Secret to happiness...

[Lark]

Money doesn't buy happiness, it makes it easier to do things that make you happy that require money to do.

I'll give you an example of something that made me happy that couldn't be bought with currency or anything else because it happened by chance. I was working one summer in my early twenties as a house painter. The group I worked with was painting the house of a man who played the bagpipes. I love bagpipes. Well one morning we rolled up to his house and were finishing our coffee and having cigarettes and he began playing in his backyard. A beautiful relaxed piece that just drifted and echoed wonderfully into the trees and after a few minutes a mist rolled in as he was still playing. It was magic. You can't buy that. Sure if you had the money you could pay a guy to play and use a fog machine to recreate that but the point is it was priceless and powerful because it happened organically. Those are moments in life being rich or poor makes no difference.

I think everyone who thinks money cant buy happiness should put a few dimes in a high interest savings account for me to test that idea.

 

[Population: 1]

I think everyone who thinks money cant buy happiness should put a few dimes in a high interest savings account for me to test that idea.

Well- for science. I'll donate a pound. Well less than seeing as it will go in as a US dollar.

 

[Sacrophagus]

Money doesn't buy happiness, it makes it easier to do things that make you happy that require money to do.

Though I enjoy status and power for it allows me to take care of myself and my people, it is absolutely true that money can't buy you happiness. I have seen many miserable tycoons and wealthy men who struggle to get up in the morning or indulging in many self-destructive behaviors.
Just recently we've been to a funeral of a business man. One would think he had no reason to kill himself because he has a big fat bank account, but these people making judgments regarding his motive were really just talking about themselves.

 

[Population: 1]

Though I enjoy status and power for it allows me to take care of myself and my people, it is absolutely true that money can't buy you happiness. I have seen many miserable tycoons and wealthy men who struggle to get up in the morning or indulging in many self-destructive behaviors.
Just recently we've been to a funeral of a business man. One would think he had no reason to kill himself because he has a big fat bank account, but these people making judgments regarding his motive were really just talking about themselves.

If a person's soul is empty no amount of currency or possessions will fill that void. Attempting to fill it with such things is not only futile, it will also blind them to what they truly need.

 

[Mole]

The secret to happiness is alternance, found in the book The Art of Joyful Living by Jacques Peze.

 

[Tellenbach]

Benjamin Franklin's take on the "money buys you happiness" idea:

'Money never made a man happy yet, nor will it. The more a man has, the more he wants. Instead of filling a vacuum, it makes one."

I think he's right on the long term prospect of happiness but wrong on the immediate impact of riches. Suppose you're able to rescue 500 cats from an animal shelter with your money. That may make you happy for a fleeting moment.

 

[Lark]

Benjamin Franklin's take on the "money buys you happiness" idea:

'Money never made a man happy yet, nor will it. The more a man has, the more he wants. Instead of filling a vacuum, it makes one."

I think he's right on the long term prospect of happiness but wrong on the immediate impact of riches. Suppose you're able to rescue 500 cats from an animal shelter with your money. That may make you happy for a fleeting moment.

Momentary happiness is still happiness.

Anyway, I judge that someone like myself who is not inclined to that sort of frivolous carry on would be able to spin out the happiness from a windfall for a pretty long time.

 

[Lark]

Anyway, to be honest I read an essay called stocisim and mental health by Bertrand Russell lately and he summarised the key to happiness is having "objective interests" and "a multiplicity of interests and activities", in some ways I think he's right, though it could as easily be construed as "keep busy".

 

[Sacrophagus]

Anyway, to be honest I read an essay called stocisim and mental health by Bertrand Russell lately and he summarised the key to happiness is having "objective interests" and "a multiplicity of interests and activities", in some ways I think he's right, though it could as easily be construed as "keep busy".

Keep yourself busy = Happiness?

What a load of shit. I guess I'm a miserable fuck for enjoying myself more than I should at the shores of the beach. I guess this explains why people throw themselves in the sea, because they are miserable beings.

Holy fuck, someone gives me chores to do. I need to keep myself busy or I'll kill myself.

 

[Tomb1]

I love having a wad of money in my pocket that I can just peel bills off when I want something. I even love the way money looks. My money. That said, my forte is power. Money has always just been a lever to me. I have gotten to exercise power on a bigger scale due to it and put more aggressive strategies into action. Money did not do that. I did. It will also take a big warchest to wage an open war against my competitors, for the strategy I have in mind. Money alone won't win it, though. Without money, I could just go back to exercising power on a routinely smaller scale and still be happy. Don't get me wrong, money can buy tremendous leverage, but it won't show you where to look to find that leverage or even how best to use that leverage once you have got it (that comes from instinct).

 

[Lucy_Ricardo]

William Shakespeare said, "Expectation is the root of all heartache," and he was right. Most things that hurt only hurt because we had hoped and imagined differently.

But I think it's wrong to lower our expectations. Granted, we need to have realistic expectations, but the fear of being disappointed should never keep us from hoping for the best.

 

[Lark]

Presently, I'm taking my happiness from physical training mainly, I am developing a range of different interests, really different ones, as in they are not in associated fields, so you arent just diverse in the sense of know a lot about one single thing, plus spending more time with friends and trying to meet new people too, those things are good provided the people you meet are not just scumbags, which can happen but you got to take a risk you know, sometimes it works out. Besides that I love my dog. Reflecting on things too, is good, occasionally but for me its about the future and having goals.

 

[Mole]

William Shakespeare said, "Expectation is the root of all heartache," and he was right. Most things that hurt only hurt because we had hoped and imagined differently.

But I think it's wrong to lower our expectations. Granted, we need to have realistic expectations, but the fear of being disappointed should never keep us from hoping for the best.

Hoping for the best, and preparing for the worst.

 

[Gone]

Food. Food is the secret to happiness.

From "Dhammapada", a Buddhist text: "If a man speaks or acts with a pure thought, happiness follows him, like a shadow that never leaves him."

Maybe this is true; all those fat buddha statues show a very happy person.

He probably ate a lot.

And I am probably more serious with these words than I should be.


Also, I dunno. My expectations are already pretty low and I don't think I'm way happier than most people. I don't require much to be content, that's true, but being content and being happy are two different kinds of shoes.
I also think that awareness of expectations being low kinda... dampens the highs you get from events that surpass these expectations, because you know that it wasn't that hard. But then, if you have high expectations and something exceeds them, now that's something to be really happy about.
Yeah. How I understand it it's a quantity vs. quality thing.

 

[Population: 1]

Anyway, to be honest I read an essay called stocisim and mental health by Bertrand Russell lately and he summarised the key to happiness is having "objective interests" and "a multiplicity of interests and activities", in some ways I think he's right, though it could as easily be construed as "keep busy".

That's why the world's richest like keeping the rest of us busy! They want us happy. Bless their souls.