Shelter Island Reporter column: What makes happiness?

This is the time of year when happiness seems to be everywhere, at school events, holiday gatherings, Christmas tree and Hanukkah lightings, and in advertising promoting miles of smiles to consumers. But considering happiness as not just a fleeting emotion, but what it truly is and what it means, is worth a longer and closer look.

Is it money? Is it fame? Being a scratch golfer? How about a size 4 dress? People who long for these things often believe they will magically bring them happiness.

Happiness has now been studied by many disciplines, including neuroscience, psychology, economics, and philosophy. And much of that literature is instructive.

Dan Gilbert, a Harvard “happiness expert,” was one of the early researchers who studied the subject as a neuroscience. His findings are that, in general, the obvious is true: healthy people are happier than sick people; those in good relationships are happier than those who are not.

These long-term, lifelong circumstances can be significant indicators of a person’s well-being.

Here is what’s interesting: short-term desires like getting the ideal job, getting into the best college, or winning an election bring what Gilbert calls “natural happiness” — or short-term happiness. But they themselves do not intrinsically bring long-term happiness.

In fact, the duration of joy can be remarkably brief. Gilbert has also created the term “synthetic happiness” to describe what the normal brain does when things do not go our way. Basically, this is our brain’s psychological immune system, fighting off despair and moving us into positive action and thoughts, maybe not immediately, but in the long-term.

For example, think of how often you’ve heard someone say, “Whoever thought that terrible event could have been the best thing that ever happened to me?”  This is not to suggest that bad things are better than good things, only that neither are determinative of long-term happiness.

The late Victor Frankl, a psychologist and Holocaust survivor, devoted his life to the search for meaning. For him, joy was not an end in itself, but a byproduct of finding one’s personal meaning. He believed that a life without purpose leads to depression and despair.

Frankl was already a psychologist when he was sent to the Terezin concentration camp in what was then Czechoslovakia. His basic theories were developed before then, but he refined his thinking as he observed himself and others while in captivity. His seminal book, “Man’s Search for Meaning,” was written in 1946.

The field of psychology was traditionally known for curing mental and emotional disorders. Psychologist Martin Seligman was instrumental in popularizing the concepts of positive psychology. In 2004 he stated, “In our rush to do something about people in trouble, in our rush to do something about repairing damage, it never occurred to us to develop interventions to make people happier — positive interventions.” 

Therefore, in an attempt to answer the question of what makes happiness, he developed the ”PERMA theory of well-being.” PERMA is an acronym for 1) Positive emotion, 2) Engagement, 3) Relationships, 4) Meaning, and 5) Accomplishments. 

1) Positive emotions may vary. They may include hope, interest, joy, love, compassion, pride, and gratitude, or all of these.

2) Engagement refers to spending time doing things one loves. If that is work, fine, but if not, do something you love in your spare time.

3) Establishing relationships means deepening friendships and feeling valued and supported while doing the same for others.

4) Again, we see the word “meaning.” Seligman recognizes that this is different for everyone whether it be a job, a social or political cause, a creative endeavor, or a spiritual belief. 

5) Finally, accomplishments refer to the motivation to work toward something that matters and the perseverance that accompanies it — maybe even that low golf handicap or weight loss.

What brings economic happiness? Morgan Housal, a bestselling author on the psychology of money, talks about what money can, and cannot, do. It can bring a comfortable lifestyle and certainly it is better to live without the stress of poverty and debt.  But economic happiness is largely based on expectations.

A person’s level of economic happiness is all about the gap between his expectations and his circumstances. If a person has $10 million and it bothers him that his neighbor has $20 million, he will never be happy.

Housal makes the point that in the 1950’s, most middle-class Americans had a small house with one car and one television. They didn’t feel poor.

In 2023, the expectations of what makes a good life are vastly different. And this is now fueled by social media’s portrayal of the rich and famous. We see the wealthiest people constantly, and are very aware of the difference between us. Those who are bothered by that will never be happy. Those who don’t care have a much better chance.

David Steindl-Rast, a 97-year-old Benedictine monk and psychologist known for facilitating interfaith dialogue, says it all comes down to gratefulness. He says that people who live gratefully experience each moment as an opportunity.

And even if the opportunity is lost, there will always be another one. Opportunities allow us to rise to the occasion, stand up, and make something out of life. 

Grateful people do not operate out of a sense of deprivation, but out of a feeling of fullness. They tend to see the world in a more positive light. The best news about gratitude is that while it comes easier for some people, for others it can be learned.

Studies show that the brain can be rewired to deal with the positive aspects of life. Over the last decade “gratitude journals” have become an easy and popular way to make this happen. 

Steindl-Rast also says that life’s greatest lesson is taught to kindergarten children crossing the street — stop, look, and then go. I suppose he’s saying that we all need to stop, maybe watch the sunset over Crescent Beach, or watch our children and grandchildren discovering something wonderful, and then savor it. 

So, the answer may be simpler than we think. We must open our eyes and our hearts and feel gratitude for what we have. And when the world does not go our way, we can find the opportunity to change it.

Nancy Green is a retired social worker and a member of the Shelter Island Health and Wellness Alliance.