The Pursuit of Happiness is Just a Delusion

It is an elusive feeling that most people want. Many believe that once they find it, they’ll be content. But this isn’t true. Happiness is just a feeling people get addicted to. It never really lasts.

The pursuit of happiness is a ridiculous phrase and an even more ridiculous life purpose. People who spend their lives pursuing happiness rarely find it. Happiness is a carrot on a stick that every up-and-coming brand links to whatever new product they want to sell you next.

For many people, it is uncomfortable to be told that the aim of living is not to be happy. This is hardly the staple of most irrational self-help books. ‘Happiness’ is a pointless goal. “Don’t compare yourself with other people; compare yourself with who you were yesterday”. “No one gets away with anything, ever, so take responsibility for your own life”. None of these transformative life principles, sadly, point in the direction of how one can become “happy”.

Maintaining sanity involves learning to enjoy suffering, which makes the pursuit of happiness a mere delusion.

I once heard it said by the late Napoleon Hill that “happiness is an opiate.” What does this mean? It means that happiness is addictive in the same way drugs like morphine, alcohol, nicotine or opium are. Many people pursue happiness for its own sake and sometimes can eventually become so dependent on it that they can’t live without it. This, within itself, is such a meaningless and empty way to live life.

In our instant gratification society, many people get addicted to happiness. Mass media constantly screams out that if we just buy this product, or do this course, or follow this guru, or subscribe to this membership website, we’ll finally be happy – as if by magic! And just like with drugs, when we’re not happy, we feel like something is wrong. It’s important to be aware of the potential dangers of becoming too reliant on happiness.

We live in a world of instant gratification and quick fixes. Most people would erase suffering from the Oxford dictionary. Today’s post-modern culture of comfort, happiness seeking, self-identification and instant gratification has no patience for suffering – most people want to drug it, escape it, divorce it, or do anything but live with it.

The term ‘instant gratification’ has now become a fixture in the modern lexicon. Examples of this are everywhere. Food advertising, entertainment, online shopping, and even online dating have been engineered to make it easy for people to get whatever they want, when they want it, without ever really needing to apply themselves.

The character cannot be developed with easiness, comfort, instant gratification or happiness. Only through the experience of trial, error and long-suffering that the human soul (mind, will and emotions) can be strengthened and matured. Unfortunately, fewer and fewer people today have the patience for these life-giving things.

In summary, over-reliance on instant gratification and happiness distracts people from more meaningful pursuits and leads to an array of insidious financial, social & health outcomes.

Sadly, all those who prioritise feeling ‘happy’ in life discover that happiness fleets and quick fixes just put off the kind of hard work that builds people, families, businesses and even communities up until tomorrow – which rarely ever comes.

Grab Kain’s #1 Amazon Bestseller Book

The main influencing factor that leaves countless people worldwide disempowered in their thinking & fruitless in their action-taking is a lack of personal responsibility. Responsibility proceeds all personal empowerment.