The pursuit of happiness makes me think of a journey or a treasure hunt, where people go on an adventure to find what they are missing–happiness. They hope that by the end of this journey they will reach some magical moment where all the pieces of some impossible puzzle are put together and suddenly they are happy, today and forever, and it stays this way forever and ever.
Yet, the happiest people on the planet aren’t looking for happiness and they aren’t holding on to it, as if they were holding on to a dear life. Rather they are happy, period. They aren’t happy for any specific reason. In fact, they can be in the middle of a rather hard situation, which would break most people, and they are still thriving.
Yes, being happy may feel like an impossible dream, especially when more than half of the population of the planet Earth is struggling to feel happy. Yet, it is completely possible if you focus on the right element of life and this is exactly what we teach here in Optimal Happiness.
Stop Copying & Start Living
Lately, “Mental Health” is becoming the latest trend, but mental health just sounds like another coping mechanism rather than a solution for a perfect life. As such, in order to create a life that we ideally want to live, we use a different set of tools, which I personally call Optimal Happiness.
At this point, I remember a happiness paradox that states that the more we chase happiness, the further it seems to run away from us. I guess, this is because if we need to chase something it is because we don’t really have it and we don’t really know how to keep it either, even if we can reach this temporary goal.
In other words, pursuit of happiness is a rat race, which just proves that we are probably unhappy and might need help.
The Pursuit of Happiness – The Movie
This part of my life, this little part, is called happiness.
Will Smith from Pursuit of Happyness (2006)
This movie isn’t ultimately about the science and art of happiness. Instead, it is about someone who is struggling throughout a movie, and at the very end of it all they get what they want, which in their case is a job, which is supposed to magically solve all of their problems.
After all, money is a solution for everything, right? Wrong. There are countless financially well-off individuals who are still very unhappy, some of whom sometimes even commit a suicide. So, money is only a solution to problems that the lack of money creates. In other words, yes, it is one of the important pieces of the puzzle for an optimized life, but it isn’t the only piece of the happiness puzzle.
Furthermore, most movies end with the main actor getting what they want. So shouldn’t we call all movies “the pursuit of happiness?”
The End to Pursuit of Happiness
The slogan of Optimal Happiness is:
We offer happiness regardless of who you are, where you are from, and what are your life circumstances.
Roman Russo talking about mission statement of Optimal Happiness
This is because happiness is the number one goal and everything we do is for the sake of happiness, while happiness is the only thing we seek for its own sake (as stated by Aristotle).
So if we want to be happy above everything else, and everything else (e.g., jobs, careers, money, relationships, traveling, etc) we search for the sake of happiness, should we not optimize our lives towards being the happiest we can be? I certainly think so.
This is why Optimal Happiness might be for you if:
- Happiness is as important for you as it is for me,
- You don’t want to endlessly live in pursuit of happiness,
- You are tired of dealing with mental health issues,
- You are tired of copying, and
- You want to start thriving,
Have a happy day!
2 thoughts on “Forget the “Pursuit of Happiness.” Be Happy Now.”
Do you mean by happiness, simply being more true to oneself? While outside measures such as fame and wealth are still missing the mark in this?
Great question, as without knowing what happiness is (and what it’s not), it’s easier to miss the mark of becoming the happiest we can be. On a side note, this is also a big problem in our society today, and it’s why so many people are unhappy. I wouldn’t say that happiness is exclusively “being true to oneself.” I would even ask you, what do you mean by that? Fame and wealth definitely miss the mark of happiness as we are living in the most technologically advanced society the world has ever seen, where the mental health epidemic is now considered the norm.
I address what happiness is (aka definition of happiness) in the following blog post: https://optimalhappiness.com/what-is-happiness-definition/
I also talk about the limits of money here: https://optimalhappiness.com/money-wont-buy-you-happiness/