Quotes About Happiness

As the philosopher John Stuart Mill wrote, "It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool, or the pig, are a different opinion, it is because they know only their own side of the question.

Despite the third word of the title, this is not an instruction manual that will tell you anything useful about how to be happy. Those books are located in the self-help section two aisles over, and once you've bought one, done everything it says to do, and found yourself miserable anyway, you can always come back here to understand why.

The key to happiness, fulfilment and enlightenment, the ex-professor argued, was to stop thinking so much about the future.

We treat our future selves as though they were our children, spending most of the hours of most of our days constructing tomorrows that we hope will make them happy.

Similarly, the cocaine experience is not the kitten-fur experience, which is not the promotion experience, but all are forms of feeling that occupy different points on a scale of happiness.

The key to happiness, fulfillment, and enlightenment, the ex-professor argued, was to stop thinking so much about the future.

Who thus define it, say they more or less / Than this, that happiness is happiness?

Stuart Mill wrote, 'It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool, or the pig, are of a different opinion, it is because they only know their own side of the question.

It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool, or the pig, are a different opinion, it is because they only know their own side of the question."14

All men seek happiness. This is without exception. Whatever different means they employ, they all tend to this end. The cause of some going to war, and of others avoiding it, is the same desire in both, attended with different views. The will never takes the least step but to this object. This is the motive of every action of every man, even of those who hang themselves.12 Feeling

The fact that we often judge the pleasure of an experience by its ending can cause us to make some curious choices.

Impact is rewarding. Mattering makes us happy.

If someone offered you a pill that would make you permanently happy, you would be well advised to run fast and run far. Emotion is a compass that tells us what to do, and a compass that perpetually stuck on north is worthless.

We are happy when we have family, we are happy when we have friends and almost all the other things we think make us happy are actually just ways of getting more family and friends.

People want to be happy, and all the other things they want are typically meant to be a means to that end.

Economies thrive when individuals strive, but because individuals will only strive for their own happiness, it is essential that they mistakenly believe that producing and consuming are routes to personal well-being.

The belief-transmission network of which we are a part cannot operate without a continuously replenished supply of people to do the transmitting, thus the belief that children are a source of happiness becomes a part of our cultural wisdom simply because the opposite belief unravels the fabric of any society that holds it.

Real security only comes when we are comfortable with who we are, real happiness is a byproduct of a life well lived.

This is what almost all parents want for their children: a lifetime of happiness and an easy passage.

A genuine smile involves two facial muscles: (1) the zygomatic major muscle, which stretches from the cheekbone and lifts the corners of the mouth; and (2) the outer part of the obicularis oculi muscle, which orbits the eye, and is involved in "pulling down the eyebrows and the skin below the eyebrows, pulling up the skin below the eye, and raising the cheeks."7 Artificial smiles involve only the zygomatic major.

The best endings don't leave us happy. Instead, they produce something richer—a rush of unexpected insight, a fleeting moment of transcendence, the possibility that by discarding what we wanted we've gotten what we need.

Happiness is love. Full stop.

The ability to move others to exchange what they have for what we have is crucial to our survival and our happiness. It has helped our species evolve, lifted our living standards, and enhanced our daily lives. The capacity to sell isn't some unnatural adaptation to the merciless world of commerce. It is part of who we are. As you're about to see, if I've moved you to turn the page, selling is fundamentally human.

Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience BY MIHALY CSIKSZENTMIHALYI