I don’t think it matters personally. However, you reach a series of “happy” days that work for you is all that matters.
I say, if you want to think of a value for your life. Add up the sum of how you liked your days.
However you get there, It doesn’t matter.
He was discussing “eudaimonic” happiness, and basically was pushing folks towards that.
It’s a web ‘zine for folks near retirement, so it’s basically, saying “play golf,” or “putter about in the workshop,” to stretch some stereotypes.
Me, I’m definitely a “putter about in the workshop” kind of guy. Seems to do the trick for me.
[EDIT] Added “about” to “putter in the workshop.”
THEN I realized you were not talking about a putter.
You can tell I don’t play golf.
I tweaked it.
Any activity you do regularly and consistently will bring about different emotions and states of mind on different days. Some days you can’t wait to get started and some times you go weeks of having no motivation towards it.
I’m on a journey right now of hiking 50 miles a week. On most days, being able to get in nature for an hour or more is such a serene and grounding experience that brings me a lot of joy. But there are weeks where I don’t want to get out there, and even when I get started I don’t want to be there. But looking back, I see those days as part of the whole experience. I have retroactive enjoyment and pride in having pushed myself (type 2 fun) and I know that the subsequent 50 mile weeks are easier and more enjoyable because I kept the consistency up.
Yes, it is good to take breaks from things when you’re not enjoying them anymore. This allows you to reevaluate and get back your motivating “why”. But it can also be extremely hard to get back into a routine after a relatively short break. Anyone who has not exercised for a few weeks will know that feeling of weakness when they get started again.
From the standpoint of immediacy, it absolutely can be.
From a medium to long term standpoint, the path this presents may or may not be a happy one (I posit that happiness is a process and not a resting state), which is highly dependent upon your circumstances.
If you're fabulously wealthy, smoking crack all day for the rest of your life might be a very happy path.
If you're not, there are likely some bumps along that path which could negatively impact one's happiness.
Your "argument" attempts to conflate the travails of a tiny minority (those whose lives are negatively impacted by substance use issues) of us as a major component of the process called "happiness."
Which is unfortunate, as there's (as has been mentioned elsewhere here) that hedonistic activities (like smoking crack) are certainly on the same spectrum as eudaimonic activities (like working at a job you find fulfilling) and are, in their effects, quite similar.
Yes, I do realize your "argument" is a straw man specifically designed with all sorts of baggage to placate folks into not looking too closely at that "argument."
I'm sorry I'm unable to be placated thusly.
I'm like, if it's your money you begged for it spend it on whatever you really want, whatever you really really want. There was a serious presidential candidate here saying, Jadué[1]. So what you do with the addicts is you dispense them a reasonable amount, of whatever. Anything.
And really? They're not addicted by accident. There's a reason there wasn't a crack epidemic in the 60's, it wasn't because people couldn't figure out the trivial recipe with fucking baking soda and cocaine like in any kitchen? The CIA did not invent crack because nobody can invent crack because it's not patentable, it's obvious. In fact the crack epidemic is a response to the 60's, crack cures the system of the counter-culture.
[1] I like his party I like that he's Marxist, I feel red too, and American Republican, just like the color red, let me declare it here. Color-based political affiliation in Chile and in America, just red in both. Republican red, Marxist red. That's legal, you can be a Republican and a card-carrying Communist if you're open about it. I'll see where I can get an actual card I can carry. I just like the color red.
EDIT: this came out with a lot of explosion, good thing it's nested deep in the comments, let it be known I had to leave a lot out. That was some really unwise stuff to write...even drafting it, like any javascript keylogger...oh well I'll compile it, it'll be in a book perhaps. Well I guess anything that goes through a computer is public from day one. Anyway, a book about what's up, why you can't just reach out for happiness like you mock real people for doing. It's actually not that complicated. It's upcoming. Maybe. I actually am figuring out my business and my idealism simultaneously, and you can read about it all on http://www.fgemm.com .
Totally true
> Let them be happy for a bit, hell.
Also true: we shouldn't cast judgement on their favorite type of happiness, lest they cast their judgement on ours.
> I'm like, if it's your money you begged for it spend it on whatever you really want, whatever you really really want.
And you respect freedom?
Overall, words of true wisdom. Amen to that.
> EDIT: this came out with a lot of explosion, good thing it's nested deep in the comments, let it be known I had to leave a lot out.
Don't self censor please. Actually good and unique content is a rare find.