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There's a famous poem written by a Nepali poet Laxmi Prasad Devkota: O Lord, Please maketh me Sheep. It's too heavy to translate entirely but a succinct summary is that to not have intelligence is the only path towards happiness.
There’s no happiness without knowledge. But the knowledge of happiness brings unhappiness, because to know that you’re happy is to realize that you’re experiencing a happy moment and will soon have to leave it behind. To know is to kill, in happiness as in everything else. Not to know, on the other hand, is not to exist.
Only the absolute of Hegel managed to be two things at once, but in writing. Being and non-being do not mix and meld in the sensations and laws of life; they exclude one another, by a kind of reverse synthesis.
What to do? Isolate the moment like a thing, and be happy now, in the moment we’re feeling happiness, thinking of nothing but what we’re feeling and completely excluding everything else. Trap all thought in our sensation..”
Excerpt from The Book of Disquiet by Fernando Pessoa
Was intrigued by the title, disagree completely with the content. You can have a rewarding job and still be unhappy, you can have no job at all and be the happiest person out there. Happiness is not one-dimensional... I still think it's a fascinating topic, anyone got any better recommendations for reading up on this?
I've just learnt to get happiness and fulfillment in clubs, friends and family, so that some abusive managers don't have the power to make me happy or not. And I've become more minimalist. I should be able to survive, if I change of job.
Joy is the emotion expressed when one accepts the courage to be themselves.
We haven't established that intelligence should imply happiness. We haven't even established that intelligence should imply the desire to be happy. If intelligence enables a person to identify problems, and problems make a person unhappy, then an intelligent person will have at least one factor that tends to increase unhappiness.
> We haven't even established that intelligence should imply the desire to be happy. Most people desire to be happy. I don't believe I need to prove this. The point was that we should be able to use our intelligence to identify and resolve issues that decrease our happiness. I think this is true to a certain extent, but there is an upper limit where solvable problems are not the limiting factor to our happiness.
"So here are 3 things that you can do to get what you want out of your work life." They forgot the biggest one. Adjust your expectations.
This is so true, life is all about expectations. If you hope for the best, but plan for, and expect the worst, you'll be pleasantly surprised along the way.
We haven't established that intelligence should imply happiness. We haven't even established that intelligence should imply the desire to be happy. If intelligence enables a person to identify problems, and problems make a person unhappy, then an intelligent person will have at least one factor that tends to increase unhappiness.
> We haven't even established that intelligence should imply the desire to be happy. Most people desire to be happy. I don't believe I need to prove this. The point was that we should be able to use our intelligence to identify and resolve issues that decrease our happiness. I think this is true to a certain extent, but there is an upper limit where solvable problems are not the limiting factor to our happiness.
Happy isn't a long term state of being. It's a short term emotion like anger or sadness.
If you expect to feel that way all the time, and think you can achieve that through some kind of changes to your life you are setting yourself up for failure.
You should aim to build a life that is in line with your values, and accept that you're going to have down days. If you were to rate each day on a 1-10 scale, you're going to have 2s and 3s and probably some 8s and 9s. But if you've done the work, most days will be a solid 6 or 7.
And therapy. Therapy really helps. I think everybody should go to therapy.
If you're smart and unhappy, it seems like the best next step is to read some books on the topic of Positive Psychology written by researchers that study it. Two great starts: The How of Happiness and Stumbling on Happiness but there are many more. ps - 4DWW (Four Day Work Week) would be an amazing improvement to happiness to anyone who gets it. Let's all work on making it the norm!
I'd rather say that if you're smart, so-called Positive Psychology seems like a fraud. Fulfilling and meaningful life > „positive“ life. Although it may bring less „happiness“ in short term. „Dopamine Nation“ is a good easy read.
A great read for you may be The Good Life: Unifying the Philosophy and Psychology of Well-Being by Michael Bishop.
But being smart is merely a conviction of your enlightenment to the awful reality of things. Bravo, you learned about all these awful things you can’t do much to fix, and the reward is to languish in existential dread. Congratulations, you have learned the history of humanity and how our society functions, and your reward is sullen remorse in the unending cacophony of injustice.