Quantification of happiness
August 19th, 2023
Of course, it is impossible to quantify happiness and its emotional impact on the being of a particular person. Happiness should be the lofty end goal of our actions, something to strive for and more than fulfilling our basic needs, and more upholding our basic rights, and more than just a simple lack of pain and unhappiness and strife. And I cannot judge the needs of anybody that is not me for a specific way to look and dream about happiness — I shouldn't begrudge anybody to think about happiness in terms of having secure and reliable and repetitive sources of food and shelter.
But I can judge myself on my pursuit of happiness and I am not happy with the way it has been going. And I don't feel particularly happy myself in general. Of course, I know the main sources that I need for my happiness — with a lot of variables, the constant idea is the same — self-reliability, self-improvement, the pursuit of truth in myself, and limitation of my needs and limitation of all stimuli in my life. Simple enough, and for several years I worked diligently on that with more than satisfactory results. But now, I feel stuck at the same point I have been for months (or even longer). The main ideas are well-defined and well-set, so even a temporary step back is well, temporary.
But if the pursuit of the ultimate is a long-term goal, then it seems I forgot about short-term ideas and things that used to bring me contentment and pleasure and put me in the right mood and on the right path for the general feeling of happiness. I am stuck in a rut. And I do have some excuses — a new job that requires a lot of my mental energy to absorb all the new knowledge, another “highest on record” summer in a row with debilitating heat, but I think I forgot about a promise I made to myself — I don’t want excuses, I am better than excuses, I used up my excuses in my previous lifetime. Now — when I see a problem, I will find a way to fix it, and then make sure it doesn't happen in the future. No excuses.
