Definition Essay On Happiness

In the 1940s, millions of US soldiers came home from the European and Pacific theatres, starting families and their own businesses in chase of the American dream they had so dutifully defended, but many came to realize that their happiness was a façade of the damaged veterans inside, of whom the horrors of war never left. In the post­World War II society, psychologists and pharmaceuticals tried to do away completely with any negative emotion in the pursuit of increasing millions of people’s respective levels of happiness. This was a noble undertaking with the right intent­­after all, who wouldn’t want to be happy? However, it was misguided in the sense that the negative emotions they tried to dispose of are equally as important as the positive

Positive emotions do come with their proven perks. They drive people to success, allow them to make more considerate decisions, reduce the risk of some diseases related to stress and depression, and encourage a longer lifespan. However, many devote entire lifetimes chasing what they call “happiness,” but few can succeed; this task is almost self­defeating, as “...the flaw was introduced much earlier: ...the hedonic psychologists asked ‘How happy are you?’ when they should have asked ‘What is happiness?’ As a result, they could do no more than measure and calibrate happiness...” (Schoch 451). It simply is not possible to figure out what happiness is for two reasons; the first being that psychologists and philosophers have asked the wrong questions for millennia, in turn, only allowing them to put a numerical value to an emotion, as Orwellian as it sounds. Secondly, there is no one­size­fits­all solution which could possibly apply to the nearly 8

Happiness, in a sense, sets off a sort of chain reaction where the literal high (from neurochemicals such as dopamine) only feeds into riskier behaviors. Happiness can also force a certain inflexibility where when one is happy, they perceive they are in a secure environment and cannot care for some problems, resulting in low creativity and drive for success (David 124). For example, a person who is hanging out with mates and having a good time may take turns doing extravagant flips into a pool but then persuaded into doing something stupid, such as jumping off a roof into it for “style points,” which results in an injury. Being happy can misconstrue how people accept and read information in their surroundings, resulting in the resorting to stereotyping and jumping to conclusions. These things disallow a genuine search for truth because it might just not be the truth that they