What is happiness? Have you ever thought about happiness deeply? I recently reviewed one of Daniel Gilbert’s, who is currently a professor at Harvard University, lectures. I also read an article “The Futile Pursuit of Happiness” written by Jon Gertner in the “New York Times”. These two talk about happiness as the main concept. Gilbert said that “There are two different kinds of happiness”. One of them is synthetic happiness and the other one is natural happiness. What is synthetic happiness and natural happiness?
Most people have experience of both types of happiness. Synthetic happiness is from your imaginations or predictions. For example, if you were to buy your own house, how would you feel? You may predict that it’d have a huge back yard, living room, a lot of rooms, a perfect view and then after a few years, the house’s profit should be higher. How does this affect you? I guess you’d be smiling at this bright future. Thus, something you imagine makes you happy and smile, Gilbert calls it synthetic happiness. We use our sensory systems to predict what will make us happy and what will not.
Natural happiness is unpredictable happiness. It can happen over time and at any time. For example, while you were walking on streets, you suddenly find a lottery ticket on the ground. You then take it, and realize you’ve won. How does this make you feel? It’d truly make you happier, wouldn’t it? Gilbert said in one of his lectures that natural happiness is “what you get when you get what you want.”
I have had both experiences through my life. When I think about my future it makes me happy. I usually envision myself becoming a famous person as a computer programmer. I imagine having dinner with Bill Gates, having a casual chat with Steve Jobs on phone and having a happy family while earning a lot of money. I am pretty sure that this is what makes me happy. So, it is one of my experiences of synthetic happiness in my life.
Also I have had different kinds of experiences. Last year I tried to buy a new car. However, it gave me a hard time because I had to check my background thoroughly for everything to be processed. It took a little bit of time. Finally I got a new car and I registered it with my name and not my father’s. It was the first time that I had my own car. It made me really happy. I felt like flying. This was my process of natural happiness.
So like the “New York Times” article title, is our journey really a futile process in pursuing our happiness? I believe that it’s not because there are many different things that make different people happy. Whether it’d be synthetic or natural, it’s still happiness. I don’t see any negative outcomes from both happiness.
It's interesting to realize how many different things happiness can be. As you mentioned in your reflection, both synthetic and natural happiness can be constituents of a person's emotional state of being. I feel that it does not matter what the origins of a person's happiness are. This is because the end results are the same. Whether our happiness is natural or synthetic, short term or ever lasting, it has the same effects on us. All of them make us feel good. If living happily is something beyond our reach, our remaining chance at happiness is imaginative, or synthetic. Therefore, if imagining is our road to joy, let us obtain the end result- happiness regardless of the method we choose to reach it.
ReplyDeleteLee,
ReplyDeleteThese are interesting examples. Like Juan, I love that you don't "judge" between different kinds of happiness. As a wise woman (Sheryll Crow) once said, "if it makes you happy, it can't be that bad."
However, I think you have misunderstood synthetic happiness. You are talking about your fantasies for the future (you could argue this is a kind of synthetic happiness, but its not the kind Gilbert wrote about). Clarifying this would be a great idea.
Good start!
Lee, You know how to draw someones attention, because you definitely grabbed mine. I like your essay but I was just a little confused with your explanation about synthetic and natural happiness. I like your intro and I enjoyed reading your point of view about the article. =)
ReplyDeleteI tend to agree and I think his experiments are quite compelling aren’t they? What especially interesting I think is that he has found the ways of actually investigating happiness in a reasonably scientific way. Of course science may never tell us what makes you or me individually happy that it can tell us certain things that are common to all human beings.
ReplyDelete