The Pursuit of Happiness

Happiness. It’s what everyone wants. While people might gives answers like fame, money, love, when you ask them what they want, what they’re really saying is “I want to be happy.” Think about it. People who want fame, money, love, etc. think these are the magical keys that will bring them happiness.

As Christians and Catholics, our general assumption is that doing God’s will, our mission in life, will bring us happiness. This is a lovely idea. We picture the saints as experts at doing God’s will. Sure, it wasn’t always early for them, but they did it. And they were HAPPY.

Perhaps this is a skewed assumption. Take St. Elizabeth of Hungary, for example. She married Louis of Thuringia and had a love- and faith-filled marriage. However, Louis died in the Crusades not long after. They had three children, one of whom died as a young child. Elizabeth certainly had her share of heartache. It would be unreasonable to think that she did not suffer from pain and loss every day of her life.

That is not to say that St. Elizabeth did not find contentment, fulfillment, and joy in obeying God. But perhaps the ‘issue’ is with the idea of happiness itself.

I believe that many people, including myself, associate happiness with how you feel when you’re hanging out with friends, for example. You’re laughing, joking around, and just feeling really good, key word being ‘feeling’. We associate happiness with how we feel.

That’s where we mess up. Happiness is, or should I say, can be, an emotion, just like sadness, joy, or anger. I think of happiness as a combination of joy and contentment. And who doesn’t want to feel like that? ALL THE TIME?

But seriously, we are human beings. We have these things called emotions that vary GREATLY and FREQUENTLY throughout our lives. That’s just life. Isn’t it somewhat unreasonable to expect to experience just one emotion for the rest of your life, regardless of what happens?

Maybe true happiness is less of a reaction, and more of a decision, less of a feeling and more of a knowing; a knowledge that we know what this life is all about and what we need to do in order to be eternally happy.