Hecht
insists the phrase "It turns out that…" is a generally inappropriate,
that we are simply in another era of “deeply integrated nonsense”—a
disenchanted world. I agree, but for different
reasons altogether. For me, the phrase
seems to imply a disconnect from participation, or an off-hand comment from the
stands rather than the arena of life—as if one is standing at the Heraclitian
river waiting to step in as soon as it settles into something more permanent.
I
stumble upon an interesting line in Book I of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics this week. “And Just as Olympic prizes are not
for the finest and strongest, but for the contestants—since it is only these
who win—the same is true in life: among the fine and good people, only those
who act correctly win the prize” (1009a).
In other words (to use a baseball metaphor for extra bonus points), you
have to swing the bat. Hecht suggests we should start by “working to shake off
the myth of knowing, and demand evidence when someone claims to (pp. 320, 321).
For
many people in America—a land flowing with milk and honey—the wolves are constantly
at the door. For some, their minds are
chained in darkness and superstition, fearful of the dim shadows cast on the
walls by charlatans.
But
Hecht offers a way for everyone to seek happiness: if it’s broke—fix it. Her idea is “not to abandon the search for
happiness but to be suspicious of the same old ways of thinking about it” (p.
314).
That
seems like pretty good advice.
Upon
reflection, if there are hellhounds on your trail, take Robert Johnson’s advice
too, and keep your little sweet rider by your side—and don't worry how it might turn out.
"Got to keep movin'..." - that's my happiness myth, exactly!
ReplyDeleteI love the Aristotle quote, and I love ("it turns out") the soundtrack of our course. It'd make a great mix tape, HAP 101's Greatest Hits.
and so we've come to the end of another happiness book. i really enjoyed this book and will keep it for my collection (unlike the buddha book. lol)
ReplyDeleteprofessor phil is right, hecht does like to make list. in the conclusion she has lists of what you need to do to be happy, but i think to each his/her own. you can't find happiness in a list prepared by someone else, but maybe you can use it as a guideline for living if you must.
hecht also mentions her reason why we can not find true happiness is because the three kinds of happiness she talks about conflict with themselves. if you work real hard then you are not relaxing. take out the 40 hour work week situation and according to her we should strive make choices in our life that make us happy in all three fields.
her happiness categories are:
good-day happiness
euphoria
a happy life
she has listed under each what she would include, but these are really up for changes for everyone to make it fit them personally, but you get an idea of how she separates them.
since we are not having a third test and this is the conclusion, i feel a factual question is not necessary but if so see above and list hecht's happiness categories.
discussion question: what would you add or subtract from her lists?
The difficulty with suspicion of old ways of thinking about happiness lies in that one must first separate those old ways of thinking about happiness from happiness itself. The old ways of thinking (if one has lived them) are involved of the meaning of happiness; for some, to regard them with suspicion is nearly regarding happiness with suspicion. If you only understand greater happiness as a state of wealth, how would you understand a person who talks about happiness as though it were not? Would they not seem merely mistaken or silly, at least in some cases?
ReplyDeleteAt first, people with a different POV do often seem silly and mistaken. Sometimes at last, too. But I've found that the willing suspension of the impulse to discard alternative views as silly on their face, prima facie, often yields surprise turns of mind that are gratifying and mind-expanding. I urge you to try and break free of the temptation to think that our different beliefs and attitudes place us in different worlds, or different conceptual schemes, or something, such that we cannot understand or appreciate our differences. Diff'rent strokes, you know?
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