Happieness and the American Dream

Happiness is one of the most commonly contemplated subjects in the world. Everyone wants to be happy, but there is no set way of achieving it. Some people try to attain it through adventure and achievements, like climbing a mountain or completing a bucket list. Other people try to buy things that will make them happiness, which is the origin of the phrase money cannot buy happiness. Both of these strategies can work, but rarely create permanent happiness, which raises the question, what can?

The idea of happiness is closely related to an idea that is labeled the American dream. The first publicized mention of this idea was in the declaration of independence which said that all people have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I personally believe that what the authors of the declaration of independence meant by that was that every citizen of the United States could attempt to attain happiness in any way they see fit, even though it may not even be possible to fully attain it. In the United States we have the ability to gain what we need, and the opportunity to attain happiness.

Now back to my original question, what can provide permanent happiness? There are probably thousands of theories, each as likely as the last. In the Euphio Question by Kurt Vonnegut, he writes about one possible theory of attaining happiness through technology. Here is a passage from his short story, The gadget is, I think, what a lot of people vaguely foresaw as the crowning achievement of civilization: an electronic something-or-other, cheap, easily mass-produced, that can, at the flick of a switch, provide tranquility. In the Euphio Question Vonnegut also explains how perfect happiness, would necessarily create a utopia either as he says in this passage; The question is not whether euphio works. It does. The question is, rather, whether or not America is to enter a new and distressing phase of history where men no longer pursue happiness but buy it. I think what Vonnegut means by this is that since pursuing happiness is to a lot of people the meaning of life, what life would be without it.

One of the reasons I think perfect happiness is unachievable is in its name. In almost every single way imaginable, perfection cannot be fully attained. There is always some way to improve. You could make a more accurate measurement, run a lap faster, buy a better phone or gadget and you could still do better. As in Nathaniel Hawthornes, The Birthmark he writes, The momentary circumstance was too strong for him; he failed to look beyond the shadowy scope of time, and, living once for all in eternity, to find the perfect future in the present. What I think Hawthornes meant by this was that attempted to achieve full perfection, when he had what was already very near perfection, and paid the price for it.