Used courtesy of Lee Brimelow
Oh, hey there! I’d like to welcome you to our world of Happiness! Here we all strive to have a happy society void of downers, “realists”, and pessimists. Here your only standard of living is whatever finite fancy fulfills your fickle feeling for felicity! Here you will be encouraged day to day to pursue that highest of goals with phrases such as these:
“Does it make you happy?” “Whatever makes you happy.” “Well, if you’re happy, that’s all that matters.” “It makes me happy, so it must be OK, right?”
What kind of horrible monsters of happiness have we become?
It wasn’t always like this. In times long since past and even still in select places around the world, happiness was only one of many cherished and respected feelings. Emotions such as sadness and anger were held in reverence and known to be reserved for reverent occasions such as death and injustice. A funeral procession was seen as solemn and the mourning of the loved ones honored in such a way as to be emulated. All was governed by the guideline of sobriety and each emotion was valued in its proper place.
But not in our world. No, we truly live in the world of happiness. Happiness is our law, our code of conduct. It is our goal, our guiding light. It is our standard of value, our life’s worth. And it’s not really the happiness that is spoken of in our Constitution or the Scripture, but rather the happy feeling of mirth that drives our lives.
Somehow with statements such as, “If you’re not happy, what do you really have anyway?” we have confused happiness with contentment. Yes, they are synonyms but only when used as synonyms. Because of the duality of the meaning of happiness, we have somehow concluded that something that does not make me feel good in the moment does not make me feel content either. We value our continual dandy feeling more than our relationships, our responsibilities, and in some sad cases, our lives. If anything doesn’t make us happy, we end it.
Our marketers have only capitalized and encouraged this philosophy. With flashing smiles and cooperate hugs they tag their product and are trying to tell us they have the price tag to our happiness. Medication commercials are always showing what we’re like without our meds and then trying to tell us we can live “normal” lives if we only take their drug. Car commercials are trying to brand their vehicle with a social identity and telling us that a particular stereotyped identity is somehow individualistic and will make us feel better about ourselves. And above all, we’re told if it’s not fun, it’s not good.
Because we value being happy more than anything else in this world, any other feeling is diminished and disregarded. Sure, we allow for the emotions such as sadness over the death of a loved one, but that is seen as simply the path to healing so we can feel happy again. We have suppressed our feelings that take us away from feeling good to the point where we have become numb to sympathy, outrage, and grief.
Where has this world of happiness brought us? It’s brought us to broken homes where parents no longer were “happy” with their lives and left to “find their own happiness.” It’s brought us to slums and streets overflowing with druggies and alcoholics that say they just want to feel good while the workaholics look down from their twentieth stories at the lower-lifeforms in disgust. It’s brought us to extreme forms of depression when people cannot perpetuate the good feeling they think they need.
No, we’re not to be all sad and gloomy. Anyone who knows me knows I love having fun more than most people. Being happy is a good thing and helps unite the bond between us. The pursuit of happiness is an honorable one, but not the pursuit of feeling good. That’s just a pleasant-sounding name for selfishness.
In college, one of my roommates once looked at me straight in the eyes and told me the truth I needed to hear: “The difference between a boy and a man is this: a boy does what he wants to do, while a man does what he should do.” It’s not about feelings. It’s about truth.
Just another everyday thought.
“A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;” Ecclesiastes 3:4
Digital Calligraphy 
True! That attitude is so pervasive in our culture, even within so-called Christian churches that preach the prosperity ‘gospel’ rather than the true one. And many people don’t understand when they say, “But God wouldn’t want you to be so unhappy,” and hear a response like, “But there are more important things than my happiness.”
Your post made me think of the Beatitudes (Matthew 5:3-12) in which the word blessed comes from the Greek word makarios and can also be translated as happy. And James 1:12 says, “Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him.” From my own personal experience, and I’m sure everyone else’s too, I’m pretty happy when I am able to endure the temptation of eating that chocolate or extra piece of spinach & artichoke pizza, or saying something I shouldn’t. The struggle may not feel very good at the moment, but the later rewards sure do. And I feel pretty crummy when I give in and do what at the moment makes me happy. I’d rather be blessed.
Thank you, Max, for another wonderful post!
Thanks, Sweet Rains! Yes, the irony is that when our culture glorifies happiness they rarely find it, and when we just live right God blesses us with true happiness anyway. Thanks for the insight!