When Being Good Does Not Equal Happiness

Won't it be wonderful if there were a single formula for happiness? There is no such thing, and anyone who claims to have invented or found such a formula or equation is simply kidding, pretending, or trying to fool the rest of us. But it would be near-to-impossible to disprove the person's claim to gladness, because you'd have to live in the same house with that "happy person" for 30 days before you'd find out the fact that he or she only claimed to be happy all the time but was really just like the rest of us: unhappy in an unhappy world

Perhaps the closest any human being can come to cracking the happiness code is in being a good person, someone who is committed to doing what is morally right, as defined and understood by the dominant culture where that person lives. Religious people are said to be among the rare souls who have uncovered the mystery to happiness. They tend to link happiness or joy to being or doing what is good, godly and righteous.

The only trouble is that it is not that clear cut, or most humans would have followed the religious formula, and the world's billions of people would be mostly happy, glad, joyful. The reality is that being good and doing good may not result in happiness, at least not all the time. The only way godliness would produce permanent happiness in this life would be if only good things were to happen to good people, and only bad things were to happen to bad people. In a world where bad things happen to good people and vice versa, it is absurd to think or believe that lifelong happiness can become anyone's reality this side of the grave. The reality of a crippled world renders flawed every formula of happiness.

Concerning the morally good life, one writer penned these words on what he called "the straight life":

The straight life for a homemaker is washing dishes three hours a day; it is cleaning sinks and scouring toilets and waxing floors; it is chasing toddlers and mediating fights between preschool siblings. (One mother said she had raised three "tricycle motors," and they had worn her out.) The straight life is driving your station wagon to school and back twenty-three times per week; it is grocery shopping and baking cupcakes for the class Halloween party. The straight life eventually means becoming the parent of an ungrateful teenager, which I assure you is no job for sissies. (It's difficult to let your adolescent find himself – especially when you know he isn't even looking!) Certainly, the straight life for the homemaker can be an exhausting experience, at times.

The straight life for a working man is not much simpler. It is pulling your tired frame out of bed, five days a week, fifty weeks out of the year. It is earning a two-week vacation in August, and choosing a trip that will please the kids. The straight life is spending your money wisely when you'd rather indulge in a new whatever; it is taking your son bike riding on Saturday when you want so badly to watch the baseball game; it is cleaning out the garage on your day off after working sixty hours the prior week. The straight life is coping with head colds and engine tune-ups and crab grass and income-tax forms; it is taking your family to church on Sunday when you've heard every idea the minister has to offer; it is giving a portion of your income to God's work when you already wonder how ends will meet. The straight life for the ordinary, garden-variety husband and father is everything I have listed and more . . . much more.

Should we then forget about being good people as our society or religion stipulates, forget about doing good deeds, because goodness will only wear us out rather than bring us the bliss of happiness we desire? Certainly not! Why not? Because being bad and doing bad things will remove us even farther away from the gates of joy. Though happiness via goodness is illusive, it is far better to spend life at the gates of happiness, where we may see or smell the desire of every heart, even if we barely enter into those confines of joy. That is much better than to live our existence atop the pit of gloom, on the threshold of a hellhole, where we may never even know what the greenery of happiness looks like.

We should choose character with charity, because, when all is said and done, it is better to be and do good than to be and do evil. But let us be good and do good for goodness own sake, not for any reward of happiness we expect in return in this lifetime. That misguided soul who intends to trade goodness for happiness will find that such a bargain is never the fair trade we wish it to be in this uneven, fallen world we call home.

The Pursuit of Happiness: Choose Your Chase

Now that you have it down that America guarantees only the pursuit of happiness, not happiness itself, you need to decide what it is or how many things you want to pursue in the spirit of America. What do you want to pursue in American fashion? Is it pleasure? How about wealth, more money, a bigger house, a bigger car, many houses, many cars? Why not add a motorcycle, a boat, a yacht, an ATV, an RV, a private airplane?

Pursue knowledge, philosophy, education. Go beyond high school to college. Reach the heights of graduate school and add a title or two before your name, perhaps Dr. or PhD, or some other fancier, more impressive tag. Be a lifelong student; no learning is for nothing, so they say.

Pursue the career of your dreams. Pursue toys, little ones or big ones, cheap toys or expensive toys. Pursue sex, all the sex you can have, with whomever you want to have it, whenever you like it, wherever you and your sex partner choose.

Pursue the best foods at the best restaurants. Pursue travel and spend your nights at the world's luxurious hotels and motels, and watch pay-per-view movies or premium channels while you are there. See the world by car, train, ship or airplane. Add tourism to travel as icing on the cake of adventure.

Pursue friends, and multiply them by the dozens, if you want. Pursue sports. Pursue the perfect body, watching what you eat; work out like a well-oiled machine. Pursue your pet project, the hobby of your fancy. Become a decorator, a writer, a singer, a designer, an engineer, a builder, and build whatever your heart desires. Pursue plants and gardens, and seek fulfillment in nature and horticulture.

Pursue fame, and get your own shiny spot in the sun of celebrity and popularity. Pursue position with some star power of your own. Seek political office for whatever reason you can come up with, and have the whole world chanting your name or slogan, while you convince them that it's all about them, not about you. Get them to believe that together you and they have been called to change the world.

Pursue technology. Own the latest computer and other communication gadgets of the time: laptop, cell phone, ipod, iphone, GPS, HDTV, DVR, TiVo. Get all you can, and can all you get.

Better yet, pursue religion, charity, philanthropy, doing the right thing. Volunteer your time and give your hard-earned money to help those in need. Find your cause in life and sacrifice all you can for that worthy cause, whatever it is. It will even make you feel good, that with your life you have made someone else's life better.

Pursue and marry the love of your life. Settle down and raise a family. It is far better than running around, shacking up, sleeping here and there, or is it really better? Raise responsible children and donate them as your ultimate contribution to human civilization. You may be proud of that, or you may regret the whole thing after all, in your sunset days.

You can pursue all of the above. You can grab hold of some or most of them. But sooner or later, you will realize that happiness still lurks in the foggy distance of your future, yet waiting to be pursued.

If there is anything in life close to a semblance of happiness, it only lies in the pursuit itself. "The pursuit of happiness". Not the possession of happiness. You are happier pursuing than finding and keeping whatever it is you are chasing.

Whether sifting through the desolations of the underdeveloped world in Africa, Asia and South America, or soaring heights of affluent North America and Europe, it does not matter what continent or country, there is no deposit or reservoir of happiness to be found anywhere on this planet. Humans have searched for and found deposits of petroleum, the dark wealth over which humans and nations continue to fight wars to control its flow and supply. Deposits of gold, diamond, iron and other minerals abound, and greed for these precious metals never cease to spoil much of our luck at happiness. But there has yet to be that one lucky son of man who decoded the secret or unearthed the stuff of happiness, that true wealth that all other riches combined cannot even begin to afford. Happiness is as priceless as it is scarce.

And whatever is valuable, humans will search for. Thus the chase goes on. The pursuit continues, the pursuit of happiness. Though something inside each of us tells us, we'll never find on this side of the grave the permanent state of happiness we are chasing, we somehow know it's better to be in pursuit of the dream than to give up the chase, sit back and kick back for a cop out in the name of frustration.

Be true to yourself and admit it: You are not happy, and you have never met a truly happy person. Many of your acquaintances pretend to be happy, but if you ever get to really know them, you'll find they're just like you and your family and friends: unhappy, always in pursuit, but never laying hold of the prize, not finally and permanently.

Now, for any soul who has ever been so blessed as to experience pure happiness, it has always been just for a fleeting moment every time. You see, real happiness is the orgasm of life. Like orgasm, happiness is the peak to which every human effort and endeavor builds. Like orgasm, happiness is a climax that sends into one's innermost being the sweetest of feelings. Sad thing is, the high never lasts. It is not meant to. Happiness is meant to like the brief splash of a victory lap accompanied by cheers, the awarding of medals and singing of a national anthem after an athlete wins an Olympic event. Happiness never lasts beyond the moment. Because of its fleeting nature, we humans can spend our lives in pursuit of happiness. Without the thrill of the chase, life would be quite boring, hardly worth your breath. What is life, after all, without something worth chasing, especially if the object of the chase is happiness, even if for a dot of time.

I'm still in hot pursuit of happiness. In the not-too-distant past, I managed to grab it a time or two, but lost it again each time. How about you? Let me know if you've found happiness that lasts. Or have you given up the pursuit, as millions of souls have done?

Happiness: The Chase Goes On

Some people claim to know what happiness is. No one seems to know where or how to find happiness.

Born and raised in Liberia, we spend part of our childhood dreaming about leaving Liberia, crossing the vast Atlantic Ocean, landing on the heaven-on-earth terrain known as America. My junior high friend, Robert Saydee and I would lay on the bunk beds of our dorm room in a boarding school and verbally dream of the day when both of us would migrate to the great, rich United States, the land of the missionary, peace corps, CIA agent, tourist, Hollywood star, cars, planes, and black American athletes. So we dreamed until Saydee and I were separated by the need to continue our educational journeys in different locations. Our American dream lingered.

Well, it was not exactly the journey to America we would have scripted, but my lifelong friend and I are in the United States now. It was the brutal Liberian civil war that uprooted us and catapulted us to this sweet land of liberty, which has proved to be so much more than our boyish minds had imagined. Give or take a few surprises.

Liberians who still live in what is perhaps now the world's poorest country will not believe me when I say it, but it is true: there is no happiness in America, just as there is no happiness in Liberia. Life in America means a lot of things, but permanent happiness is not one of them.

What does it really mean to live in America? Find it in those words in nation's Declaration of Independence: it is the right to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness". In the United States, what you are given is the right to live, to be free, and to pursue happiness. You are not granted, guaranteed or given happiness. No, it's not happiness but the pursuit of it. That's what America offers.

The "pursuit" is the key to life in America. As for the happiness part, give it up, you will never catch it here. Unless you have figured out the mental trick of finding happiness in the pursuit itself, you will be a wind chaser all the days of your life in America. Can you catch the wind and hold it in your hand? Neither can you grab happiness, hold it, and take it with you into your American home.

Happiness has little to do with geography. It is not about location, or relocation. Moving from here to there will not make you happy any more than changing from flip flops or slippers to shoes. Happiness is not some place or some thing.

Happiness is a pursuit, not a catch. So, let the pursuit begin, or let it continue. Remember, they call it "the American dream". It's a "dream", not a reality.