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Happiness in the specific sense
Defining happiness
Defining happiness
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Being happy is considered as one of the most important things in life. But most people struggle to live happily. While there are ways to be happy, none are as effective as being self-aware. Happiness is achieved when a person is self-aware of his/her personal abilities, limitations and values. Self-awareness is the knowledge about the self: strengths and weaknesses, vulnerabilities and passions, idiosyncrasies and normalness (Furham). Being self-aware is the most powerful quality a person can have. One can obtain this quality at any given point in life such as when watching a movie in your couch. With self-awareness, you can figure out where you belong in a group or an organization, find out who you really are as a person and what your contribution to others may be. Happiness comes when the benefits of self-awareness are collected. When found, this knowledge is dependent only on the individual and not on anybody else. …show more content…
Happiness is to be content with your own life. Every person has a different definition for happiness but according to Acacia Parks, Assistant Professor of Psychology at Hiram College, happiness is a combination of how satisfied you are with your life and how good you feel on a day-to-day basis. Parks also estates that being rich or affording everything is not the answer to being happy… it may increase your sense of pleasure in a short-term period but after some time, you will feel as you felt just before. Happiness is necessary to enjoy your life but in order to achieve it permanently, you need to be
The sense of being aware of yourself as an individual is called ‘Self Understanding’ A sense of self is not achieved in a single step…it develops gradually throughout your life.
"To be self aware is to be conscious of one's character, including beliefs, values, qualities, strengths and limitation. It is about knowing oneself" (Burnard 1992).
To begin with, self-awareness is having a clear perception of your personality, including strengths, weaknesses, thoughts and emotions. Self- awareness allows you to understand other people, how they perceive you, your attitude and your responses to them in the moment. For nurses to be able to empathize with their patients and treat them with compassion, they have to be self-aware. When nurses are self-aware, they are able to positively change their attitude and actions in order to best understand how different people treat them, hence improving nurse- patient relationship.
People with self awareness can be both happy and unhappy. Mr Bennet has self awareness but he is unhappy because he finds no satisfaction in his family. Elizabeth and Darcy come to know themselves and develop towards each other and so their marriage has the capacity to hold the greatest happiness. Also, happiness can be found when you have no self awareness. Charlotte has self awareness and knows what she wants and needs and so she is content in her marriage to Mr Collins. Mr Collins has no self awareness but is happy because he has a wife and this is what he aspired to. Ultimately, people who have the most self awareness and knowledge who can grow and learn their weaknesses and faults are the people who will have the most happiness in their lives.
According to Daniel Goleman (2002), self-awareness is the degree to which you are able to notice your feelings, label them, and connect to their source.
Gaining self-awareness allows us to become aware of how our internal processes such as our thoughts and feelings can have an external effect on the people around us, both our colleagues and the service users that we work
To have a deepened self-awareness, it allows us to work well with others, and can include
Firstly, knowing yourself is an ongoing attention to one’s internal states (Goleman, 1997). It is the ability to see how your emotions and perceptions influence your thinking and behaviour. Self-knowledge is the beginning of self-improvement because it helps build confidence and emotional intelligence, which are skills that can be learned and developed overtime.
Self-awareness is not about reading a book or attending a course. Self-awareness is a journey, and it takes practice. It’s like a muscle that becomes more effective with time and effort. It gives us mental strength as opposed to physical strength. We are constantly changing and adapting to the multiple external forces around us and to our individual experiences. The more we learn to be aware of, and understand, our reactions, thoughts, and emotions, while also keeping in mind our values, the more we can become the best we can be and the more successful we can become.
For example, for one person, happiness is a sense of satisfaction from success in a career, whereas for others, it may be a feeling of being loved by other people. Meanwhile, philosophers indicate that happiness has two senses. The first one is psychological sense related to a state of mind (Haybron). The other sense is “a value term, synonymous with well-being” (Haybron). First observation may be in our daily lives.
Happiness is a feeling that humans naturally desire. Without it, one feels incomplete. In this generation, happiness has taken on a definition by how we are presented to one another. It is measured by how much money we have, how famous we are, or the things we possess. When in reality, none of these things guarantee a happy life. Happiness is something that cannot be bought with money, but rather, it must be found, earned, sought after. Each and every one of us has our own list of things that we consider to make us happy. However, happiness shines brightest through the relationships we create, and the goals we make for ourselves to strive after. Along with these two essential sources, we then can mix and match those things in life that we enjoy to create our own unique formula for happiness.
“Self-awareness is a psychological state in which people are aware of their traits, feelings and behaviour. Alternatively, it can be defined as the realisation of oneself as an individual entity.” (Crisp & Turner, 2010). In other words, self awareness is recognising one’s personality which includes strengths, weaknesses, thoughts, beliefs and emotions.
But in this debate, one question still raises its head - What is happiness? Happiness is not actually leading a luxurious life, but the luxury of living a life. Happiness is not actually about expanding your business, but it lies in expanding the horizons of life. Happiness is not having a meal in the most famous restaurant, but having it with your most beloved family. It does not lie in attending honorable parties, but to attend a party with honor.
According to Buddha, “Happiness does not depend on what you have or who you are. It solely relies on what you think.” To be happy, one must know what happiness is and then find aspects that make them feel that way. Happiness is not a brief sense of positive feelings, but a lasting sense of contentedness that can be achieved by keeping close relationships and engaging in habits that seem contradictory at first to happiness.
Happiness is a feeling that cannot be broken if strong enough, no matter how much sadness or hate is around you. Happiness can come from the smallest thing, for instance, music makes me happy and can easily change my mood, or when I am doing something I love my mood is easily changed. For others it could be whenever you do something well, or right and get recognition for it. It is the easiest feeling to be spread and given out but often neglected and forgotten about which is something we should all be more aware