Yes. The question mark was intentional.
While at home over the holiday (which I loved, I miss my family so much) the conversation of happiness came up. What makes a person happy? Can anything actually make a person happy or is it an intrinsic choice?
Then Nathan and I talked about it briefly tonight.
Honestly, it confuses the snot out of me. Right now, I have a highly intrinsically rewarding job, but it's also highly stressful. I feel like it's affected my personal relationships, and I'm not necessarily okay with that. Most people have been exceptionally understanding, and I appreciate that. Does the stress go away though? What happens if the angst cause by the stress begins to outweigh the intrinsic pleasure?
How does one even know what they're supposed to do in life?
Or is anyone even supposed to do something? Perhaps it's all a shot in the dark and there isn't this sense of pre-determination/fate that guides a person to the "right" career choice.
And how do you know when to balance the pleasure your job brings isn't enough to compensate for the unhappiness the life outside of work brings?
This isn't to say that I am unhappy, or anything of the sort. But the phrase "stuck" was brought up tonight and it got me thinking about how many people (myself included) often feel "stuck" in their situation.
I'm ready to go home, again.
Showing posts with label happiness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label happiness. Show all posts
Sunday, November 25, 2012
Wednesday, October 10, 2012
Happiness vs. Pleasure
I've recently begun reading "The Art of Happiness".
The book itself is a conglomeration of speeches the Dalai Lama has given, talks he has had with the books author (a Western psychologist), and the psychologist's thoughts on the question of "what makes people happy?".
While I'm not comfortable mind-vomiting at length on the topic, yet, I would like to pose the question to whomever comes across this blog:
What is the difference between happiness and pleasure, to you? Is that difference important? Do you find yourself more often pursuing one over the other and do you think it has affected your overall outlook on life?
So far, I've come to believe that there is a great, and possibly grave, difference between happiness and pleasure. Too often I find myself thinking "Oh, that will make me happy", when really, it is a simple thing of pleasure. That extra delicious and gooey chocolate chip cookie that came out of the oven after I've already had 2....pleasure. That expensive beer that I've been dying to try? Pleasure.
So what is happiness, then?
A friend of mine hypothesized something about this topic that I think could very well be true. Happiness isn't in the accomplishment, happiness is in the process. (Thanks Margaret, I'll tell you more in the letter back!)
I agree because of situations such as this: when I graduated from college, did it bring me "great happiness"? Honestly, no. When I graduated college I didn't feel much. What about the process of learning throughout high school and college? I look back on that, and when I was stretching my mind, that was a time that I was quite happy.
Margaret brought up the concept of cooking/baking food. She and I think similarly on this matter and both sincerely enjoy the process that goes into making the food, almost as much as we enjoy eating/tasting it!
When I examine my current career, I continue to think that this may be true. I am happiest when I am in the process of teaching. My job is a very "do-ing" oriented job, and I think that's a great reason why I love it. I love watching and encouraging the process of learning amongst my students. I also get great pleasure from their post-assessments and seeing how much they have learned, but not nearly as much as I get day-to-day.
I don't think that we can really recognize happiness until we look back on it. In the moment, I think it appears more as contentment and then people get afraid that they are settling. Humans, for some odd reason, seem to love drama. Humans tend to like to fight the Tao concept of Wu-wei.....and perhaps that's okay. Perhaps the process of fighting the status quo makes some people happy, but once the battle is over and they've made their point - do they continue to be satisfied?
Like I said, elementary brain goo. Still working on it. Also working on getting ready for bed, good night!
Best,
The book itself is a conglomeration of speeches the Dalai Lama has given, talks he has had with the books author (a Western psychologist), and the psychologist's thoughts on the question of "what makes people happy?".
While I'm not comfortable mind-vomiting at length on the topic, yet, I would like to pose the question to whomever comes across this blog:
What is the difference between happiness and pleasure, to you? Is that difference important? Do you find yourself more often pursuing one over the other and do you think it has affected your overall outlook on life?
So far, I've come to believe that there is a great, and possibly grave, difference between happiness and pleasure. Too often I find myself thinking "Oh, that will make me happy", when really, it is a simple thing of pleasure. That extra delicious and gooey chocolate chip cookie that came out of the oven after I've already had 2....pleasure. That expensive beer that I've been dying to try? Pleasure.
So what is happiness, then?
A friend of mine hypothesized something about this topic that I think could very well be true. Happiness isn't in the accomplishment, happiness is in the process. (Thanks Margaret, I'll tell you more in the letter back!)
I agree because of situations such as this: when I graduated from college, did it bring me "great happiness"? Honestly, no. When I graduated college I didn't feel much. What about the process of learning throughout high school and college? I look back on that, and when I was stretching my mind, that was a time that I was quite happy.
Margaret brought up the concept of cooking/baking food. She and I think similarly on this matter and both sincerely enjoy the process that goes into making the food, almost as much as we enjoy eating/tasting it!
When I examine my current career, I continue to think that this may be true. I am happiest when I am in the process of teaching. My job is a very "do-ing" oriented job, and I think that's a great reason why I love it. I love watching and encouraging the process of learning amongst my students. I also get great pleasure from their post-assessments and seeing how much they have learned, but not nearly as much as I get day-to-day.
I don't think that we can really recognize happiness until we look back on it. In the moment, I think it appears more as contentment and then people get afraid that they are settling. Humans, for some odd reason, seem to love drama. Humans tend to like to fight the Tao concept of Wu-wei.....and perhaps that's okay. Perhaps the process of fighting the status quo makes some people happy, but once the battle is over and they've made their point - do they continue to be satisfied?
Like I said, elementary brain goo. Still working on it. Also working on getting ready for bed, good night!
Best,
Saturday, June 16, 2012
Talks with Mom (part 1)
As my brother is on a travelling baseball team, my parents are often gone during the summer, sometimes both at the same time, sometimes one at a time. Such was the situation this weekend. Derek (lovingly referred to as "Deek") was playing in Topeka, KS and Mom decided to stay home. Because I love my family and I love being able to talk with them (when they're in talkative moods), I ventured over to the homeland to talk with Mom for the late morning-early afternoon hours.
This conversation had some usual parts:
"Hey, how was work....." "How are you doing....." "How is Deek's baseball going....."
but, after all of the small talk and idle chatter, we can generally glean a good hour of solid conversation, which I always find myself learning from.
Two Points Made By Mom (this trip):
1) The key is balance.
2) Some people like to have shallow and basic relationships with a lot of people and not spend the time to develop deep, lasting relationships with a few people. Other people prefer just the opposite and would rather have a few very close friends and not know many people.
Point 1
This point almost came out of the blue, but it was a good one and a concept that I've taken to heart. No matter what aspect of life, it must be kept in a balance. Working time must be balance out with sleeping time, and anyone who makes you feel lazy for needing your time to recoup via sleeping needs to bugger off. I'm guilty of giving folks a hard time for "sleeping too much". I, personally, can run just fine off of 6-7 hours of sleep. Others need more like 8-9. So, folks that I have teased so mercilessly, I apologize.
Time spent relaxing (physically and mentally) should be paired evenly with time spent creating and doing.
But, perhaps the most important fact of this balance (between all of life's aspects) is that the balance is different for everyone. For me to feel balanced, I need about 60% of my time alone and 40% of my time with people (not counting as sleeping hours and no, Koda doesn't count as "people"). I also need about 1/3 of my car riding time to be spent in silence (I really don't care to listen to the music on the radio much, it's either NPR or MPR or nothing). The silence allows me to collaborate my quiet time and alone time into my driving time...multi-tasking?
(The topic of multitasking is also and interesting one that I'll touch on later).
But there are some things that I think we spend the majority of our lives trying to figure out how to balance. How much food do we actually need to feel satiated and happy but not overly full? How much money do we need in our savings to feel secure, but not pompously wealthy? How much affection do we expect out of a relationship to feel loved and cared for, but not smothered?
And how often do these balances change as we grow and mature (or, perhaps, im-mature?)
Point 2
I'll confess. This topic came up while discussing Nathan and my Dad. You might call them the "men in our lives", although mine has taken a noticeable absence as of late. Either way, both of these individuals sincerely love to talk to anybody and everybody. When going somewhere with my Dad, it was always guaranteed that you should budget an extra half hour of time, because you would inevitably run into someone that he knew and wanted to chit-chat with.
My Dad loves to chat. Nathan loves to chat.
My Mom and I are quite different. I can go for a long while without seeing a bunch of people or talking to a bunch of people and feel quite alright with it. However, if the opportunity presents itself and I am with a few close friends (or even just good friends that can make me laugh!), I will spend hours talking with them. I love getting to know people deeply and personally, and, in my opinion, the people that are almost always worth knowing deeply/personally are not going to share all their secrets within just a few days of knowing you. They might give you their blanket story, but truly learning what makes them tick will take much longer and will require effort on both parts.
Is one mode of communication and befriending better than the other? I wouldn't care to say yes or no to that. I think these ways are just different, and to be honest, it's another act of balancing. After all, what is the point of having 1,000,000,000 friends, if no one knows you well enough to (as my Mom said) "wipe your butt if you need it?". Similarly, it can get awfully lonely just having 5 friends to talk with.
Balance. It's all about balance.
Best,
This conversation had some usual parts:
"Hey, how was work....." "How are you doing....." "How is Deek's baseball going....."
but, after all of the small talk and idle chatter, we can generally glean a good hour of solid conversation, which I always find myself learning from.
Two Points Made By Mom (this trip):
1) The key is balance.
2) Some people like to have shallow and basic relationships with a lot of people and not spend the time to develop deep, lasting relationships with a few people. Other people prefer just the opposite and would rather have a few very close friends and not know many people.
Point 1
This point almost came out of the blue, but it was a good one and a concept that I've taken to heart. No matter what aspect of life, it must be kept in a balance. Working time must be balance out with sleeping time, and anyone who makes you feel lazy for needing your time to recoup via sleeping needs to bugger off. I'm guilty of giving folks a hard time for "sleeping too much". I, personally, can run just fine off of 6-7 hours of sleep. Others need more like 8-9. So, folks that I have teased so mercilessly, I apologize.
Time spent relaxing (physically and mentally) should be paired evenly with time spent creating and doing.
But, perhaps the most important fact of this balance (between all of life's aspects) is that the balance is different for everyone. For me to feel balanced, I need about 60% of my time alone and 40% of my time with people (not counting as sleeping hours and no, Koda doesn't count as "people"). I also need about 1/3 of my car riding time to be spent in silence (I really don't care to listen to the music on the radio much, it's either NPR or MPR or nothing). The silence allows me to collaborate my quiet time and alone time into my driving time...multi-tasking?
(The topic of multitasking is also and interesting one that I'll touch on later).
But there are some things that I think we spend the majority of our lives trying to figure out how to balance. How much food do we actually need to feel satiated and happy but not overly full? How much money do we need in our savings to feel secure, but not pompously wealthy? How much affection do we expect out of a relationship to feel loved and cared for, but not smothered?
And how often do these balances change as we grow and mature (or, perhaps, im-mature?)
Point 2
I'll confess. This topic came up while discussing Nathan and my Dad. You might call them the "men in our lives", although mine has taken a noticeable absence as of late. Either way, both of these individuals sincerely love to talk to anybody and everybody. When going somewhere with my Dad, it was always guaranteed that you should budget an extra half hour of time, because you would inevitably run into someone that he knew and wanted to chit-chat with.
My Dad loves to chat. Nathan loves to chat.
My Mom and I are quite different. I can go for a long while without seeing a bunch of people or talking to a bunch of people and feel quite alright with it. However, if the opportunity presents itself and I am with a few close friends (or even just good friends that can make me laugh!), I will spend hours talking with them. I love getting to know people deeply and personally, and, in my opinion, the people that are almost always worth knowing deeply/personally are not going to share all their secrets within just a few days of knowing you. They might give you their blanket story, but truly learning what makes them tick will take much longer and will require effort on both parts.
Is one mode of communication and befriending better than the other? I wouldn't care to say yes or no to that. I think these ways are just different, and to be honest, it's another act of balancing. After all, what is the point of having 1,000,000,000 friends, if no one knows you well enough to (as my Mom said) "wipe your butt if you need it?". Similarly, it can get awfully lonely just having 5 friends to talk with.
Balance. It's all about balance.
Best,
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