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How do you define success and happiness?

#41
Syne Offline
Happiness is like self-esteem. You don't get the former by getting/being given everything you want, and you don't get the latter by being told you're great. You only get fleeting and pale comparisons of each. Just ask rich people after several divorces, depression, substance abuse, and therapy or those unfortunate singing contestants whose families never told them the truth. Like happiness, self-esteem is not something you can make a goal. It comes as a side-effect of proving your own competence to yourself through other goals.
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#42
Secular Sanity Offline
It’s no a secret that I’m a big Nietzsche fan and like him, I see suffering as a necessary feature of life. I’m sure that there are those that have been lucky enough to escape most forms of hardship but in retrospect, overcoming them has made me more grateful. I see it as something that forces you to be more resilient, grow, and make positive changes.

I think here in the states our ideas and concepts of happiness and success are quite warped. I know someone who would be considered successful by most standards. She’s revered in the public domain, but her happiness is chained to public opinion, and fluctuates accordingly.

There’s a part in the Gospels of Thomas where his disciples say to him, "When will the kingdom come?" He answers, "It will not come by watching for it. It will not be said, 'Look, here!' or 'Look, there!' Rather, the Father's kingdom is spread out upon the earth, and people don't see it." Humans are always striving for happiness but it is often displaced to some other location or time. 

There are lots of elements that are essential for life, but a life well lived requires only three—food, family, and rarest of them all—true friends.

Goethe said that the happiest man realizes that his happiness is through others and this allows him to rejoice in their enjoyment as if it were his own.
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#43
Leigha Offline
(Nov 5, 2018 10:53 PM)Secular Sanity Wrote: It’s no a secret that I’m a big Nietzsche fan and like him, I see suffering as a necessary feature of life. I’m sure that there are those that have been lucky enough to escape most forms of hardship but in retrospect, overcoming them has made me more grateful. I see it as something that forces you to be more resilient, grow, and make positive changes.

I think here in the states our ideas and concepts of happiness and success are quite warped. I know someone who would be considered successful by most standards. She’s revered in the public domain, but her happiness is chained to public opinion, and fluctuates accordingly.

There’s a part in the Gospels of Thomas where his disciples say to him, "When will the kingdom come?" He answers, "It will not come by watching for it. It will not be said, 'Look, here!' or 'Look, there!' Rather, the Father's kingdom is spread out upon the earth, and people don't see it." Humans are always striving for happiness but it is often displaced to some other location or time. 

There are lots of elements that are essential for life, but a life well lived requires only three—food, family, and rarest of them all—true friends.

Goethe said that the happiest man realizes that his happiness is through others and this allows him to rejoice in their enjoyment as if it were his own.

I really like this perspective of yours, SS. I think that we often think that wants are needs, and it's not hard to do in the type of culture we live in. It's in striving for the wrong things as well, that we can find much discord and in turn, find ourselves ''unhappy.''
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