Thirteen {x2} on Thursday

Words of wisdom on (my favourite subject) *happiness*

Yes... I am obsessed. There is much to think about on the subject. The first being - why do Chinese proverbs sound like something a Baba ( a Ukrainian grandmother) would say??? Check it out... you'll see what I mean! And you'll note some of my blah blah...( next to the words of wisdom)

1.The search for happiness is one of the chief sources of unhappiness. (Because one is so busy searching, one forgets about doing the living!)
Eric Hoffer . The Passionate State of Mind

2. But does not happiness come from the soul within? ( exactly MY point!)
Honoré De Balzac. Later appeared as part of Romans et contes philosophiques and part of the Etudes philosophiques (1831).

3. Character is the basis of happiness and happiness the sanction of character.
George Santayana . “Reason in Common Sense,”, The Life of Reason

4. The search for happiness ... always ends in the ghastly sense of the bottomless nothingness into which you will inevitably fall if you strain any further. ( stop searching and start living a positive productive life, and see what comes to you!)
D.H. (David Herbert) Lawrence “The Fox,” The Tales of D. H. Lawrence,

5. Deceive not thyself by over-expecting happiness in the married estate.... Remember the nightingales which sing only some months in the spring, but commonly are silent when they have hatched their eggs, as if their mirth were turned into care for their young ones. ( It's when the singing stops therefore, that you have to figure out how to create new melodies)
Thomas Fuller “Of Marriage,” bk. 3, The Holy State and the Profane State

6. Men who seek happiness are like drunkards who can never find their house but are sure that they have one.
Voltaire - in a letter to - François Marie Arouet ( DO NOT get me started on the house!)

7. Happiness is always a by-product. It is probably a matter of temperament, and for anything I know it may be glandular. But it is not something that can be demanded from life, and if you are not happy you had better stop worrying about it and see what treasures you can pluck from your own brand of unhappiness.
Robertson Davies In The Enthusiasms of Robertson Davies

8. Happiness is a matter of one’s most ordinary everyday mode of consciousness being busy and lively and unconcerned with self. ( Yes... you're right Iris!)
Iris Murdoch Willy Kost, in The Nice and the Good,

9. Happiness consumes itself like a flame. It cannot burn for ever, it must go out, and the presentiment of its end destroys it at its very peak.
J. August Strindberg . The Husband, in A Dream Play.

10. Happiness serves hardly any other purpose than to make unhappiness possible.
Marcel Proust. “Time Regained,”, Remembrance of Things Past

11. Happiness lies outside yourself, is achieved through interacting with others. Self-forgetfulness should be one’s goal, not self-absorption. The male, capable of only the latter, makes a virtue of an irremediable fault and sets up self-absorption, not only as a good but as a Philosophical Good.
Valerie Solanas. The SCUM Manifesto (1968).The acronym SCUM stood for “The Society for Cutting Up Men.” ( only at the heights of the Feminist era in the 1960s would one say these things. Please remember, I am not one who doesn't like men. I do indeed like MOST men!)

12. Happiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance. If the dispositions of the parties are ever so well known to each other, or ever so similar before-hand, it does not advance their felicity in the least. They always continue to grow sufficiently unlike afterwards to have their share of vexation; and it is better to know as little as possible of the defects of the person with whom you are to pass your life.
Jane Austen . Charlotte Lucas in Pride and Prejudice, ( note to self - have the daughters read Jane Austen BEfORE marrriage, not after!)

13. Happiness is a monstrosity! Punished are those who seek it. ( well... that'a a tad harsh!)
Gustave Flaubert Pensées de Gustave Flaubert,

1-2. Happiness is peace after strife, the overcoming of difficulties, the feeling of security and well-being. The only really happy folk are married women and single men. ( I would argue this!)
H.L. (Henry Lewis) Menckenc. A Mencken Chrestomathy,

2-2. Happiness does not await us all. One needn’t be a prophet to say that there will be more grief and pain than serenity and money. That is why we must hang on to one another.
Anton Pavlovich Chekhov. Letter, March 3, 1888, to K.S. Barantsevich. Complete Works and Letters in Thirty Volumes,

3-2. Extreme happiness begets tragedy. (SEE! A Ukrainian Grandma - a baba- would say this!)
Chinese proverb

4-2. Happiness ain’t a thing in itself—it’s only a contrast with something that ain’t pleasant.... And so, as soon as the novelty is over and the force of the contrast dulled, it ain’t happiness any longer, and you have to get something fresh.
Mark Twain The Complete Short Stories ( there's truth here!)

5-2. Happiness lies neither in vice nor in virtue; but in the manner we appreciate the one and the other, and the choice we make pursuant to our individual organization. ( regardless of WHO he is, I think he makes a point)
Marquis de Sade L’Histoire de Juliette, ou les Prospérités du Vice,

6-2. The happiness of the body consists in the possession of health; that of the mind, in being sensible of that blessing. Anonymous, U.S. women’s magazine contributor. Weekly Visitor or Ladies Miscellany, p. 189 (March 1803

7-2. Happiness does not consist in things themselves but in the relish we have of them; and a man has attained it when he enjoys what he loves and desires himself, and not what other people think lovely and desirable.
François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld Moral Maxims and Reflections, no. 49

8-2. If happiness, then, is activity expressing virtue, it is reasonable for it to express the supreme virtue, which will be the virtue of the best thing.
Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics, bk. 10,

9-2. Cheerfulness is a policy; happiness is a talent.
Mason Cooley. City Aphorisms, Sixth Selection, New York (1989).

10-2. In the midst of happiness, one may not appreciate what happiness is. ( too true, too true)
Chinese proverb.

11-2. If all our happiness is bound up entirely in our personal circumstances it is difficult not to demand of life more than it has to give.
Bertrand Russell The Conquest of Happiness,

12-2. Virtue is simply happiness, and happiness is a by-product of function. You are happy when you are functioning. William Burroughs “The Creative Observer,” Painting and Guns (1992).

13-2. Doing good is the greatest happiness. ( do some good this Christmas season)
Chinese proverb


And the Bonus bits of wisdom....

One should never direct people towards happiness, because happiness too is an idol of the market-place. One should direct them towards mutual affection. A beast gnawing at its prey can be happy too, but only human beings can feel affection for each other, and this is the highest achievement they can aspire to.
Alexander Solzhenitsyn. Shulubin, in Cancer Ward

Strictly speaking as emotional entities, human beings are self contained. We believe other people's actions cause us to be happy - or miserable, as the case may be - but it is our thoughts about their actions that create the hormonal responses we interpret as happiness. (and remember this! Never mind she writes erotica - whoa...it's AMAZING what one finds in public library collections.... I am still.... catching my breath.. but that's a T-13 for another day)
Emma Holly, Strange Attractions

Happy?

Happy - from Merriam Webster Online.

Pronunciation: 'ha-pE
Function: adjective
Inflected Form(s): hap·pi·er; -est
Etymology: Middle English, from hap
1 : favoured by luck or fortune - a happy coincidence
2 : notably fitting, effective, or well adapted : a happy choice
3 a : enjoying or characterized by well-being and contentment - is the happiest person I know happy childhood> b : expressing, reflecting, or suggestive of happiness happy ending> c : Glad Pleased happy to meet you> d : having or marked by an atmosphere of good fellowship : Friendlyhappy office>
4 a : characterized by a dazed irresponsible state happy boxer> b : impulsively or obsessively quick to use or do something happy> c : enthusiastic about something to the point of obsession : obsessed happy --

It happened again! At the office Christmas party on Saturday evening. I went solo... well... actually I went with some of the other girls/men who didn't have/want dates. We sat at dinner together. I was having a wonderful time in spite of the fact that I haven't danced in stilletos in some time. I barely sat all night! Lots of men to dance with, and when they didn't want to dance, (hip hop - not big with the over 45 crowd apparently) the girls were doing the dance in the circle thing anyway... I found it difficult to stay off the dance floor. It was clear a good time was had by all!

At one point, I went to our table for a glass of ice water, and one of guys I've known since I started working at this place asked me... " so... Marie, what's the deal? Are you like still technically married or what?" So I am straight and honest... "I am more than technically married, I am plain married"

Then comes the obvious question "and you're here without your spouse because......?

I was straightforward back at him, " Because the spouse is not much fun at these kinds of events, and things are not great in that department. I am working on making significant changes in my life."

Then I hear it again, something I've been hearing a lot, and I am not sure what it means anymore. "well... if you're not *happy* then you're probably doing what's right"

Happy - and from the definition above, I would have to say it's the third point I am assuming people are talking about. Well-being and contentment. In many facets of my life I do have a good sense of well being and contentment, and in just one part- okay albeit fairly major part - not so good.

So is it really all about "happiness?"

It's what my former friend said to me when describing his latest-live-in ... "we're happy." I am sure he is... but it all sounds... so trite and shallow. It's also what he kept saying after his apologies and justifications for his behaviour as he signed off his dozens of emails to me. "I wish you happiness" Even my own sister-in-law, when learning of what was going on with me the last few years asked, "Are you happy?" It seemed like a shallow comment.

My life doesn't come close to being miserable. It could be far more satisfactory in the relationship department but unhappy? no.... I wouldn't say so. I have good health, as do my children. I have a roof over my head and a job that compensates me well. And in spite of the relationship problem, I have many friends who care about me and my well being, and I cherish them for what they give me. This is not a person who is not content or not in a state of well being.

Is it happiness that is the point? I am not *unhappy* because it's about so much more than contentment in living a good life isn't it? Perhaps it's my eastern rite Catholic living where I feel there is much more going on. Or perhaps I am digging too deep? perhaps rationalizing? or denying? HMMMMM.

I am enjoying a good time, a laugh, and a good life. What is at stake for anyone making decisions, is that there are too many factors that affect more than the individual. It has to be about more than being happy doesnt it?

Happy? I am fine! I am content - mostly. I am sure there are many who would argue with me after seeing me in my many states of depression, sadness, and outright bawling my eyes out three-box-tissue-style. But I am not an UN-happy person. Hey I can wear size 6 trousers - and the leather trousers I bought on my 30th birthday( pre babies!) still fit twenty years later, AND I can dance in stilletos all night long!

I am pretty *happy!*