Opinion Prep for the new year: What I’ve learnt about happiness
Let me wish you a happy new year. And not just a happy New Year’s Eve, a whole year of happiness. But the thing about happiness is to be sure you know what you’re wishing for. It’s something that’s surprisingly easy to get wrong.
It’s psychologists who take most interest in happiness, but even they prefer to call it “subjective wellbeing”. Sounds more scientific.from the British Psychological Society says that “people who are happy – who enjoy ‘hedonistic wellbeing’ - experience plenty of positive emotions and are generally pretty satisfied with life”.
The social commentator Hugh Mackay – a man from whom I’ve learnt much – is very critical of the modern preoccupation with happiness. It’s that word “hedonistic” that offends him. It implies that it’s OK to make the pursuit of pleasure our primary goal. Seek out positive emotions and avoid negative emotions as much as possible.As usual, he’s right. A life of pleasure seeking and avoiding all pain is unlikely to be satisfying.
The British article offers a better kind of happiness: what Socrates called “eudaimonia” – the feeling that your life has meaning, and that you are reaching your potential. Harvard psychologist Daniel Gilbert says “social relationships are a powerful predictor of happiness – much more so than money. Happy people have extensive social networks and good relationships with people in those networks”.
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