Both authors seem to have different views on how happiness is portrayed. The author of "What Makes Us Happy?" concludes from the cases that happiness does not come from ones self but from those around us. While Rita Dove looks at happiness from a spiritual view. She mentions how she would see the older women from the church "get happy" by the Holy Spirit falling upon them.
From my point of view, happiness is a choice. Everyone in this world has the choice to either be happy or sad and knows what brings happiness into their lives. Another way to say this is trying to stay and think positive.
I agree that people is our own choice however I believe that before people can get to a point of self-reliance, where they do not need affirmation from others, they must first experience unconditional positive regard in some form or another from other people to allow them to evolve into a more independent person. And even when reaching a state of self-reliance, nobody is 100% self-reliant. You will see even the most independent people will still need to come back to other people from time to time for affirmation.
ReplyDeleteHappiness is a choice, but i also believe that people in our lives influence us to be happy as well as our faith. If you're surrounded by negative people all the time you too will soon to show signs of negativity. The same with surrounding yourself with positive/happy people. I have friends that are positive people and if I'm in a bad mood, I begin to be more happy after being around them. People and the world do have a small influence on us being happy. Our faith can keep us positive and happy. I am a Christian and I live my life for The Lord. With my faith i have found that i tend to be less of a negative person and more content with life. Now I'm not saying nothing bad ever happens to me and i never get angry, because things happen all the time and i get mad. My faith and relationship with God helps me overcome whatever lays ahead. We have a choice to be happy, we also have a choice of letting our surrounds dictate our emotions as well as our spiritual views.
ReplyDeleteI also agree with your idea of how happiness is a choice. Its true, we tend to pick certain things and people who make us happy and keep them in our lives, while we then block out the other stuff that doesn't satisfy us. I say it connects to how you said Shenk's view concluded that happiness comes from those around us. It's like when we pick people as friends. You keep the people who make you happy around, rather than those who are a downer.
ReplyDeleteI must agree. Happiness is all up to you, it all depends on you, if you chose to be happy and if the people around you are positive you're most likely to stay positive. Hardly anyone wants to be depressed all the time so we chose who and how we want to live. Happiness does comes from those around us. I come from a happy family, and we can always relay on one another when we are in need because we will help one another get back up. We don't like to see each other struggle. When I do something I always think how my family will react to the situation. I would hate to turn them down or disappoint them because I know that that wont make them happy. When we are in a bad situation we always set back and think about the positive situations and the good that will come out because if we sit there and just think negative we will never get back up and finish what we started. When I have a lot of homework and test for one week I don't think negatively I stay positive and tell myself why I am here and how I have to make my family happy and proud.
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