Pursuing happiness can be an unhappy effort

Research has found that people take failure harder and tend to feel discouraged if their society places a premium on happiness. — dpa

Just be happy! You can if you want to – you just have to go for it, work at it, and work on yourself and your attitude, many a life coach has often said.

A multitude of self-help books and seminars purport to lay out a road map to what’s arguably the most desired destination of all: happiness.

Were it only that simple!

If your goal is to become happier, you automatically assess your progress, says psychologist Jens Asendorpf.

“And you naturally recognise that you’re falling short, which is dissatisfying,” he points out.

“The more attention you pay to it and try to force it – the unhappier you become.”

The pursuit of happiness is much more complex than all the how-to tomes and inspirational desk calendar aphorisms would have us believe.

In his scientific career, Asendorpf has extensively studied human personality development and says that genetic heritability accounts for about half of it.

This impacts our sense of contentment and happiness in various ways.

If you ask someone how happy they are, “social comparison processes” come into play, he explains.

They compare their situation with that of people of similar age and level of education whose state of happiness they think they know.

If that sounds subjective, it’s because it is.

Strong societal pressure to be happy can adversely affect people’s sense of well-being.

Experiments by researchers several years ago found that people took failure harder if those around them placed a premium on happiness.

A recent comparative study had similar findings: In countries with a heavy emphasis on being happy, many people feel discouraged, because to their mind, they’re not measuring up to society’s expectations.

It’s not easy to be uninfluenced by societal pressure.

You’ll be happier if you can ignore it to some extent though, says Asendorpf.

He gives the following example: Extroversion is largely seen as a desirable personality trait.

However, if you’re an introvert, you won’t be happier by trying to become more extroverted, but rather, by recognising and appreciating the positive side of your introversion.

”Everything has its pluses and minuses,” he remarks.

Accepting your personality as it is doesn’t mean you shouldn’t make any changes.

But you should approach them in a relaxed way, Asendorpf says, and not credulously follow the “do this, that and the other, and you’ll be happier” advice in a self-help book.

It’s better to simply try something new without having any expectations, he says.

Striving for happiness is a fruitless endeavour, according to bestselling German author and moral philosopher Wilhelm Schmid, whose work deals mainly with the art of living.

“That’s not how life is,” he says.

No one is happy round the clock, 365 days a year.

Instead, he recommends directing your attention from happiness to something else: the meaningfulness of your life.

“Happiness is capricious; meaning is much more durable.”

Asked how to achieve meaningfulness, Schmid has a clear answer: through personal relationships.

They won’t always make you happy, of course, and he says it’s important that they withstand difficult situations.

Many compromises are necessary too, and you must be prepared to invest time.

All of this is especially true of loving relationships.

“Love requires unending care,” he says.

“But you’re rewarded for it: with meaning.” – By Alexandra Stober/dpa