week 1, all posts here for mrs.dunley

Post 1 week 1

Notes

12:28 video: the philosophical and spiritual views on happiness

• reflects what it preaches right away by giving weekly check ins that correlate with your happiness and keeping track of it which may be and example of how they want you to engage in your happiness
• many cultures as well as people have long had different depictions as to what creates a good or happy life, every single thing that a person experiences influences what they consider happy. All based off of perception.
• one of the oldest questions is how do I lead a meaningful life and cultivate the happiness of those around me?
• Confucius
• what does it mean to be happy? 2500 years ago he writes about J-E-N, and jen is about dignity and conveying your sense or reverence and humility towards others.
•  “brings good of others to completion and does not bring the bad in others to completion” this means that in a sense happiness has an outward orientation in the sense of it is related to enhancing the wellbeing of others 

• Buddhism
•  if you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion. 

✰Both Buddhism and Confucious had similar themes of giving others compassion for both your own and their betterment.

• life has a lot of suffering, one step towards happiness is accepting that 
• Taoism
•  happiness is often paradoxical, putting aside preconceptions of happiness to achieve genuine happiness

• Aristotle
•  Nicomachean ethics, how happiness is found is the end of life, the balance of virtuous life. 
• The principle of moderation - we really have to accept them (them meaning our emotions and passions)  all that they all have their place and functions and when cultivated the right way are healthy and can bring happiness. Moderation and acceptance

• hedonistic view of happiness such as what we see in places in europe like france, happiness is the sum of all the sensory pleasures and the absence of pain
• Enlightenment era philosophers
•  Utilitarianism - happiness is found in your actions that bring about the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people. Might not just be about your own personal pleasure
•  This philosophy is something that impacted our own declaration of independence written by thomas Jefferson. 

• Vague ideas from other places in the world-
• happiness from the freedom of desire, hindu
• Some people find it through yoga
• happiness can change based on where you are from

My response to the discussion question: “What does Happiness mean to you”

For me happiness is based off of my personal experiences and perception of life. It is not constant, and it is based off of satisfaction and joy. Happiness is created in my opinion by the acceptance of life as it is. Being able to take all of the highs and the lows. without the lows you cannot have the highs. I believe that it varies for every person but I believe we all feel the most joy when we are surrounded by it and helping others feel it. I believe happiness is not rooted in yourself but in the environment which one lives in. I do not know that I can define it. I feel that happiness can be a byproduct of a fulfilling life which is full of both ups and downs, but I do not believe that making happiness your main goal is healthy. Because then when you are sad you do not allow yourself to fully feel that emotion and let it pass through. I believe that to be truly happy you must not let others tell you what will make you happy. Because in the end when you find happiness you know it and that is an emotion that is indescribable. I feel that happiness in its most true and fulfilling form comes with feelings of bliss and relaxation, where the world does not stress you out at the moment because you are in control of those emotions and you have accepted the many aspects of life.

-Positive psychology and the study of it came much after we had thousands of studies on fear anger and anxiety.

-we had no systematic scientific studies of compassion. We knew a lot about what makes couples divorce but we didn’t know as much about what makes couples happy.

-What do We mean when we use the word happy/happiness?

Clarifying the Conceptual domain of happiness:

1. Well-being: “overall my life is going well.”
2. Traits: “I am an enthusiastic person/naturally happy.”
3. Emotions: “I feel reverence and gratitude.” 
4. Sensations: “This sun feels good on my skin”

-Ed Diener, Overall well-being/life satisfaction, and positive(vs negative) emotions. He thinks these two things are your subjective well being/happiness

Methods of studying happiness

-Observation and experience sampling of people

-cross sectional surveys of happy people

-longitudinal studies of what makes people happy

-experimental studies: Compare the effects of a variable versus control conditions 

Self-Report (ed dieners idea)

-How satisfied are you with your life, Satisfaction with life scale:

Measures how much people agree with statements like, “the conditions of my life are excellent”

-Scale of Positive and Negative Experience:

Measures self reported level os positive and negative feelings

Experience Sampling (matt killingsworth)

-”what are you doing” and “how happy are you feeling right now?”

Expressive behavior

Your happiness can be indicated through your body in things such as your facial muscles, posture, voice, ect. One example is the orbicularis oculi muscle that surrounds your eyes, as an indicator of your well-being and happiness, Particularly important in studying the well being of young children and infants

Happiness/wellbeing= the experience of joy, contentment, or positive well-being, combined with a sense that one’s life is good, meaningful, and worthwhile

Terms scientists use to measure happiness: Life satisfaction, positive affect( feeling of a positive emotion), subjective well being.

Roots of happiness

The concept of deserving to have happiness and the mindset that one should and will be happy is relatively recent and up until the late 17th century many thought happiness was a matter of luck. Now it has become a human right in wewstern civilization. In doing this many people have failed to remember that to be happy you can not be happy all the time and the pursuit of happiness can involve struggle and pain

Every Indo-European language going back to ancient greece, is a cognate to the world luck.

happiness was not something you could control back then.

philosopher Cicero’s claim that the happy man will be happy even on the torture wrack., the idea that happiness was seen as living a good life, not just a feeling.

 “Happiness is a life lived according to virtue,” Aristotle famously says

ancient/old ideas of happiness were not democratic and many believed very few people could be happy

In a Christian worldview, happiness is not something we can obtain in this life. 

Happiness Revolution

In 17th and 18th centuries people overthrew these old ideas,

 French Encyclopédie, the Bible of the European Enlightenment, declares in its article on happiness that everyone has a right to be happy, It is in this time that Thomas Jefferson declares the pursuit of happiness to be a self-evident truth.

“Happiness is a new idea in europe”

John Locke,
“The business of a man is to be happy” idea that we should enjoy our pleasures on earth, this is a liberating perspective which allowed many people for the first time in history basically to feel they had the chance to be happy, lead to the concept that inherently suffering is wrong.

Unnatural happiness

The idea of happiness as a given right gave a misconception that happiness was something tangible that you could catch or consume. The idea of happiness becomes something much smaller and about pleasure and rather than about being good, and having a well lived life.

With this new philosophy we forgot or invalidated some very important things from ancient concepts.

Maybe we need to refocus on non materialistic and more spiritual things

Difference between a happy and a meaningful life?

Five differences between a happy life and a meaningful one

1)Happy people satisfy their wants and needs, but that seems largely irrelevant to a meaningful life. 

2)Meaningfulness is derived from giving to other people; happiness comes from what they give to you

3)Happiness involves being focused on the present, whereas meaningfulness involves thinking more about the past, present, and future—and the relationship between 

4)Meaningful lives involve stress and challenges.

5)Self-expression is important to meaning but not happiness

What does happiness include?

Baumeister’s study, familial relationships—like parenting—tended to be tied to meaning more than happiness

 Lyubomirsky's study- Results showed that, in general, parents were happier and more satisfied with their lives than non-parents, and parents found both pleasure and meaning in childcare activities

Lyubomirsky feels that researchers who try to separate meaning and happiness may be on the wrong track, because meaning and happiness are inseparably intertwined

Steven Cole of the UCLA School of Medicine, and Barbara Fredrickson of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, found that people who reported more eudaimonic happiness had stronger immune system function than those who reported more hedonic happiness, suggesting that a life of meaning may be better for our health than a life seeking pleasure.

eudaimonic and hedonic well-being are surprisingly similar and aren’t as different as one might expect,” says Dunn.

Four Ways that Happiness Can Hurt You

1. Too much happiness can make you less creative—and less safe

Makes you less flexible to react to new challenges 

People in this heightened ‘happiness overdrive’ mode engage in riskier behaviors and tend to disregard threats, including excessive alcohol consumption, binge eating, sexual promiscuity, and drug use. Trying so hard to fuel the happiness

2. Happiness is not suited to every situation.

people in a happy mood performed worse than people in an angry mood when playing a competitive computer game.

individuals who experience happiness in inappropriate contexts were at greater risk for developing the emotional disorder of mania.

3. Not all types of happiness are good for you.

when we experience too much pride or pride without genuine merit, it can lead to negative social outcomes. Self-focused positivity can hinder us from connecting with others

4. Pursuing happiness may actually make you unhappy

suggests that the pursuit of happiness is also associated with serious mental health problems, such as depression and bipolar disorder.

Finding Healthy Happiness

1.it is important to experience happiness in the right amount.

2.happiness has a time and a place, and one must be mindful about the context or situation in which one experiences happiness

3.it is important to strike an emotional balance

4.to pursue and experience happiness for the right reasons

Is there happiness without pleasure?

Eudaimonic happiness- the happiness that comes from meaningful pursuits

Hedonic Happiness- happiness that comes from pleasure or goal fulfillment

My answer to the discussion question- 

Has any of the material you've encountered so far in this course challenged earlier beliefs, or made you think differently about happiness? Or, has it echoed or reinforced your own, existing views on happiness?

This course has helped me put into words thoughts I have had for a very long time. Previous to taking this class for an AP lang prompt I talked about how pursuing a materialistic or disingenuous happiness can be detrimental to ones mental health, and I did this based off of my own personal experience and also based off of a book which I read. This has been super cool to see explained through science.

Benefits of happiness-

1.Greater life expectancy, longevity

2.better physical health

3. Social benefits

3. Relationship benefits

4. make you more creative and innovative, higher quality work

5.make you more diplomatic

6 ways happiness is good for your health

1. Happiness protects your heart

-Happiness predicts lower heart rate and blood pressure

-heart rate variability is associated with risk for various diseases, however happier people who were tested for these diseases had healthier heart rate variabilities.

-study in canada asked people to rank their days 1-5 and in the long run with each increase in points for positive emotion their heart disease risk was 22 percent lower 

2. Happiness strengthens your immune system

-people exposed in a study to a common cold who were more positive were less likely to have developed a cold.

-immune system activity can go up and down with the feeling of happiness

3. Happiness combats stress

-stress is psychologically upsetting but it also causes biological changes in hormones and blood pressure

- happiest participants had 23 percent lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol than the least happy, and another indicator of stress—the level of a blood-clotting protein that increases after stress—was 12 times lower.

4. Happy people have fewer aches and pains

- People who reported the highest levels of positive emotion at the beginning actually became healthier over the course of the study, and ended up healthier than their unhappy counterparts

  -2005 study suggests that positive emotion also mitigates pain in the context of disease

5. Happiness combats disease and disability

-Happiness is associated with improvements in more severe, long-term conditions as well

-participants who reported being happy and satisfied with life most or all of the time were about 1.5 times less likely to have long-term health conditions (like chronic pain and serious vision problems) two years later

-the participants with more positive emotion ratings were less likely to be frail(personal connection, my papa is a very happy man and is 83 and not frail at all)

6. Happiness lengthens our lives

Here, happier people were 35 percent less likely to die over the course of about five years than their unhappier counterparts.

HAPPINESS ISN'T A MIRACLE WORKER THOUGH!!!

YOU WON'T NECESSARILY BE HAPPIER “WHEN” YOU FINALLY DO SOMETHING 

!make sure to do three good things! 

-positive emotions allow us to see the bigger picture, be more creative.

People given candy before tasks or who experience a positive interaction tend to be more creative or have more open minded approaches to things

.-positive emotions bring out the best in us,

Emotions impact our levels of cellular change

-increasing mindfulness and resilience

A better way to pursue happiness

The difference between effectively and ineffectively pursuing happiness may all be in how we go about it

-prioritizing positivity also having balance in life

-people who pursue happiness by seeking out pleasant experiences as part of their everyday lives are happier

-people who scored higher on the prioritizing positivity scale felt more positive emotions, fewer negative emotions, more life satisfaction, and fewer depressive symptoms than people who scored lower on that scale

How happy brains respond to negative things-

people with sunnier dispositions are better able to regulate their emotions than people with gloomier personalities

Amygdala- a small almond shaped brain region

Cunningham and colleagues found that negative images did provoke amygdala activity, as expected. The positive images did as well—but only when the participants were explicitly told to focus on them.

Humans have a negativity bias, a tendency to focus on threats. But this research suggests that people may be able to compensate for it by consciously trying to focus more on the positive

Happier people are better at adapting to the bad things in life.

Is it possible to change your happiness

50 percent of happiness levels are genetic

Hedonic adaptation-We get used to the happiness we have so it becomes cumulative and we want more

When we think about happiness as pleasure or always having our needs met or trying to feel pleasure over and over again when our needs are met, we’re bound to an endless pursuit.

We have a psychological immune system that helps us recover from things such as heart break quite quickly

-experiences make you happier than things

-emodiversity is linked to less depression

Terms of happiness definitions:

Affective forecasting - The process of making predictions about how you will feel in the future

Impact Bias - The tendency to overestimate how an event or experience in the future will affect our emotional well-being, for better or worse.

Set point theory - The theory that we each have a relatively stable level of happiness that is largely determined by our genes and personality

Hedonic adaptation (hedonic treadmill) - Our ability to adapt to changes in our life circumstances or sensory experiences

Prioritizing positivity - Deliberately organizing your day-to-day life so that it contains situations that naturally give rise to positive emotional experiences

Emodiversity - The variety and relative abundance of the emotions a person tends to experience

Response to can money buy happiness?

No, because money is a physical thing, not an emotional thing. as long as you are not below that $75,000 line money cannot do much to improve your life long term. It can only get you things that bring momentary joy. while money might help support passions or experiences that make you happy, in the end money is not what makes you happy.

Post 3-

Happiness is an emotion or feeling which directly impacts every single human in one way or another. However, there is a vast grey area for many people when it comes to defining or understanding the science of it. The word happiness is most commonly referred to, to describe positive emotions such as joy, contentment, or gratitude. However, there is a lot more to the word and the “emotion” than it leads on. The word and concept of happiness itself have significantly changed from how it was viewed in ancient societies. The idea of happiness started out being something that very few people experienced and was based purely on luck. This is why it is no shock that the word happiness was a cognate for luck in those times. In ancient times a happy life was one “according to virtue,” to quote Aristotle, or as philosopher Cicero says “a happy man will be happy even on the torture wrack.” To them, happiness was about living a meaningful and good life, not about continually feeling that positive emotion. They saw a happy person as someone who learned to cope with pain because they knew that true happiness and real life is not without immense pain. To be happy one did not always have to feel positive emotions, but they had a meaningful and overall good life; full of both pain and joy. For many religions, true happiness was not even fathomable on this earth. This was the overarching view until the happiness view of the 17th and 18th centuries, where the modern perception of happiness comes into play. The new perspective on happiness was to indulge in the pleasures of this world, and everyone was deserving of happiness. This is a concept philosopher john locke preached, and Thomas Jefferson uses it in the Declaration of Independence. This modern idea of happiness is fed by material things and has a much more hedonistic approach. This has caused something called hedonic adaptation, “Our ability to adapt to changes in our life circumstances or sensory experiences.” This essentially means the happiness of a being only momentarily changes because once that person is used to the new source of happiness, they revert to their original happiness levels, and it leaves that person needing more and more to feed their desires and happiness. This has created a very self-centered perception of joy. This modern perception of happiness quite often leaves people feeling less happy or even lonely.

This is why living a life to be meaningful verses with a false perception of happiness is much better for people. However, the words happiness and meaningfulness often become intertwined because a meaningful life quite often brings true happiness. Now someone may wonder, ”what is the point of following this old concept of happiness?”, “what will doing this versus the more hedonistic approach do for someone?”.The answer to this is that true genuine happiness comes with many social and health benefits, such as greater life expectancy, better physical health, Social benefits, Relationship benefits, stimulates being more creative and innovative, higher quality work, and can make people more diplomatic. Aside from this, happier people have a greater ability to adapt to new situations and challenges, as well as react to negative experiences. This is important because, in the fast-paced society which exists today, many people find themselves feeling drained and without a further purpose in life. This leads to shorter lives, weakened health, less productivity, and loneliness. When people can remove themselves from the self-centered idea of happiness, and apply themselves to a greater purpose which includes helping and giving to others, it not only increases their emotional stability and happiness, but it helps widen the range of happy people.

Post 3

The feeling that I have assumed after this week of learning is clarity. I have learned so many things which reiterate thoughts I have never taken much time to process, or simply couldn't process. For me it has been interesting to explore the evolution of the concept of happiness as well as to view what others think of it. The discussion part of the class has been one of my favorite parts because seeing each and every person's thoughts on the questions has helped me to understand different viewpoints. This week has changed my viewpoint on myself and my own happiness. It helped me reevaluate and reflect on my own mental situation and how that is impacting my life physically as well.

Questions that came to me through the course of this week were, How can I apply all of this to my life so that I can have the capability to bring myself from a low point in life, to a high point in life? Why is it that we first studied the negative side of things and how to fix things rather than how to prevent them from happening and is this a trend in how we think about things in everyday life? Is how people view happiness in general in modern society detrimental to our health? Is the constant drive for it what causes the deficit of true happiness?