Happiness Is …

If we let folks fill in the second half of a plausible sentence that begins with the phrase, “Happiness is …” we are likely to find as many answers as there are respondents.  Except, of course, if we happen to poll all Tibetan Monks.  They will only have one answer.  “Happiness is a feeling”.

There is probably something to that because one song writer, Morris Albert, composed the song, “Feelings”, now considered a pop classic, noted for the chorus  refrain, “whoa, whoa, whoa, feeling”. Morris Albert would have been happy, as his song topped the charts in 1975, from his debut album, if not for the fact that in 1981, a French composer, Loulou Gaste, sued him for copyright infringement because the melody was plagiarized from Gaste’s 1957 song, “Pour Toi”.  Both composers now share the credit for the same song.

Pop composers do see something with feeling because Simon and Garfunkel also had a hit with their own song, “Feelin’ Groovy” released in 1966, much earlier than Morris Albert’s version but later than Gaste’s.  And more artists did sing their song than Albert’s own, unless you include Karaoke.  More Karaoke singer wannabes sing “Feelings” than “Feelin’ Groovy”.

So, there has to be more than feeling to define happiness. Actually, when I thought happiness had to have been at the top of all aspirational wishes – hence, had to be the most quoted – it is apparently not! This is of course totally unscientific to base it on the number of quotes generated from people; but then we are the only species who would know about and aspire for happiness.  Truth be told, love ranks highest, with the most number of quotes – 43,058 quotes!  Humor came in second (33,671) but happiness was a distant 7^th with only 8,656 just below wisdom at 9,858.

Now, how about humor!  Well, all I can say is that for those single men and women out there looking for love, don’t dismiss anyone being referred to you just because attributes like beautiful, handsome, wealthy, even a good personality, are left out, but pay attention instead when the friend (even of a friend of a friend) says that the person that is the object of the referral has a great sense of humor.  That is because happiness may yet be possible between you and the person with a great sense of humor.

Since I already started to write about happiness, let’s stay with it.  I won’t be up to the task to talk about humor and wisdom; love is all right, but we’re awash with expertise on that already.

Here is something that troubled me.  Mark Twain said this, “Sanity and happiness are an impossible combination.”  What did he mean by that?  Is it that we have to be certifiably insane to achieve genuine joy?  Or, is it that we have to be crazy to be thinking about attaining happiness?  I like Mark Twain’s writings and he had to have been a sane writer to have written them, so by his statement, he must not have been a happy person.

Would it perhaps take the mind of a Forrest Gump to be happy?  In the short story, “Flowers for Algernon”, later made into a movie, retitled, “Charly”, Charlie Gordon was happiest, in the end, when he reverted back to his original mental capacity – that of someone with a diminished IQ. I mention that because it was Ernest Hemingway who said, “Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.” Well, as we all know, as much wealth and fortune he amassed from writing which allowed him all the adventures worth many lifetimes, he killed himself.

Einstein, I thought was a happy man, Stephen Hawking has a great sense of humor but Newton may not have been a happy man and Galileo had his problems with the Church that made him commit some serious scientific retractions for fear of ex-communication, so there’s a mix bag from the deeply intelligent folks.  We can set aside what Hemingway said.

What is happiness then? Let’s hear from the Dalai Lama XIV who said, “Happiness is not something ready made. It comes from your own actions.” It is easy for him to say - he’s been around through fourteen lifetimes so he knows the feeling of, and how to feel as, a happy person.  But then again, the Dalai Lama The First apparently said the same thing.  We’re back to feeling happy as the answer to this most elusive definition.

This much we know.  In any culture, from any region on earth, from the poorest to the wealthiest, from the most powerful to the ones barely able to defend their borders, the happiest from every population are the children.  Yoda had it right when he said, albeit in Yoda speak, “Truly wonderful the mind of a child is.” You see if laughter is the side effect of happiness, children seem to have an unlimited amount of it.  Not only that, children have the sincerest, most genuine form of laughter. I used to not pay attention until our grandchildren came to brighten our lives.  Reader’s Digest was right all along with their monthly, “Laughter is the best Medicine”.  If so, then children are the best portable carriers of it and they must be allowed to infect us all.