Harvard Professor's Guide To Achieving Real Happiness - Arthur Brooks

What do most people get wrong when they think about happiness?

They think that they can be happy. And happiness is not a destination, it's a direction. One of the most important things that we've lost sight of, particularly in the current generation of young adults, is thinking that if you're unhappy for any particular reason, something's wrong, something's abnormal. And that's completely incorrect. We have negative emotions for a reason, th- they make us feel unhappy. The negative emotions are a signal that something's aversive outside of us, and that's not gonna change. We need sadness and anger and fear and disgust. Furthermore, we actually need negative experiences so that we can learn and grow. Happiness is a direction, and therefore we shouldn't be trying to attain happiness, we should be trying to attain happierness, which is obviously a neologism, but that gets the point across. That's, that's mistake number one.

What is an analogy that people can use to understand how happiness isn't a destination? We, we think of happiness as a thing.

Right.

We think of happiness as a, a feeling, a state, an affect that we arrive at. Um, what's a, what- what's another way that you can explain this, uh, disquieting of what happiness is?

Happiness, as we talk about it, is really a state compared to something else, and it's along a kind of a number line. We, we're, getting happier means happier than what, is what it comes down to. And it's a s- it's a, it's kind of an, it's a, a status in which we have these macronutrients more or less in equilibrium. You'll never be perfectly healthy, but you can be healthier. You, you're never going to eat a perfectly nutritious diet, but it can be more trici- n- n- more nutritious than yesterday. What's more nutritious than yesterday? Well, you have a good, for example, macronutrient balance to your diet. I'm a health and nutrition nerd, as are you, and, and we know that you, you gotta get your macros right. You have to have, be paying attention to your protein, carbohydrates, and fat, and have them more or less in balance and proportion and relative abundance. The same thing is true for your happiness. So, I start happiness discussions by saying, "There's three macronutrients for happiness, just like there's three macronutrients for food that you have to get right." They are enjoyment, satisfaction, and meaning. Those are the three things to pursue, and everybody can get better at those three things. That's an analogy that people can actually, particularly people that would be wanting to improve themselves, that's why they're listening to Modern Wisdom, that they would actually help them understand the whole process.

What is the truth behind people who try to be happier make themselves less happy?

(laughs) What they're trying to do is to feel good all the time. You know, back in the '60s, uh, you don't remember this, I barely remember this, the hippies used to say, "If it feels good, do it!" And I remember my dad hearing that and saying, "That's the end of America." (laughs) He was kinda right. The problem is that, that people still think that feeling good is, is, is the happiness state, and they're trying to feel good all the time, as opposed to having a, a tangible set of goals like, "I am going to enjoy my life in a better way that's more stable, and it's not just looking for pleasure. I am going to try to achieve things in my life with goals and direction that gives me adequate access to satisfaction. And I am going to do what it takes to find the meaning of my life, even if it hurts." Those are strategies that I, actually lead us to live, live a much better life with actually a lot more happiness.