Life is all about happiness. Beautiful memories, wonderful people you have met, glorious days, delightful moments in nature. All of these is what makes our life bright and worth living. Some people might argue that life contains more dark moments than happiness, But I say, without that darkness, happiness can’t shine. Life would not be complete without some tough times.
In this round, the theme for literacy class is ‘Happiness’. To discover deeply about happiness, how can we achieve happiness, and what does it mean to us and other people, We’ve read and study a lot of poems & writing pieces from famous authors and watched a lot of films related to the topic.
As we discussed and study deeper into the topic, we have found some interesting facts about happiness related to money, social bonds, nature, and enjoyment.
Talking about Happiness, there are a lot of assumptions that most people tend to make about it, one of which is that money can buy happiness. According to a study titled: Waiting for Merlot: Anticipatory Consumption of Experiential and Material Purchases which they surveyed a lot of random people and the result is surprising. People got excited about both product purchases and experiential purchases. But they tended to feel more positive about experiential purchases, and their feelings about material purchases were more likely to be tinged with feelings of impatience. Which means experiential purchases can have a more positive impact on the person’s feeling and social connections.
There are many ways to achieve happiness according to the situation we are in. For instance, during the great depression, achieving happiness is unlikely and very hard due to the severe effects, it put on the citizens. In order to be happy, citizens can escape to another happy world through arts, culture, and music. They can watch movies that they can relate too or listen to entertaining kinds of music. All of these helped Americans to feel more positive besides the complex and frustrating situation in the country. This showcases that, even in the darkest of time, happiness can be found if only one remember how to turn on the light (1).
Many famous poets use poetry as a way to capture their happiness and to express their delightful moment. Many poems capture the emotional range of the poets and their philosophy of life. Some of the poems are: “Truth By Nikki Grimes”, ‘I Wandered Lonely As a Cloud By William Wordsworth’, ‘From Blossoms by Li-Young Lee’.
The philosophy I took out from ‘I Wandered Lonely As a Cloud’ and ‘From Blossoms’ is to spend more time with nature. We need to look deep to see the beauty, the meanings and the sensation that nature gives to us. We can just let ourselves enjoy the view, forget the darkness and welcome the beautiful feelings that nature offers to us. Be grateful for the moment that you have with nature and save it as a beautiful memory. Because life is short and one day, someone is going to take away these beautiful days from us, so make it meaningful and value every moment you know that makes you happy. Hold onto every beautiful memory as life goes on.
(1): A quote from Albus Dumbledore, Character from Harry Potter Series written by J.K Rowling