ANNALS OF PSYCHOLOGY SOCIAL ANIMAL

ANNALS OF PSYCHOLOGY-SOCIAL ANIMAL
by David Brooks
from http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/01/17/110117fa_fact_brooks?currentPage=5

What does happiness come from? How do we feel happy?
Some excerpts from the article of social animals
“I believe we inherit a great river of knowledge, a flow of patterns coming from many sources.
“The information that comes from deep in evolutionary past we call genetics”
“The information passed along. From hundreds of years ago we call culture.”
“The information passed along from decades ago we call family.”
“The information offered months ago we call education.”
“Our thoughts are profoundly molded by this long historic flow, none of us exits, self-made, in isolation from it”
“Though History has made us self-conscious in order to enhance our survival prospects,………..”
“Flourishing consists of putting yourself in situation in which you lose self-consciousness and become fused with other people, experience, or tasks.”
“It happens sometimes while you are lost in a hard challenge, or when an artist listening to music, or lost in story, or to some people when they feel enveloped by God’s love.. And it happens most when we connect with other people.’

“Happiness isn’t really produced by conscious accomplishment.” (we can see it physically.)

“Happiness is a measure of how thickly the unconscious parts of our mind are intertwined with other people and with activities.”

“Happiness is determined by how much information and affection flows through us covertly every day and year.” (We can not see it physically and apparently.)l

“during his lifetime, the competition to succeed-to get into the right schools and land the right jobs-had grown stiffer.”

“Yet somehow the things that didn’t lead to happiness and flourishing had been emphasized at the expense of the things that did.  The gifts he was most grateful for had been passed along to him by teachers and parents inadvertently, whereas his official education was mostly forgotten or useless.”

(My thought about the last statement:

If he did not get his official education, how could he meet and know different teachers?  Official education has its purposes and goodness.   However ,it seems like we pay too much attention to grades that we forget about the parts of the learning process.)