I’ve come to the realisation that most people aren’t happy. This is because we have created systems that tell us happiness is gained by material wealth or status or association. So “I’ll only be happy when I have a lot of money, or I’m well-known or esteemed, or I have a girlfriend/boyfriend, this particular job, that particular perception of myself”. Blah blah blah. I mean, it’s pretty trite but I’ve realised it’s genuinely like a mass delusion we’ve been drip fed from birth and it just doesn’t work. And human happiness is very important to my mind. That’s the other thing. We’re also conditioned to think of happiness as incidental or some byproduct to our ‘real’ and ‘worthwhile’ aims of wealth or status accumulation. But this is wrong. Human happiness is directly tied to human progress and betterment. Happy humans make not only other humans better off, but the world around them too.So what is happiness? For me, it is a number of distinct factors: 1. A sense of achievement in your daily life, 2. Having a purpose that engages you intellectually and emotionally, 3. A feeling that when you go to bed at night you can look back on your day with a sense of pride and be excited about waking up the next morning to live the next day. None of this involves money, or a particular qualification, or a certain job, or other people to validate you. You can be a guy chopping logs inna woods or a great engineer or an reallh good teacher. These are universal principles that apply across all humans everywhere.And I think this is really important. We should, as humans, be sitting down and asking ourselves: What makes me happy? Truly happy. What makes me feel good about myself? What makes me feel I achieved something today? Not a wage, not a promotion. But something that makes me feel good. Like I matter. Like I lived a good day.I just wanted to write all that out. What makes you happy, Anonymous? Truly happy.
>>34520460Happiness exists. I've seen to most people it's about, first ridding of the bills, second is to get drunk and fuck someone. No measurement or judgement in between, some people judge others to make fun of them and they have a fun time at it.But if you "care" about anything, either because someone shamed you before, or someone constantly told you it's your duty, or it's better to be or you're a failure, or anything in that line of thought, Then happiness shatters. It's always people who were given shit in their life that start with this, and they get the chain running. That's a lot of people. Many people are living in poverty and that's not fun. Many people rose from poverty to middle class and passed that on, this is clear in immigrants and they call it generational trauma. Sometimes, some middle class guy, or even a poor that rose but was laid back and hedonic, will have a middle class kid that will see success as gifts, and advancements as rewards. Those are the ones who truly rise to be rich, the ones that have happy lives. Being happy is a far cry from being proper.
>>34520460And to answer that question, Nobody here is happy, that's why we found /adv/ in the first place. I used to think I was happy being under the protection of my parents, but now that my dad is gone I am part of society and utterly incompetent. I would argue being at the top of some hierarchy, even a small gang of friends or the head of the family, gives you some confidence, which is one half of happiness, the other half would be to not have a larger pyramid submitting you. You will never be happy as an underling.
>>34520460>we have created systems that tell us happiness is gained by material wealth or status or association.>“I’ll only be happy when I have a lot of money, or I’m well-known or esteemed, or I have a girlfriend/boyfriend, this particular job, that particular perception of myself”well these are inherently primal desires. we can observe these traits in apes.finding happiness isn't going against the grain; it's learning to accept our nature and adapting to it as best as we can. It's a pursuit. unfortunately, facilitating happiness is much easier with money and material objects. I've met a lot of stupid happy homeless people that were zonked out.>So what is happiness? For me, it is a number of distinct factors: 1. A sense of achievement in your daily life, 2. Having a purpose that engages you intellectually and emotionally, 3. A feeling that when you go to bed at night you can look back on your day with a sense of pride and be excited about waking up the next morning to live the next day.those really only scratch a handful of our needs for happiness. you're ignoring the primal need for social interactions and relationships.
>>34520460based
>>34520494This. The thing I crave the most is being protected in a group. That means, having friends to take your side even in a shitty argument, friends who check on you, friends that raise you learn new things. Of course current society does away with those because it's harder to tell people to care for each other than to tell them to stop caring about anything but themselves. Thus a natural dickhead is rewarded and more gentle people take bigger emotional hits.
>>34520490>>34520485But that’s the thing. I keep thinking on all this because I want to write something and this preoccupies me a lot. Like, what is happiness? Why is it so important? And like you just alluded to - more systems. We create systems of wealthy, systems of belonging, of fealty, loyalty, nationality, religion. And they’re all supposed to give us security. So then I think to myself “ok, security is happiness”. The whole hierarchy of needs thing. A place to sleep and shelter, food, a sense of belonging, a purpose. But it’s not enough. Or rather it doesn’t meet that feeling. We all know what happiness feels like. Or rather we think we do. An almost fleeting or intangible sense of contentment. But I think it’s more than that - I think it’s the full realisation of human potential at an individual level. Not contentment or pleasure which I think we’ve again been conditioned into thinking, For me it’s that simple test - when I go to bed tonight will I feel a sense of accomplishment and pride and purpose in the day I just lived, and be very excited about living tomorrow. It sounds fucking dumb but I want this for every human being on earth and I want to understand why we can’t do this. What’s holding us back from this. Just because we have these systems doesn’t mean they’re our only choice. >>34520494Well, no, I don’t think so. My OP was already a wall of text as it is. I just wanted to set out the basics. I agree that we have these needs but that’s not what I’m talking about. Fulfilling needs brings is security, satisfaction, even pleasure, but not necessarily happiness. Plenty of people have great jobs that pay well, they have a loving wife and family, a nice house, whatever - but if you ask them if they’re happy, they’ll tell you no. So what is then? Or maybe do you think it’s just an idea that has no actual tangible meaning or value? I’m just asking. I’m really interested in everyone’s perspectives.
So, like let’s say we got a chance to start humanity again on another Earth. What would you change, Anonymous? If you could start again from scratch, knowing all you know now. Both from what you’ve learned and your own personal experience of being alive. You get to build a whole new world. What would you do? Would you think your survival was more important, or your happiness? Or do you think happiness wouldn’t matter? What do you think the peak human life is? Pleasure? Security? Love? Power? Accumulation? Belonging? What? What’s the most important thing you would want to aim for if you got a chance to start humanity again? Tell me. You get to build a whole new world. No rules, no conditions. What would you prioritise? What would be your aim for you and all other humans?
>>34520571> What’s holding us back from thisLife. Life is a miracle reaction, lying at the exact limit of existance. It follows the law of the path of least resistance, where equilibrium is death, and life exists only there where it's barely possible. To have life get so complex that it introspects is another miracle in a chain of failures, just see the mammals that don't, the monkeys that can't progress the necessary step, the parrots that may very well think and introspect but don't have hands to act on the world. We have what is needed and yet we survive over piles of failures.What we see as happiness is one of the miracle mechanisms that allows us to keep following things that feel alright. That's why the most basic needs are sex, food and sleep. But there's also the matter of survival and neuroplasticity, so the miracle of adaptability allows us to endure in unhappiness, sometimes to a point of irreversibleness. We get wounded on our skin, and neurons adapt to psychological wounds as well. Universal happiness cannot exist because it's far too costly. Even if you had infinite resources, brains would adapt to a basal level and seek happiness in another thing. This is why the feeling of progression and reward is important, it reinforces trying, and why abusive upbringing and abusive workplaces only creates broken people.None of this is standard theory yet. You find slips of it in pediatrics books, you find the philosophy in biology, in which all life is rooted. Trying to rationalize it through "logic" is futile, logic is a manmade game after all.
>>34520571>but if you ask them if they’re happy, they’ll tell you nooh I see what you mean. I think I agree. I am not sure that true happiness as a state of mind really exists. Happiness might only exist in our memories.I have also suffered the same. I thought I wasn't happy at certain times in my life, but now I look back with nostalgia. Like when I believed I wasn't happy with an ex, but I'd give anything to be back with her again.relevant vidhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_eCrIO0ECw
>>34520646>>34520652I started this thread too late and rather typically both your replies have just ignited my brain with ever more thoughts and questions while I’m pretty shattered. I’m going to come back to reply to each of you later after a few hours’ sleep but I just want to thank you both very much for your responses so far. I’d be really interested in your input on this question >>34520621 if you get a chance. No worries if not. But thank you very much for your considered and thoughtful input so far; I really and truly appreciate it. This is something that constantly preoccupies me and I can’t talk about it irl so hearing from you guys means a lot to me - thank you so much for real.
>>34520460...you're just describing what capitalism does.did you not understand that already?maybe try reading something and not just going along with your programming?
>>34520690Ok, but then tell me what you would do if this >>34520621. It’s your world. Using all you know and have experienced, what would you do? You get to restart humanity. No rules, no conditions, no systems. It’s all yours to design. What would your aim for humanity be? The best and most ideal of human life. You get to decide it all. What would you take away? What would you add? What would you aim for? What is your absolutely peak human life?
>>34520460Try to be happy in a Izzatmaxxing country. I dare you For me Happiness would be the ability to navigate through any situation in life. To handle any conversation. Any dire circumstance. And come out the victor.I don’t know how to cure my social autism tho.
>>34520675ty for your post anon. I love seeing stuff like this that challenges my world view as well, so I do truly appreciate you as well.In regards to your question of >>34520621truly I think happiness can't be dictated or prescribed. America's founding fathers recognized this, hence coining the phrase "pursuit of happiness". It would have to be a society that doesn't award greed, which is pretty much unthinkable. We know that communism really doesn't work, so I don't know what an alternative would be.This may be an answer that will surprise you, and maybe I'm just retarded, but I truly believe religion was man's original solution to reign in human behavior. religion paved the way for civilizations to take a foothold. human nature is a beast that can barely be contained, but religion was an ingenious solution. leverage the fear of the unknown.
happiness has multiple forms, primarily two, so confusing them together creates this paradox inside your head that removes and re-attaches a form of happiness onto some thing, some one, some action, some way of thought. happiness while eating, while reminiscing, while having sex, being content with what you have are different forms of happiness. i totally agree with your factors regarding happiness; its the most barebones, straight forward explanation of what happiness is. humans love progression, love thrill, love pleasure, love satisfaction and love content. we love stimulation, of any kind. get desperate enough and you'll enjoy pain and/or sadness, something we usually associate negatively but are necessary evils. to kill the human spirit you have to strip him of any stimulants.. imagine yourself in a pitch, quiet black room. stay in it long enough and you'll start hallucinating sounds, maybe even visualize something not real, do anything to get out of the state of mundanity; the happiness killer. desensitization is the essence of depression.what makes someone happy differs from person to person. i know, gay fence-sitting answer, but think of it differently. don't ask the person, you got to observe the behavior when facing stimulations. it's the only true way to determine what makes someone happy; by reverse engineering it. what makes me happy personally is progress. the more i move forward the better i feel - the better i am - the better my world is. everything is tied to your progress in some way, how much you've lifted, how much you've made, how many times you've banged, how deep your connections are with people, all of this is tied to you not staying in the exact same place you started with at a certain point in time. cont
>>34520894this is one of the biggest factors in my view. progress. but remember you are only happy as long as you are true to yourself. creating a false image of yourself to people will have you not stride towards that version of yourself. life will remind you of your true self regardless.in short, happiness is learning, experiencing, teaching, playing, driving, lifting, doing anything. the day you stop moving is the day your soul dies, shortly your body will rot and your brain will stop functioning - you perish. it's a concept i find scarier than death, because you are alive but you're not living, you know? kind of how someone can be lonely but never alone. seeing everyone beside you be, active, stimulated, and you, are not. the internet is a direct consequence of this. the largest, most vast, educational, entertaining, stimulating thing that has literally ever existed has ironically reduced lots of people into soulless pieces of organisms, that continue beating their hearts for no purpose. it's a sad death, and i do not wish this on anyone. it is unfortunately imperative to living, as happiness cannot exist without sadness. this is thankfully very reversible but it takes an iron heart to scrape yourself out of the grave you've dug.thank you for this thread anon. it's about time i got this off my chest.always keep moving.
>>34520460I'm happy
Whatever exists has already been named, and what humanity is has been known;no one can contend with someone who is stronger.The more the words, the less the meaning, and how does that profit anyone?
>>34520460>We’re also conditioned to think of happiness as incidental or some byproduct to our ‘real’ and ‘worthwhile’ aims of wealth or status accumulation. But this is wrong.>can I borrow some money
>>34520460Nearly everything we look at is advertising. People be a lot happier if they take notice of that.
>>34520460>I’ve come to the realisation that most people aren’t happyNo shit, sherlock. Life is pure suffering and a constantly struggle, we can only find moments of happiness when we have some room to brief between a fatality and other.>This is because we have created systems that tell us happiness is gained by material wealth or status or associationNot at all, it's just how life is.
>>34520755No, I agree with you, friend, I think religion very much has a purpose of controlling humans. For good, for bad. But do you think it brings happiness? Let’s say we have this new world and it’s populated by humans taken there and raised by AI or whatever. And now they have all the AI so they have all the knowledge, all the stuff we had on earth - what would you tell them was most beneficial to humans? Let’s say they have food and shelter and they’re totally secure. What would you advise them to keep from Earth humanity? Or definitely never have? Would you suggest they have religion? Or create wealth systems? Would you suggest they never work, or should they do some work? How would you advise how they choose a leader, or make collective decisions? Would you suggest they fight to settle their differences, or something else? The point I’m trying to get at is we’re so embedded in the systems that we’ve created we think we have to have them no matter what; they’re ’part’ of who we are. What I’m interested in is what if we got a chance to start from scratch - like really start from scratch. What would we keep? What would we definitely dispense with? And I think a lot of those answers are tied to human happiness as an actual goal. There’s no point just being alive. That’s not enough.
>>34520460>This is because we have created systems that tell us happiness is gained by material wealth or status or associationNo its because i have to share a planet with 7 billion shitskins and niggers and chinks
>>34520894>>34520954These were some great posts, thanks, man. Very nice to reflect on. You put into words so much better what I’m trying to say about what makes us happy and that it’s not just random. It’s I guess being masters of our own destiny. Having not just goals, but purpose, and always making things better. What good would we be if we were just alive? Like in those films like Star Trek or Star Wars and they’re on some alien ‘utopia’ planet, in the background there’s all these people walking around genteely conversing with one another in long elaborate robes, and I always think to myself “the fuck are you people chatting about, why aren’t you at work”? You know what I mean? People think if we had robots or some shit to do everything we need, it’d be the best life ever, and they couldn’t be more wrong. I think most people nowadays are distinctly unhappy despite never having had it so good in the history of humanity for precisely this reason - they are purposeless. They have no real challenges, nothing to feel a sense of achievement for. I’m not saying people should go out and suffer; I’m just saying that we have systemised ourselves into basically not mattering. And I think humans are extraordinarily capable. All of us. I think not mattering or living lives so subsumed by all these systems does actually get to us but we can’t quite put our finger on why. And this applies to everyone. Even the mindless consumers you allude to. They’re not happy. They think they are but how can they be if their ‘happiness’ is defined by things really out of their control - money, status, the latest fucking thing. They’ll scoff and sneer, sure, but that’s just an indication not all humans are capable of excellence. /Cont.
>>34520894>>34520954>>34522682Shit. Sorry, I didn’t realise I’d wall-of-texted that last one.Anyway, so as I was saying, they’re satisfied to be really in the shadows of ability and that’s fine, too. So I do broadly agree with you that human happiness is relative but only in so far as some people are more purposeful and seek progress than others. That sense of achievement and accomplishment that’s beyond just what you earn and what you ‘do’, and where you live, what you have, whatever. But yeah, I’m just trying to get into the meat of this quality. What makes us happy. And if happiness in itself is worth pursuing. Like this based guy >>34520755 points out, the US Founding Fathers literally placed that in the Constitution. The pursuit of happiness. That even total freedom wasn’t enough. There was a goal to it. To be totally free to then seek happiness however you determine it to be. So I think yes, a lot of people think wealth and status and security brings happiness, and I’m not denying that they certainly help, but I also think you can have no wealth, no status, and actually very little security but if you’re in a position where you’re a master of your destiny beyond the reach of the myriad systems we’re forced into on a daily basis, then I think you’ll achieve true human happiness. Meaningful, real happiness. Anyway, those are just some of my thoughts your based replies made me think of. Thank you again so much.
>>34521473Ok, so are you saying only money can bring you happiness? Is happiness important to you? I’m legit interested in all of your thoughts. Also, please answer this for me if you can. >>34520621>>34520714So to have control over your life beyond the expectations and measures of others? Do you think you being ‘an autist’ would stop you, say, building a shelter inna woods or going on a big ship in the 19th century to explore unknown lands? If you could all these things you’ve listed, would you really be happy? Or would you just feel more able to handle the systems you live in? >>34522366I agree.>>34522411Wow, ok, Buddha. So you think our systems are beyond change? So the system that says you have to go to college, get a job, get X amount of money, get a wife, get a kid, die. You think those are all systems we will never have any choice over?
