Question: Is western culture too fixated on happiness?
Keltner: It is an obsession, isn’t it? This obsession of unhappiness and there’s a historian, Darrin MacMahon, who wrote a wonderful book on the history of happiness. It’s one of my favorite books on happiness and recently he said, you know, only in America can this, an obsession with happiness make you unhappy, and it’s this, you know, you have this feeling that there’s perhaps there’s a little too much reflection on happiness and I think there’s a very interesting philosophical point alongside that comment which is does this very willful strategic pursuit of happiness bring you happiness? And we don’t know. I think that the pursuit of happiness is essential and vital to our culture. It’s guaranteed in our constitution, the right to the pursuit of happiness and we know from 250 studies in the social and biological sciences that as you cultivate happiness, you become healthier, you become a better neighbor, a better community member. You’re more productive and creative at work. You’re stronger in your family, with your friends. It’s a good thing to go after and we’re lucky that we can, but everything has its excesses and I think there is a risk that it turns into navel-gazing and the one thing that I really felt in writing Born To Be Good is that we risk as our culture defining happiness in terms of sensory pleasures, wow, this is a delicious wine, or in terms of exercise or in terms of personal gratification. That’s a longstanding tradition in western thought, that happiness is economic gain and what I’m trying to encourage is its more social dimension to happiness where you bring out the good in others.
Discuss
Jon Koresko on March 24, 2009, 6:22 AM
Keltner’s concern for our culture is the risk of defining happiness in three respects: sensory pleasures, exercise, and personal gratification. He explains the social dimension of happiness by defining it by emotions. This is in contrast to a more materialistic understanding of happiness that can be routed in material gain. These different emotions cause you to bring out the good in others. They range from compassion to laughter and have the ability to tell us when we are living a meaningful life.
Reflect on times when you have unselfishly given to someone. Reflect on the proverbs that say “it is better to give than to receive.” They both point us to the experiential effects of happiness which are “greater purpose and a deep well-being.” I recently spent a weekend in Baltimore working at a place I’ve never been to before. At the end of the day I was weary from laboring yet my sense of accomplishment and happiness to give to others were abundantly clear. While the pursuit of happiness can sound selfish, done right it also brings happiness to others.
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