The Pursuit Of Happiness: The Search For Happiness In American Life

The Search for Happiness in American Life
Happiness can be easily defined as the state of well-being and contentment gained by personal life experiences through either direct or indirect connections with the world around us. The people we meet and the trails we go through in life add together to create a hopefully happy life. To be happy in life is indeed the only way to enjoy it. Therefore it’s no wonder that we all strive to achieve this idea of happiness. This interest in the search for true happiness has become a major factor in our modern age. Looking back at our history, the moods of many Americans have seemed to become stagnate even when we experience a rise in salaries and overall life expectance. This begs the question as to what then

In some ways, happiness may have indeed helped American soldieries get through both WW1 and WW2. In the article “War and the American pursuit of Happiness,” Milwaukee Journalist Kathleen Parker asserts that “The opportunity to pursue happiness is what fuels our drive and willingness to fight for and preserve liberty” (Parker). This feeling of pride and unity also plays a major role with discussing war and its connection to happiness. Even when times are bad, a sense of togetherness brings us closer; we’re all going through the same hardships, thus creating relations and friendships that would ease the turmoil emotions of war. However, unlike the prosperous opportunity’s that are available to Americans after times of war or even when one experiences poverty, the same cannot be said of the rest of the world and their own handling of poor weary citizens. Even in our modern age, the poor are still being forgotten; this doesn’t necessarily mean they are unhappy in life, but are substantially more susceptible to poorer living conditions than that of the average American who would otherwise be unhappy living in better living