Daniel Haybron's Happiness And Its Discontents

The reason we are not happy is because of ourselves. It sounds a little intense but it makes sense at the same time. Happiness comes to those who understand that to gain it we must strive to live a happy life. To live a happy life, we have to fulfill our primal needs because without those we can’t focus on our inner selves. Then we have to understand that we aren’t always going to be happy if we don’t learn how to properly react towards our happy and unhappiness. Finally, we have to reach that emotional self-fulfillment to be entirely happy. In the end it isn’t material things or pleasure that push us to happiness but ourselves and our fulfillment. In Daniel Haybron’s Happiness and Its Discontents he jumps into the meaning of what happiness …show more content…
These sources of happiness are: security; good outlook; control over our lives; good relationships; and meaningful activities. Without security, we would be too scared to go out and experience the things that help bring happiness or too scared to acquire another of our basic needs. A good outlook because we can’t be sad and mopey like Eeyore all the time. Happiness comes to those who have a happy outlook. I think that control over our lives is one of the major things on the list. If we have no control, then we can’t really satisfy our other ends which becomes an endless cycle of unhappiness. I highly believe that meaningful relationships are a need for happiness. I believe that we all bounce off of each other’s vibes to create our own happy vibe. Lastly, we need activities that actually mean something to us. You can’t expect a mechanic to be happy doing an artist’s job, it just doesn’t work that way. Haybron states “If you are unhappy, there’s a good chance that it’s for want of something on this list” (Pg. 134). I think that these primal needs are the first step into emotionally becoming happy. This is because once we have these we can start to focus on our inner