Remaining Happy During Challenging Times
What I read: World Happiness Report 2021 by various authors (each chapter is authored by different people). Downloadable PDF here. Appendices and data here. Published March 20, 2021.
One of the topics I find massively interesting is happiness. What adds to our happiness? What detracts? What have philosophers and thought leaders said about happiness? What does data say about happiness? What can we individually and collectively do to encourage happiness within our immediate circles and society as a whole?
So, every year for the past nine years I have perused the annual World Happiness Report. You can access the current and past reports and read their FAQ if you want to dive into more details.
Admittedly I did not read this year’s Report in its entirety, but I did read or deeply scan the whole thing. I try to sync what I learn from these reports with what I have otherwise learned about happiness. I find this personal exercise useful because if we are not continually honing our approach to encouraging happiness, then we are not focused on living our best possible lives. We should elevate our happiness, standalone as individuals and collectively as a society, to the best of our abilities. It’s always an ongoing, iterative process. Hopefully.
What follows is a smattering of my thoughts as I read the Report. It’s by no means a guide to happiness, success, purpose, or whatever, but perhaps it will be food for further thought. Here we go.
COVID-19 is understandably the main thematic element for this year’s Report because it was the proverbial elephant in the room from which there was no escape. Studying happiness seen through the lens of a worldwide shared emergency provides yet one more vantage point from which we can examine those things that contribute to happiness.
No one on Earth has escaped the influence of the virus. Daily life. Work. Economics. Mental health. All have been affected by the ravages of the pandemic. As I write this, some parts of the world are exiting the worst of the disaster, while others such as India are in the throes of devastation.
It seems odd to talk about happiness when so many are suffering. But we must find slivers of hope amid despair. The sun does rise. We must see a happier future for ourselves and humanity even if it’s mostly on the distant horizon for some. Plus, as people have documented while experiencing some the world’s worst catastrophes and demonstrations of evil, grabbing onto whatever happiness we can in whatever situation we find ourselves has value.
One of the conundrums of happiness is that on an individual level we can’t really pursue it as if it’s a series of logical steps leading to a natural conclusion. It’s more a pleasant side effect than a planned for outcome.
And closely tied to our level of happiness is our sense of purpose in the world and what success we experience. They are all inextricably linked. While the Report discusses happiness specifically, I think much of what forms the basis for that happiness is a sense of purpose and related success. Sometime a purpose is simply helping others get by during tough times or proving to ourselves we’re made of stronger mettle than we might have imagined. As Viktor Frankl, a man who endured so much horror, said,
Don’t aim at success. The more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side effect of one’s personal dedication to a cause greater.
The greater cause for most of us these past many months was to simply get by and help those in our sphere get by as best they can.
Spiritual leaders, psychology researchers, and philosophers seem to agree that you can’t pursue success or happiness as if it’s a target at which you can aim your quiver of task or mindset arrows. The end results that are success and happiness are outside your control. Happiness, and its cousins of success and purpose, come about because of one’s daily actions that are then influenced by whatever environment or situation you find yourself in at the time. Some of it is also sheer luck if we get honest.
Quick-fix self-help pundits and wannabe gurus will most certainly dole out a plethora of feel-good advice on how to achieve happiness and success. They might clobber you over the head with a strategy to arrive at your purpose. With rare exception one should eye such advice with suspicion, or at least caution. Success and happiness are the manifestations of a life well lived, values well developed, and character continually improved. Happiness is not a foregone concluding equation of this plus that inevitably equaling happiness.
Still, it’s worth the exercise to dissect and analyze what makes people happy as a whole in order to determine what might work in our own lives. At least I think so.
When reading the Report, one can’t avoid the reality that situational factors are influenced by culture, politics, and geography. Someone placed by fate in a country that’s struggling with extreme poverty or political upheaval must navigate the building blocks of happiness quite differently than someone living in a wealthier country with an abundance of social safety nets. The foundations of happiness are not always a one-size-fits-all proposition.
As a side note, I agree with the esteemed philosopher Aristotle who believed that pleasure was the guidepost to happiness. By seeking out pleasure, and not simply superficial replacements for true pleasure, one can fine tune the path toward real and meaningful happiness.
Renowned classicist Edith Hall put it this was in her superb book, Aristotle’s Way: How Ancient Wisdom Can Change Your Life, when describing Aristotle’s contention that pleasure leads the way to happiness, albeit when in a moderated, cautious manner.
Acknowledging what gives you greatest pleasure, and then asking how it may prevent you from rationally pursuing happiness, can help you negotiate the moderate path in being a good person and thus a happy one.
Whether assessing what makes people happy on a micro or macro level, it is life’s true pleasures that carve out the path for the journey toward happiness.
Okay, that was a bit of a sidetrack. Back to the Report itself.
Reading the entire Report might be overwhelming, but luckily the report provides a superb summary of its contents and conclusions in the first chapter.
It would be impossible to encapsulate all the main points in the Report, but here are some things that resonated with me and how I interpreted them.
Those countries that have in recent years been at the top of overall happiness rankings remain so even during the pandemic. This signals to me that despite the horrific health emergency challenges under which many of us have lived, the underpinnings of people’s general level of happiness can sustain.
Those countries that have created an environment and culture in which happiness can thrive still do so even during tough times. I find this heartening. It means these countries are on to something from which other countries can learn and that we can endure a great deal if the foundation upon which our happiness resides is firm. It’s difficult to shake the contentment such happiness brings.
Countries that consistently reside at the top of the happiness rankings such as Finland, Denmark, Sweden, and Germany share a political ethos that believes that the common good also benefits everyone individually. Health care. Education. Unemployment support. These types of overarching social programs and policies create environments in which everyone has a better chance of thriving and thus being happier.
Lockdowns understandably lessened overall happiness, at least temporarily. This points to the notion that most of us are happiest when we can engage socially with friends, coworkers, and community, or when we otherwise feel some form of connection.
People whose feeling of connectedness fell had decreased happiness, as did people whose sense of loneliness increased and whose social support was reduced.
Many positive features of a person's life helped to protect their sense of connectedness. These included gratitude, grit, prior connections, volunteering, taking exercise, and having a pet. It also helped to have activities that provided 'flow.'
Social trust in our fellow human beings accounts for more of people’s happiness than things like income, employment, or risks to health. If people can rely on solidly formed social connections and an atmosphere that supports the best life for all versus greedy attempts to thwart the good life for some, happiness will sustain or spring back quickly. We need people and we need institutions and governments that we trust have our best interests at the forefront.
A sense of “we’re all in this together” tends to create better outcomes for everyone. In countries where health safety protocols were most readily and pervasively adopted the level of happiness remained higher.
When comparing the success of addressing COVID-19 in Asia-Pacific countries compared to North Atlantic countries, it’s clear that while the more individualistic and personal liberty focused populations might offer certain components of a happier life, the commonly shared values of other countries created more success in weathering the pandemic that therefore eventually led to happier people overall.
Our country of the United States and others have sadly shown a decreasing respect for science, fact, and truth. This had severe repercussions. I contend that the more informed and educated we are as people and a society, the happier we will be because real happiness can’t be created or maintained on a bed of lies or misinformation. Fake news fosters fake happiness.
As much of the world begins to exit the worst of the pandemic, I hope what lessons can be learned from its horrors can benefit us all to live happier and more purposeful lives. Perhaps no words better express what COVID-19 has taught us than the title of Hillary Clinton’s book and an adage that I now often repeat, “It takes a village.”
Let’s make the world a better village in which we all live by helping to develop an atmosphere in which we can all be as happy as we possibly can.