The Nature Of Happiness By Daniel Gilbert

A powerful quote said by pre-socratic philosopher named Democritus says “Happiness resides not in possessions, and not in gold, happiness dwells in the soul”. In other words, happiness does not come from materialism but instead from the things money can’t buy. In the article The Secret of Happiness the author David Myers writes directly to Americans about how he believes we need to obtain a new “American Dream” that emphasizes personal happiness instead of materialistic happiness. Myers also believes happiness resides in the soul and he says people that think money is the key to happiness are actually less content with themselves and he uses various ways to prove this point. With that being said materialistic happiness vs personal happiness is an important issue, and Myers made a strong use of Logos by showing surveys and studies, Ethos by showing credibility in his argument but he could have used more Pathos by using more emotion and enthusiasm in his argument.

Within The Happiness Hypothesis by Jonathan Haidt, he mentions that there are two ancient truths concerning how the mind works. The first truth is the foundational idea of the book: the mind is divided into parts that sometimes conflict with each other. The second truth is Shakespeare’s idea about how “thinking makes it so.” (or, as Buddha said, “Our life is the creation of our mind.”) Like a rider, on the back of an elephant, the conscious, reasoning part of the mind has only limited control of what the elephant does. Nowadays, we know the cause of these divisions, and a few ways to help the rider and the elephant work as a better team. We can improve this ancient idea today by explaining why most people’s minds have a bias toward seeing threats and engaging in useless worry. To change this bias, we can use three techniques to increase happiness, one ancient, and two very new.

In society there are still differences in classes such as higher class, middle class, and lower class. In sociology, we observed a film called The Pursuit Happyness, where we witnessed the struggles a father went through to succeed. Chris Gardner, who was played by Will Smith, is living in his apartment with his wife and his son. Due to their struggles, the mother walks out on and leaves Chris struggling alone with his son. In the film Chris Gardner applies for an unpaid internship for a competitive stockbroker company where out of twenty men, only one gets the job. While he is on his internship, we see the hardships of getting kicked out of his apartment to staying at a shelter home to then sleeping in a subway bathroom with his son. Viewing the movie through a sociological lens, The Pursuit of Happyness will be analyzed according to the major three sociological paradigms: structural functionalism, social conflict theory, and symbolic interactionalism.

Happiness is a euphoric state, it is the light at the end of the tunnel, it is what individuals seek to achieve. Human beings inherently want to be happy. Happiness is unique because it has seven billion different definitions. In his book Immune to Reality, Daniel Gilbert argues that individuals are only as happy as the subconscious function of their brain allows them to be. Additionally, he questions the state of happiness by citing the psychological immune system. The psychological immune system is a subconscious process of the human brain, which favorably rationalizes human decisions whether they were right or not, regardless of outcome it always finds something favorable to take away. In Barbara Fredrickson’s Love 2.0, she introduces the vagus nerve as a biological apparatus to increase loving potential; Fredrickson links higher levels of loving potential to increased overall health. Most importantly, Fredrickson establishes the relationship between love and happiness as an interdependent one, “Having at least one close relationship like this is vital to your health and happiness” (108). Fredrickson believes that humans have the power within them to biologically alter themselves and to shape their own identity. Inversely, Malcolm Gladwell proclaims that human identity is shaped by the environment an individual is subject to in his book The Power of Context. Gladwell affirms that humans have the power to shape their identity, however only by changing the

Mark Kingwell, in his award winning book In Pursuit of Happiness, asserts that the pursuit of happiness is meaningful and that the benefits far outweigh the risks. In fact, Kingwell’s argument is centered on the idea that people who want to be happy will be happy if they would only pursue what is that brings them joy. For this reason, he disagrees with the idea that biology is the main indicator of a person’s happiness. The idea that “you are either happy or you’re not” (414). Though studies conducted by various universities and esteemed psychologists have reached the same conclusion. In a study conducted by Dr. Jerome Kagan, a prominent psychologist at Harvard University, he concludes that there is a clear connection between dopamine levels

“When people find it easy to imagine an event, they overestimate the likelihood that it will actually occur” (Gilbert, 2006, p.19.) Gilbert explains that this causes us to be overoptimistic about our futures and thus changes what we do in order to be happy. Young people imagine traveling the world, starting a successful business or becoming a star. Later on in one’s life they may realize that they do not have the funds to travel the world, the talent to become a star, or even the desire to start their own business. Perhaps they come to the conclusion that they would be happier starting a family or writing a book. Humans have an undeniable want to control. The reason somebody imagines the future is so they can do something about it (Gilbert, 2006, p. 21.) We imagine a future better than today so we can take the actions necessary to get to the better tomorrow. I imagined college being a whole lot better than high school. The freedom and the separation from my parents was something I wanted. So in order to get here I studied hard in high school, strove for a good ACT score, and applied to universities. The actions I took in high school were in order to control the future. Gilbert answers the question of “Why should we want to control our futures?” “It feels good to do so-period. Impact is rewarding. Mattering makes us happy. The act of steering one’s boat down the river of time is a source of pleasure, regardless of one’s port of call” (Gilbert,

People tend to feel the most happiness in their daily lives rather than happiness over all. For instance, if someone opens the door for you, does something outrageous, tells a funny story or simply reacts kindly to you, you can experience happiness. Laughing at someones joke can cause you to feel happy even for just a moment. Another definition of happiness in our daily lives is self appreciation such as, getting that new raise, getting an A on a test or even getting into the college you want. These examples all cause happiness in different but still rather large ways. We seem to think that happiness is so difficult to come by, we focus so hard on what happiness is that we don't even realize the simple things in life that are truly making a difference. We can become significantly happy without even noticing. Although happiness seems like it’s hard to find it’s not all that difficult. What’s hard to come by is the feeling of genuine happiness ; genuine happiness is what people truly look for.

The most universal goal every human has in common is the pursuit of happiness or “creation or construction of happiness” (Achor, 78). To be able to fulfill this wish of becoming happy, people often think the key to achieving happiness is success. In the book, The Happiness Advantage by Shawn Achor, he debunks this theory of success leading to happiness by illustrating the reverse theory of success. Through dozens of studies and experiments as forms of evidence, the author argues that an individual needs to achieve happiness in order to be truly successful. Achor 's argument is valid in that happiness should come before success because there is a clear advantage to being successful in an individual’s work life, personal sphere, and liveliness if they are happy first and foremost.

Gross National Happiness, The Introduction of Democracy; Categorizing the Fourth King (Eventful or Event-making, Transactional or Transformational)

The article "Stumbling on Happiness" by Daniel Gilbert is an article mostly talking about our future prediction, imagination, how surrogate is helping yourself to predict the future. This article mostly based on surrogate and three shortcomings of imagination, and how surrogate is more reliable. According to Gilberts, he is demonstrating that surrogate is a person who has knowledge or experience about the things you want to know or experience. Surrogates also push us on making improvement on our understanding of things we know.

When writing an essay, it is important to avoid being prejudice against other ideas and concepts that aren't your own, even when you have a point to prove. This can sometimes be the biggest challenge, because it is easy to write about things from our own point of view. For example, John Schumaker wrote an excellent essay that stated many credible sources, but he also made a lot of mistakes that took away from his essay. Overall, Schumaker's "The Happiness Conspiracy" seemed slightly biased due to the fact he spoke mainly about his own beliefs, instead of acknowledging other possible perspectives and eliminating them by stating entrenched facts that supported his argument. One of the first problems was that the paragraphs were cut off too soon and made into a new paragraph, which created a longer essay that could've been straight to the point and more direct if the paragraphs were stripped of the extra sentences and combined together.

To summarize The Happiness Hypothesis is really self-explanatory. It is a novel written to help people in modern society find true happiness. This novel was written by Jonathan Haidt, a social psychologist and a professor at NYU. Haidt backed his statements up well with plenty of scientific research, as well as real-life experiences from not only his own life but used examples of other people’s lives. The Happiness Hypothesis is different from a self-help book in fact, it is not a self-help book at all and that is what many find to be so interesting and helpful.

As two prominent heroes of the 18th century, Benjamin Franklin and Jonathan Edwards mastered the art of religious theology and the sciences. Although their uprisings differed, they shared a drive for success and individual approach. Sharing an interest in similar fields, their ideals of religion and fulfillment became very different, which helped shape their own future endeavors. I will consider Edwards and Franklin to be a few of the last “Do it all” men of the 18th century.

In “There’s More to Life Than Being Happy,” Emily Esfahani Smith writes about the conflict between Viktor Frankl’s book, “Man’s Search for Happiness” and the culture today, which focuses on happiness in life rather than meaning. She introduces Viktor Frankl as a star medical and psychology student who survived the Holocaust in 1942. While Frankl was kept hostage in his camp, he was forced to find the good in life in order to survive. After being liberated, Frankl recorded his experience and what he learned in nine days, creating a best-seller in the United States. Smith explains that even though it has been concluded that Americans’ happiness is at an all-time high, the Center for Disease Control says that almost fifty percent of Americans have not found a purpose in life. Smith tells that bad mental health, self-esteem, and depression are less likely to be found in those who have found a pleasurable meaning in life. Happiness is associated with being a “taker”, while having a meaning life is associated with being a “giver” according to Smith. The downside to having a purpose for one’s life is the fact that he or she is usually more unhappy due to stress and worry than those who only strive for happiness, Smith explains. A study in 2011 proved that if someone has a negative circumstance occur in his or her lifetime, that event will give him or her more of a drive to find meaning in life rather than happiness. Smith concluded by linking these other sources with Frankl’s

The main argument in Gilbert’s TED talk is that people have the ability to choose to be happy in lieu of external factors. I disagree with his claim for two reasons; The data Gilbert uses to defend his argument is invalid as well as the fact that trauma (an external factor) can result in mental illness. To elaborate, the tools to mathematically calculate one’s happiness do not exist. Therefore, when he uses experimental data based on the participants’ feelings of how content they are with their lives after the event occurring, it is flawed and inaccurate.