of material happiness’ binge we find ourselves in the hangover of peak oil, landfills, pollution and global warming. Instead of despairing, now is the time to reconnect with each other face to face, and seek out those who have been sober all along.
How much shorter the steps towards sustainable happiness when our lives are on a par with the path laid out through all history as the one which brings us closest to Spirit; the path of kindness, gratitude and love.
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