"Happiness is referred to as the good life, flourishing, or an emotional state of well-being"(wikipedia.com). Being happy is being positive and surrounding yourself with positive energy. Happiness is developed from within. It is up to the individual if they allow things of the world, personal problems, or work get them down. Should we as people allow things that occur in the world or society determine our happiness? No, because we could be depressed all our life, if we let natural disasters, crimes, hate, death and other things keep us from being happy.
Anthony Phillips feels if people are happy with the things going on within the world they are not living in reality. He basically feels people should let issues of the world effect their lives. "Three constituents of happiness are pleasure, engagement and meaning. Through casual conversation, we can increase positive emotion about the past, present and future"(Selimann et al 540). Things are going to happen within our lives and the world all the time. That does not mean we won't have moments where we feel down about something that we may go through or a tragic event broadcast for the world to know. Things happen every second, of every minute, of every day. If we surround our lives or focus on the negatives things like Anthony Phillips wants us to, we'll all be depressed and have mental disorders. We have to live our life for today because tomorrow is not promised. "We must live in fullness, without waste of time and potential" (Auden 544). Time is something we can not get back. There are so many things that cause stress dealing with life and things that occur within the world; but if we can't do anything to solve problems of the world, why let them depress us? Mental illness and depression is real, so unlike Anthony Phillips I'd choose to be happy than to create issues worrying about things out of my control. "Psychologists and psychiatrists were able to make people less miserable 50 years after World War II" (Seligmann et al 539). When you're unhappy its a process of getting back to a happy place, if the person is able to bounce back from what caused them to become unhappy. "Suffering drags you deeper into yourself. It gives people a lot more accurate sense of their own limitations, what they can and can't control" (Brooks 567).
We never know what a person is going through. Maybe Anthony Phillips is an unhappy person since he wants people to base their happiness on the state of the world. "Recovering from suffering is not like recovering from a disease, may people don't come out healed; they come out different" (Brooks 568). Life is what you make of it. We can only face each day with a positive mind set and pray for good outcomes. We have to remain strong dealing with life and society.
www.nytimes.com/2013/12/15/opinion/sunday/a-formula-for-happiness.html
I agree with your blog. Everyone has a choice to be happy or not. If you try to base it off of the things that happen around the world you will never be happy its something from within. We have to live each day like it is our last. Like you said time isn't something we can take back so why not be happy with being alive. There's so many things to be happy or thankful for because America compared to other countries we are better off so why wouldn't Americans be the happiest people on earth? Because people make their own reality to either be happy or not.
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