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What is Happiness?

            What is happiness? Can happiness truly be defined? The dictionary tells us that it is the state of being happy. But that doesn't tell us much. Happiness is different to every individual on this planet. Different things makes different people happy so the dictionary is forced to be vague. Happiness is just an emotion, therefore, not tangible; but most things that make us happy are and some are not. Happiness is not all about just being happy. It is also the lack of fear and sadness in the world. The feeling you get when you hear that your friend diagnosed with clinical depression had a great day. Or the girl you see crying every day smile for once. .
             We were raised on the saying, "money can't buy you happiness," but for some people it can. Like the homeless man you see sleeping on the side of the road. Give him five dollars for a meal at McDonald's and you will see the glimmer of happiness in his eyes. It could be his first meal he had eaten in weeks. But try and give the same five dollars to someone else who doesn't need it and they might look at you with a confused face and say, "thanks?" One of the not so tangible feelings that makes you happy is love. Happiness is being held in the arms of your significant other. The feeling of security that they will always be there when you need them. Happiness is the butterflies you get when you kiss. Happiness is even getting into a fight with one another and making up immediately after.
             Another form of love in happiness comes from parents. Most parents find happiness in being able to provide for their children. Being able to give their child not only what they need but also what they want. Happiness for them is being able to provide a roof over their head and food on the table. Having just enough money to pay the bills and get some delicious sweets for dessert. Happiness is being able to send your kid to college and watch them get an education for their future career.


Essays Related to What is Happiness?

1. My Perception of Happiness

... there are endless things that can make a person happy--a lot of things that can make a person smile, a lot of things that can lighten up a person's day. What makes me be in the state of happiness? The simpler things make me the happiest. They are the most beautiful moments I have experienced. A simple smile from a stranger could make my day. If you would give ... that I am needed. Maybe because when I am being missed, I must have probably done something good for them. I like it when people do not want to leave me, as if there is something holding them back. I just love it when somebody ...

  • Word Count: 515
  • Approx Pages: 2
  • Grade Level: High School

2. Happiness

... . Being only 10 or so I proudly replied "happiness."" My dad smiled and thought for a few minutes. He said, "What about a man who finds happiness in killing someone?- It was in that moment that I realized that everyone finds happiness in different places. For instance, I base most of my happiness on family. By family, I do not mean ... and have enough money to share special moments with them, then I am happy with my life. At the end of the day, it does not matter to me what I have accomplished if I cannot share it with the people that I love. In college, this tends to be tricky because I ...

  • Word Count: 343
  • Approx Pages: 1
  • Grade Level: High School

3. Personal Happiness

... Ethan Frome, Madame Bovary, and The Bet, this idea will be shown. One great example of an individual searching for happiness in his life is in the story of Ethan Frome. Ethan is the type of person who needs companionship and direct love to be happy. Even though companionship makes him feel secure, ... in this partnership he desperately needs a strong base backed by interaction with the one he loves. At a young age Ethan found what he thought was a woman ... in her life. Aside from Ethan, Emma did not practice morals and she did not pay attention to her con- science. She decided to find ...

  • Word Count: 653
  • Approx Pages: 3
  • Grade Level: High School

4. Eudaimonia and Happiness

... often thought of as synonyms, but this is a clear and common misconception. Happiness only makes up a piece of eudaimonia. Only after a life of happiness will one achieve a state of eudaimonia, or the ultimate good, which is only determined after death. Eudaimonia is also often compared to hedonism, but, again, this is a misunderstanding. Hedonism is self centered, focusing on the the attainment of brief satisfaction through material and ... find that my passion laid in the hands of others. I always invested myself in others and holding the desire to help it just took me a while to real...

  • Word Count: 763
  • Approx Pages: 3

5. The Search for Happiness in Nature

... poets took part in the Romantic Movement, the two being William Wordsworth, and Samuel Coleridge. These two poets essentially set precedence to what Romantic prose and poetry should entail. In the Preface to the Lyrical Ballads, Wordsworth describes poetry as "the spontaneous overflow of powerful ... holds for him while Coleridge uses description to relate his relationship with nature. In the poems "Tintern Abbey," and "Frost at Midnight," happiness is derived from the beauty of nature and the influence that beauty has on the speakers in the poems. Reading "Tintern Abbey," the speakers...

  • Word Count: 683
  • Approx Pages: 3

6. The Surprising Science of Happiness

... we have to be careful not to fall into impact bias and make it seem worse or greater then it truly is. Our impact bias can be used to crate synthetic happiness. Synthetic happiness which allows us to accept and be happy with the things we can not change. Sir Thomas Browne states " ... I am more invulnerable than Achilles; fortune hath not one place to hit me" (Gilbert). Browne obviously is a master of his frontal lobe and we are all capable of this level of happiness because we all have the same psychological immunity. As long as we know how to handle our frontal lobe ... we can are ...

  • Word Count: 553
  • Approx Pages: 2
  • Has Bibliography
  • Grade Level: High School

7. True Happiness: Does it exist?

... lives as if nothing was wrong. Eventually they found out what had happened, and the contentment of everyday life they had by masking their fears disappeared. This is a prime example of how society, as a whole, deals with their fears on a universal level. Another emotion that plays a large part in society's pursuit of true happiness is hope. Hope that someday, somewhere we could all eventually ... reside on their minds every day. These things can, however, provide for some brief satisfaction, they do not provide true contentment with one's self. The only way to truly experience happiness...

  • Word Count: 1042
  • Approx Pages: 4

8. Oscar & Lucinda: A Hunt For Eternal Happiness

... (Armstrong; Evelyn). Oscar & Lucinda tell its viewers that if there is something in life that someone believes with all their heart and soul will give them eternal happiness they must earn it, however, it would not come easy. Everyone does not know what in life will give them eternal happiness, nonetheless, when they stumble on it, not only will they know, ... but also it makes victory sweeter. Oscar sacrificed the love of his father, so that he would find eternal happiness with God. Everyone should be willing to make sacrifices for eternal happiness. The degree of sacrifice is determine...

  • Word Count: 622
  • Approx Pages: 2
  • Has Bibliography
  • Grade Level: High School

9. What We Talk About When We Talk About Love

... About When We Talk About Love," the characters have a conversation about love. Yet throughout their dialogue, they never come to an understanding of what it really means to love(Carver). Terri insists she knows love by telling stories of her ex husband Ed, who used to beat her. Mel ... seems at one point seems to be on the right track with a story of an old couple but gets lost and never really connects anything up with what love is. Even on the subject day to night, they never really came up with a determination of love. The Narrator and his wife Laura seem to know the ... affection an...

  • Word Count: 472
  • Approx Pages: 2
  • Grade Level: High School

10. Wilson's Fences (is The Recurring Theme Dependant On Racism)

... oppression. This theme is demonstrated in the conversation between the characters Troy and Cory when they are discussing the possibility of purchasing a television. Troy says, "Two hundred and sixty-four dollars . . . cash money. While you thinking about a TV, I got to be thinking about the roof . . . and whatever else go wrong here. Now if you had two hundred dollars, what would you do ... . . . fix the roof or buy a TV."(Wilson 1764) Cory suggests the option of buying a TV and somehow being able to fix the roof, "I"d buy a TV. Then when the roof started to leak . . . when it needed fi...

  • Word Count: 1319
  • Approx Pages: 5
  • Has Bibliography

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