Spelling Out Happiness

If you go to your local book store you’ll see that if you parted with your hard earned cash you’d discover the secret to happiness. There are no secrets here. It’s not because I know it and too selfish to tell you. It’s because there’s something suspect about the concept of there being a secret to happiness.

When we start to dissect happiness we realize it’s not as easy as we think. We can ask ourselves “are you happy?” but that starts to open doors in our mind that we may not even want opened.

So are you? Are you happy right now? If you aren’t, try to think back to a time you were and ask yourself these questions:

1. What kind of thing is happiness? Is it a physical feeling, an emotion or a state of mind? Is it all these things, or is it something different? How do you know you’re happy?
2. Can you feel happy and unhappy at the same time? Can you feel happy but dissatisfied at the same time?
3. Are we always aware when we’re happy? Is it possible to say, “I was happy and didn’t know it?”

If you ask yourself these questions, you’ll start to notice that our idea of happy isn’t as clear as we think. Through my research, I’ve read about different philosophers, listened to audiobooks, and seen documentaries. I’ve separated my findings in to three essays.

These essays aren’t only about questions or theories. You’re obviously reading this because you’re not only theoretically interested in happiness, but also existentially interested. You want to know about happiness because happy is something you strive to be for the sake of your very existence.

In the next coming weeks I’ll publish:

1. What is Happiness?
2. What Makes Us Happy?
3. Beyond Happiness.

I’m certainly not an expert on the matter. Try to look at this as less of a guide and more of a documentation of my research. Consider this post the Table of Contents and look at the posts as highlights from my findings. My goal is to attempt to provide you with insight and thoughts you can apply to your life. If you have something to say, write me a note, I love learning and hearing about your perspectives on the matter.

Brian is the founding editor in chief of Fameless Quarterly. He’s a chronic nice guy and multimedia storyteller. You can follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his occasional newsletter where he attempts to philosophically contemplate events that happen in his day-to-day life.