Happiness Dissected

Emotions are not a mysterious soup in your head! This book dissects happiness into our individual emotions based on their evolutionary or biological purpose. This dissection reveals many breakthrough insights: you only fall in love with strangers; women only fall in love with men of equal-or-higher rank; men fall out of love 4 years after meeting a woman; you only envy former peers – like siblings and classmates; you only feel humor when others make a mistake you could make, a mid-life crisis occurs when your rank plateaus and you stop feeling pride; we say please and thank you so others don’t feel humiliation; we only cry because we’re lonely.

Happiness, like health, is our natural state of being. Health is not a burden for us unlike its oppositedisease. Since we are most comfortable in our natural state we seek happiness which is not a burden. To be happy, what is needed is to eliminate unhappiness which is an intruder. It is similar to getting rid of a disease and health automatically makes its appearance. Unhappiness is an intruder and it intrudes as a penalty we have to pay for transgressing the law of creation. The law is that the creation is an integrated, interrelated organic whole just like a human body. Every cell works for the benefit of the whole body and the body does everything to protect and preserve each and every cell resulting in happy, harmonious coexistence. We transgress this law and create disharmony by feeling and acting as independent, separate, isolated entities from the rest of the creation. Thus we are violating the law because of our ignorance. Unhappiness is the penalty we pay for transgressing the law that the whole of the creation is an integrated, interrelated organic whole. The remedy: To be happy we should live in conformity with the law of creation namely, that the creation is an integrated, interrelated organic whole. To live in conformity with the law we have to bring about a cognitive change in our thinking and the resulting changed thinking should be followed by a transformation in our lives. The change requires us to become more and more inclusive by developing divine qualities like kindness, compassion, sharing etc. and shunning the opposite qualities. We are free either to conform or resist the law of creation. The choice is ours. In summary we are responsible for our happiness.

This philosophical and sociological look at friendship and happiness begins with a review of Aristotle's three categories of friendship--friends of utility, friends of pleasure and friends of the good. Modern variations--casual friends, close friends, best friends--are described, along with the growing phenomena of virtual friendships and cyber socialization in the Internet age. Inspired in part by Bertrand Russell's The Conquest of Happiness, the authors propose that conquering unhappiness is key to achieving the self-satisfaction Russell called zest and Aristotle called eudaimonia or thriving by our own efforts.

This book presents an interdisciplinary exploration of the origins of happiness in the modern Western culture and makes the argument that happiness is not universal but is instead a culturally and historically specific experience, characteristic only to the Western world. It begins with an overview of the main research approaches to happiness and then studies the important but elusive theme in the context of culture and relations of power. The second part of the book analyses the social, religious, ethical and political processes that lead to the emergence of the experience of happiness, including consumer culture in contemporary societies. It presents an analysis of the medieval Christian experience which concludes that the modern experience of happiness only emerged in the 17th and 18th century, when the ideal of human existence increasingly started to be pursued in the present life. In its conclusion, this book explores the concept of modernization as the collective pursuit of happiness.

葛濟捨一生扮演過四種角色身分，醫師、實業家、理財規畫師、慈濟志工，「四樣不同的工作，就像經歷四段不同的生命。雖然經歷不同的領域與挑戰，但每一樣挑戰都是興致勃勃去面對，每一階段都是寶貴的生命體驗。」 四十歲那年，葛濟捨出現中年危機，人生失去目標，不是因為設立的目標錯了，而是因為都是為了自己和家人。後來才發現，如果能夠將目標放大，包括一切苦難眾生，人生就會充滿意義；只要發揮良能，生活就會變得充實，生命也會更有價值。 一九九八年，他第一次參加慈濟國際賑災，因為中國貴州霜害，要提供食物和生活必需品給受災居民。第一次看到有人生活得這麼苦，這才知道自己的幸福，也才知道自己要惜福。 他一改自以為是的人生態度，本來認為周遭的人都是他的苦惱根源，參與賑災後才知道，周遭的人全是成就自己的貴人，要深深地感恩他們。 此時，發自內心深處的感動和願意付出，這種「知褔、惜福、再造褔」的人生體驗，是用任何金錢都買不到的人生覺悟，這分深厚的感恩心，是葛濟捨在慈濟學到的無上至寶。 「人生不如意事十有八九，要常想一、二」，我們面對人事，除了努力付出之外，無法掌握事情的結局，最好是用歡喜心去面對。歡喜心是一種選擇，也是一種人生態度。如果大家都能以「甘願做、歡喜受」的精神互動，這個社會能更祥和，我們的生命也能夠更圓滿。

Learn the secrets of happiness. You’re no idiot, of course. You know how difficult to see the bright side of things when life seems to be a rut, much less in the face of adversity. But when you nurture a positive attitude, you also nurture your ability to find happiness in the moment—even if it doesn’t live up to your perfect expectations. The Complete Idiot’s Guide® to the Psychology of Happiness offers insights into human nature and techniques that will help you regain the sense of joy. In this Complete Idiot’s Guide®, you get: • The power of optimism and humor to enhance your outlook. • The blissful benefits of engaging in playful behavior and artistic expression. • The importance of nurturing positive relationships among friends and family. • The power of exercise and meditation to simulate joyful chemical reactions within the body.

Tang Shuangshuang was originally a high school student and was known to be confused. In a school chemistry experiment, she had accidentally used a chemical agent and almost blew up the whole laboratory, while she herself had fainted. But when she woke up, she found that everything around her had changed.When Tang Shuangshuang went to the market, she became the center of attention of everyone, because her dressing was really not suitable for that moment. Just when she didn't know what to do, suddenly a man dressed very normally walked over and told her that she was his long-lost young miss, just like that, Tang Shuangshuang followed the man with doubts and confusion, becoming a rich family's Miss Kim, enjoying all the glory and wealth, but she still didn't know what was going on, she couldn't figure out why her so-called father didn't tell her why he lost, and also didn't know that she was his daughter.One day, her father told her that he was going to marry her to a prince in the imperial court, Xiao Ling. Even though she was a bit hungry, she understood that he was doing it for the rights and because of her beauty, but she couldn't reject him at all. She thought that marrying the prince was a good choice, but she was the seventh wife of the prince, and the domineering and ruthless Xiao Ling also didn't put her in his eyes at all.