12.11.19 // This is Me.

This is me.
.
We're told from a young age to chase happiness.
.
In "The Second Mountain," David Brooks writes, "our public conversation is muddled about the definition of a good life. Often we say a good life is a happy life. We live, as it says in our founding document, in pursuit of happiness.".
.
Let me elaborate.
.
Brooks goes on to explain, "happiness" makes us feel good, elated, uplifted, and involves a personal victory for the self, an expansion of the self. Happiness comes as we move toward our goals, when things go our way. Happiness often has to do with some success, some new ability, or some heightened sensual pleasure.
.
Instead of happiness, Brooks suggests that we should instead find joy.
.
Now I'm only a few pages into this book, but I feel deeply for what Brooks is trying to explain.
.
Joy, as Brooks describes, "tends to involve some transcendence of self. It's when the skin barrier between you and some other person or entity fades away and you feel fused together. Joy is present when mother and baby gaze into each other's eyes, when a hiker is overwhelmed by the beauty of the woods and feels at one with nature, when a gaggle of friends are dancing deliriously in unison.".
.
We can help create happiness, but we are seized by joy. We are pleased by happiness, but we are transformed by joy. When we experience joy we often feel we have glimpsed into a deeper and truer layer of reality.
.
He claims that joy tends to be self-transcending and explains that "you have to lose yourself to find yourself, give everything away [live life for others, and not for yourself] to get everything back." And as happiness fades because we get used to the things that used to make us happy, joy doesn't fade. To live with joy is to live with wonder, gratitude, and hope.
.
I need to finish this beautiful book, but for my next chapter in life, I'll be searching for joy through community, connection, and commitment.