The Cave
40” x 30” / deep canvas/ acrylic painting
We exist in outer and inner worlds, enjoying the beauty and intrigue of everyday life while experiencing a see-saw of buried emotions. Bringing to light hidden feelings from within and integrating them into your daily routine creates the person known as YOU, a cause for celebration.
I am so glad you are part of my tableau and wish you joy, adventure, and good health during the holidays and coming year.
Applauding the Blues by Marilynne
“The secret of contentment is knowing how to enjoy what you have, and to be able to lose all desire for things beyond your reach." ~ Lin Yutang
What exactly is Happiness?
It’s the holidays. We smile, say Merry Christmas, and are expected to emote joy and contentment, yet the only one who knows if you really feel that way is you. Scientists call this “the subjective well-being.” It’s your response to your mood and how satisfied you are with life. You are happy when you have more positive emotions than negative ones and realize that your existence has meaning and is worthwhile.
According to researcher Sonja Lyubomirsky, contentment is a fleeting emotion consisting of two components, positive emotions (love, joy, elation, optimism) and a sense of satisfaction with your life. These two sentiments don’t always coincide. For instance, there were long periods of time when I was totally content with my job and family. I could not imagine having more meaningful and rewarding ways to fill the days. Unfortunately, I wasn’t always happy. The stress of moving between two very different orbits put me on edge. I rarely had time for myself.
Perceptions of happiness are affected by culture. When analyzing perceptual differences between Americans and Russians, Lybomirsky noticed that Americans equated happiness with concrete obtainable things such as a job, success, money, fun, and family, while Russians mentioned more spiritual ideals like beauty, mutual understanding among people, spiritual salvation, and world of peace.
"Joy has nothing to do with material things, or with man's outward circumstance...A man living in the lap of luxury can be wretched, and a man in the depths of poverty can overflow with joy." ~ William Barclay
Numerous magazines provide guidelines on how to have a blissful, contended life. Articles abound telling readers the best way to raise happy children. Journalists present the latest research that reinforces how being happy will help you pursue your goals and overcome obstacles, and how it helps keeps friends connected and staves off physical and mental ailments. These articles also make us feel guilty for not remaining in a perpetual state of cheerful bliss.
After reading many euphoric write-ups, I began wondering if being happy is always good? I found many researchers who explore this very question. Following are four ways in which being happy may not be appropriate.
1.Too much happiness may be a bad thing. Happiness is related to your creativity quotient and may actually have adverse effects on inventiveness. I've heard artist friends say they did their best work when poor and struggling. People with intense and overwhelming amounts of happiness (or too little) can become less flexible and lose their creative edge when facing new challenges. Those in happiness overdrive may take risks they wouldn’t ordinarily engage in. For instance, certain gamblers visit casinos when they are happy and stay away when sad. Believing that luck is finally with them, they lose savings they worked years to accumulate.
2. Happiness tends to be situational. A psychologist once asked me why I smiled when I spoke of unhappy childhood experiences. I hid my loss from others , fearful of letting my true state of mind emerge. Emotions, such as anger are useful when you have an obstacle to overcome. Fear mobilizes fight and flight actions that help with survival. Working towards a goal can add to happiness, but it is not an appropriate emotion in every situation. Finding enjoyment from watching another person suffer is far from normal. It signals having a major emotional disorder.
3. Some forms of happiness are good for us while others are not. Feeling happy can make you more energetic, feel closer to other people, and more generous. Being successful after working hard on a project leads most people to feeling proud. However, pride without merit can lead towards aggressiveness and antisocial behavior. Excessive pride hinders a person’s ability to empathize with others.
"Happiness is a journey, not a destination; happiness is to be found along the way not at the end of the road, for then the journey is over and it's too late. The time for happiness is today not tomorrow." ~ by Paul H Dunn
4. The pursuit of happiness as a goal, makes most people unhappy. Focusing on happiness as an end in itself, according to a study conducted by Iris Maus, often leads to setting such high standards that they can’t be met. The more a person tries to be happy, the more difficult it is to achieve. This, in turn, can lead to severe depression. It is not the search for happiness that makes people happy but rather the process of working for and attaining self-set goals. When goals are realized, they create the moments of happiness and satisfaction. But, as mentioned above, the high and intense feelings are fleeting. When they subside, new challenges have to be embraced.
Happiness is a matter of emotional balance that occurs at a specific time and place. Context and situation matter and being grounded in reality is critical. Unfortunately, the process that brings about a happy state of mind often involves times of discomfort. It's pushing through barriers creates the environment allowing joy to flow.
Happy people find satisfaction in small pleasure. They get absorbed in challenging activities, set and work to meet goals, maintain close social ties, and find purpose beyond themselves. Considering both body and mind, they engage in physical activities that promote good health. They learn to understand and accept their emotions, strengths, and weaknesses. Self-knowledge makes them strong and able to reach out to others with compassion and kindness.
"Life is made up of small pleasures. Happiness is made up of those tiny successes. The big ones come too infrequently. And if you don't collect all these tiny successes, the big ones don't really mean anything." ~ Norman Lear
References:
Lyubomirsky, S. (2019) What is Happiness? Greater Good Magazine, U.C.Berkely. retrieved from https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/topic/happiness/definition
Davis, Tchiki. (2019)Happiness. Psychology Today. retrieved from https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/happiness
Gruber, J. (2012 Four Ways Happiness can Hurt Your. Greater Good Magazine, U.C.Berkely. retrieved from https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/four_ways_happiness_can_hurt_you
Artwork is always for sale. Applauding the Blues is Acrylic on canvas/
gold frame /19.25” by 23.50 “ / $495.00
Do comment below.
Five Men in a Tub: A Quest for Meaning
Acrylic on Canvas / framed 42” x 54” / $790
Impossible Dreams
Do you remember the lyrics from The Impossible Dream? The first two verses of Mitch Leigh’s song from Man of La Mancha go like this—
“To right the unrightable wrong
To love pure and chaste from afar
To try when your arms are too weary
To reach the unreachable star
This is my quest to follow that star
No matter how hopeless, no matter how far
To fight for the right without question or pause
To be willing to march into Hell for a heavenly cause”
I’ve often asked myself how far I would be willing to go for a cause. Leigh’s song reminds me of how powerful dreams can be for those willing to act on the insights they provide. During the Vietnam and civil rights movements, thousands of 18 to 24 year olds marched, rode on freedom busses, and burned draft cards for a cause that affected them personally. Many faced jail or left the country because they believed the war unjust.
The next two lines of the song are—
“This is my quest to follow that star
No matter how hopeless, no matter how far
To fight for the right without question or pause
To be willing to march into Hell for a heavenly cause”
Making dreams come true takes courage and perseverance. To-be-the-best-you-can-be at what you choose to do, to find a mate, to embrace a healthy lifestyle, and to stay informed takes time and determination. It requires staying physically active and mentally calm.
I’m reminded of the story of Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse. It’s a tale of self-discovery and explains life’s passages well. Siddhartha travels on a path rich with experiences that eventually lead him to understand the meaning of human existence. He moves from practical goal oriented activities to a more enlightened state as he starts grasps the fullness of life. He comes to realize that every truth has its opposite, and urges his readers to love the world in its entirety. His directive is to reach out to those most unlike us and learn from them. This is a message our politicians need to take to heart.
Young adults face a serious dilemma. Their survival requires them to be self-centered and focused on basic needs, but to do so, they also have to take into account changes in the environment. All I had to do at their age is dream of finding the perfect job, a mate, affordable housing, friendships, health care, adventure, and security. I knew if I worked hard, I'd get ahead. The economic and political situation twenty-year-olds find themselves in today, is brutal. Many work two jobs, carrying the burden of student debt into their fifties. With the rising cost of housing, food, and transportation, and the scarcity of family wage jobs, all too many stay in survival mode.
They won’t go through life as we did, for they face an overwhelming crisis—that of a warming planet. It will influence them more than the draft that led so many to die in Vietnam. Rising temperatures will affect their health, access to food, water, and housing due to pressure from mass migrations. It will require massive expenditures to fight fires, floods and infestations of insects. It will cause wars due to desertification of vast tracks of land.
Psychologist, Abraham Maslow construed another way to depict human growth and development. The pyramid shaped ladder shown below, helps us understand why young adults are self-centered. They have to be. Most start out on the bottom rung of the pyramid, trying to satisfying physiological needs. It takes years to reach the apex, a n reside in a place where self-actualized people who are spontaneous, creative, moral, lack prejudice, accept facts are engaged in problem solving.
Each of us have to feel that our needs are satisfied before we can move to the next higher rung. It tales courage to climb, for it requires new dreams and resetting goals. But most of us try, for we are driven by an innate curiosity that makes us want more and thus follow the path we call life. It is a self-absorbing journey, risky and at times scary, yet somehow satisfying. Striving to reach one’s full potential, to-be-everything-one-can-be, is reward in itself.
People living at the bottom of the pyramid will be the highly affected by climate crisis. They will have to deal with rising temperatures as they struggle to meet their most basic needs. To get by, they’ll have to think more broadly than did those in past generations. Their ability to flourish individually will be connected to how people throughout the world grapple with the crisis. It will require coming together to solve problems affect all of humanity.
It is a worthwhile quest to undertake. Imagine what might happen if we each pushed ourselves to reach higher on the ladder. We;d be smartyer, more communal, more understanding. Our communities would be filled with compassion, creativity, and beauty. Artificially set boundaries and self-serving biases would be left behind. Diversity and innovation would be welcome.
It is not a quest to be undertaken by sissies, but rather it is one for the strong—an adventure worth embracing with passion.
“And I know if I'll only be true to this glorious quest
That my heart will lie peaceful and calm when I'm laid to my rest
And the world will be better for this
That one man(woman) scorned and covered with scars
Still strove with his last ounce of courages
To reach the unreachable star.”
contact artist at [email protected]
