Happiness and Various Ramblings

 I wanted to talk a bit about happiness, though that's a topic in which every person is unique - and the thing that make us happy are not always what we think.*

Still, there's been some research on this... and there's consistency on at least one thing - close relationships. Oh, money is nice. I think there's a study saying more money tends to make people happier... right up until about 70K a year. After that it doesn't correlate at all. (Probably because people get used to whatever is 'normal', so as long as they're not stressed out about paying bills and making ends meet money isn't actually much of a factor in happiness.)

That's part of it, too. People adapt to what they know. They can learn to be happy with things they originally weren't. Like coffee, which most people find bitter the first time they try it.

I tend to think of adrenaline junkies here. After all, doing something scary (like jumping out of a plane, or going on a roller coaster, or other things) tend to make us hyperaware of the present moment and feel more alive. You can grow to like that sort of thing, to seek it out as much as any drug.

I'm sure there are some people who really do take pleasure in bossing others around, 'winning', and getting their way. I have to wonder, though, how many learned to enjoy it. Just like learning to love coffee.

Happiness is tied to close relationships, though even with that there's room for variation. One person may be content with one close friendship. Another with three or four close friends. Or maybe they vary in what is required to be considered 'close'. Does it mean texting every day? Seeing each other every year? Going camping or golfing on a regular basis? Or calling/texting/messaging whenever something important happens in your life?

My previous post talked a bit about how different life was for the really, really wealthy. And, again, I have no idea how realistic portrayals of their lives are. At least some of the stereotypes are this:

obsessed with wealth and status, always jockeying to 'win', driven, looking down at the poor and those who have less, believing they deserve their privileged status, and so on and so forth.

In other words, they're probably not very happy. 

Close relationships do. But how close of a relationship can you have if you're selecting your spouse for whatever role they can play in your competition for status? How close can your relationships be if everybody you know is a competitor, and you can never let them see you be weak or vulnerable?  How close can your relationships be if you have to deny who you are, pretend to like things you don't and say things you don't mean in order to 'win'?

The focus on 'winning' is pretty short-sighted, too. Not that winning is bad! Or something you shouldn't enjoy! But... there is always going to be someone better. Someone stronger, smarter, better looking. Richer. Even if you're at the top for the moment, you'll grow old and weak and won't be able to stay there forever. 

Striving is good, hard work is good... but I think it should be done for all the reasons we like something. All that science about how we get in a state of flow, how we master things. Joy, passion, hard work - becoming the best we can be. Not 'to beat everybody else', or 'to dominate'. 

When I think of the things that tend to make me happiest, it's true. Most of them are tied with either connections or mastering something I'm interested in. There's a joy in... idk. Learning something new, and doing well on a test. There's a joy in teaching someone else, and seeing them learn to master it themselves.

There's joy in nurturing, growing, developing, and building. Joy in seeing someone succeed at something they've struggled with. Joy at seeing anyone show real talent - whether it's music, sports, law, cooking, cleaning, writing, drawing, coding, building, and more. 

Seeing people reach their full potential is always amazing. Building relationships with people who share your interests, who cheer when you do well and comfort you when you don't, who may help teach you things along the way or be taught by you in turn... that makes many of us happy.

There are a lot of things I'm frankly mad about right now, especially when it comes to the people currently in power. Yet the more glimpses we get of their lives outside the public persona, the more sad and pitiful they seem. Well - when it's not scary. 

How sad, to have all that wealth and power and hardly any real close friendships. To live in a world of users and the used, of alliances for power or convenience. Of spending time with people who are only around you for what you can do for them, and vice versa.

Even worse, they take that worldview and try to impose it on everyone else. Like no - no. I'm not going to feel threatened that some non-white person gets a job, or moves in next door. No, I don't really care what genitals someone has under their clothes. Not unless I'm considering having children with them or something. 

And when you consider how much the truly wealthy make. The 1% who can afford six or seven yachts, and five or six really nice houses, and ten cars, and can take afford to fly off for some awesome vacation whenever they want...

How can they possibly feel so insecure, so threatened, that they create policies essentially keeping poor people poor and making it impossible for them to ever get out of poverty?

How can those who have so much be so stingy towards those who have so little?

There's a whole bunch of other things wrong with this, ofc... but this post was about happiness, so I'll ask the following question -

How can such people possibly be happy?