Happiness Is
The NYTimes recently published an article that one of my favorite topics: what makes people happy? Certainly not always what people might think would make them happy or what they think should make them happy.
Today's article in question is: What Makes People Happy? TV, Study Says . The headline result is unsurprising to me. Call a friend during his or her favorite TV show just to chat... But don't call me during mine. ;-) Everyday life on sitcoms can be very smart and funny business when everybody talks like some alumnus of the Harvard Lampoon has carefully crafted the lines. That probably because some alumnus did.
The more surprising result is that raising children is more fun than housework, but not much. I've never done such raising myself, but have heard it many times proclaimed as the joy of many a parent's existence. The paradox just highlights that the method of measuring happiness that was the topic of the article is just one particular metric. It measures what makes people enjoy the moment.
However, most of us look back with great satisfaction at swaths of time and what was accomplished even though some, much, or even most of the time, the journey was less than fun. Sometimes the harder the trials, the sweeter the memory of overcoming them. I know that a lot of schoolwork can fall into that category, especially when the hard work leads to success. I would guess that a lot about childrearing does too.
This being such an interesting topic to me, it's now a proud category on this blog.