I have the latest gadget, a job that pays well, a big house, a nice car, a loving spouse, 1.5 kids, a golden retriever, and a white picket fence…of course I’m happy…I think.
These are all the things that society says we need to make us happy, to mark us among the successful, to proclaim to ourselves and the world that we made it! Instagram, Tik Toc, Pinterest and Facebook all agree. So why then, after accumulating all the “stuff” that is supposed to make us happy do we still feel empty? Like something fundamental is missing from our lives. Like something is just “off”? Maybe it’s because we have never really thought about what success and happiness meant to us as individuals.
We are so wrapped up in the hustle and bustle of getting more stuff so we can post more pictures of it on social media so we can convince ourselves and the world that we really are successful and happy, that we forgot to check in with ourselves to make sure that what we are striving for will actually provide us with the happiness we crave. Most of the time, once we have attained the “thing” that is supposed to make us happy, we find that the feeling is fleeting, and we are often left unfulfilled and unsatisfied. Having to move onto larger and larger “scores” to fill the larger and larger hole left by our unsatisfying, unfulfilled lives.
We are measuring our happiness and success against a measuring stick that was never of our own design and once we start evaluating our lives against our own definitions of success and happiness, we fall short. So why do we embrace, so thoroughly, the definitions foisted on us by society? Because they have been ingrained into us for as far back as we can remember.
We grew up hearing, get good grades so you can get into a good college; because a college degree will enable you to get a good job and become financially stable. Then you can buy a house, get married, have kids and settle down to live the “American Dream”.
The American Dream
According to Sarah Churchwell, of the George W Bush Institute, Oxford English Dictionaries defines the American dream as “the ideal that every citizen of the United States should have an equal opportunity to achieve success and prosperity through hard work, determination and initiative”. By this definition, anyone that has worked hard, put in long hours, and finally achieved financial and material success should be happy because they have attained what has been pre-ordained as the dream of all Americans. But is it?
James Truslow Adams, the historian that coined the term, had a slightly different definition. In his 1931 book, Epic of America, he defined it as “that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement”. He went onto further detail that “it is not a dream of motorcars and high wages merely, but a dream of a social order in which each man and woman shall be able to attain to the fullest stature of which they are innately capable, and be recognized for that they are, regardless of the fortuitous circumstances of birth or position”.
If we measure success against Adams’s definition of the American dream, then we have missed the mark. In truth, the current definition under which we operate is the exact opposite of what Adams intended.
When Adams stated that the American dream should mean a “better, richer, and happier life for all our citizens of every rank”, he did not mean financially and materially richer. He meant spiritually and emotionally richer. As pointed out by Churchwell, Adams’s American dream was a dream of “collective moral character”, which harkened back to the document that gave America its freedom. The preamble to The Declaration of Independence states that as Americans we are entitled to “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
How do you define happiness and success?
And I truly believe that we are all entitled to pursuing whatever makes us happy. We just have to make sure that what we are pursuing is actually what we want and not what we were told we wanted. But how can you really be sure? Here are a few questions that you can ask yourself to help you write your own definition for success.
- When are you the happiest? What has your focus during those times? Are you happiest when you are playing with your children? Or when you are painting a landscape? Notice the people and activities that bring you joy.
- What do you value? What are the people or activities in your life that get priority? If you had an important report due for work tomorrow and your child had a bad day and needed some extra attention, which would you choose to prioritize? Work obligations or family obligations?
- When do you feel the most accomplished? What is the biggest motivator for you? Are you motivated to complete a task for the financial reward, the sense of accomplishment, the impact it will have on society?
- Do you have different definitions of success for different areas of your life? Does occupational success have a different definition than emotional or financial success? If so, you may need to develop different habits and skills to achieve success in each given area.
By getting very clear on how we define success, we can access which parts of ourselves we need to do a little work on. I think the below quote from an anonymous source said it best,
“Until you get very clear on what you want, you will get something that sorta-kinda-almost-but not quite meets it. Keep refining with each experience. It is creating clarity”.
