Had to write a final paper on happiness for a science of happiness class this semester. This is the result, honestly the worst piece of BS I have ever had the horror of presenting to a professor. Thought I'd post it here, though, because it's a lesson to be learned - don't write papers while half cracked-out or on serious deadline. Yikes.

"The truth about happiness is that there is nothing to pursue. The pursuit of happiness is often seen as something that stems from monetary gain or material wealth - external factors. However, this misperception about reaching a certain level of happiness exists because people believe that attaining both those things will automatically bring about true happiness because of the value of the tangible things themselves. The truth is that securing one or both of those elements, if even in the most basic of ways, brings happiness because it ensures a type of stable foundation upon which happiness can be built. Money and possessions as external factors do not affect the type of happiness that we as a society strive to achieve - this has been proven time and time again by the poor body, rich-souled individual ad the unhappy, extravagantly rich socialite. Intangible elements of life - love, compassion, gratitude - that come from within are the things that define and make up the actual "happiness" that everyone seeks. Happiness is an intrinsic element o the human condition, and can be defined as the point at which internal satisfaction meets external social awareness. It is linked to knowing ourselves, being able to envision our place within a societal structure, and seeing just how we can contribute to the bigger picture.

True happiness, then, the kind that sticks around longer than simple transient positive feelings, can be defined as a judgment, an internal decision made by an individual regarding his or her attitude in a given situation. As stated in William Shakespeare's famous play Hamlet, and as quoted in Dr. Monterosso's lecture, "there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so." Happiness is founded largely on attitude. It is not a certain set o circumstances that determines happiness, but a certain set o attitudes that makes it possible for some people to take their inherent happiness set point and fluctuate on the positive end of it as opposed to the negative end of it. Given that a large part of a person's innate happiness is determined by genetics, as proven in the Minnesota Twins study, the only way to truly reach a level of happiness that is long-lasting, genetics aside, is to adopt a certain attitude toward the circumstances he or she is presented with.

Whether imagined or not, a person's ability to have control over their lives - including the choice to stress or not in a given situation - plays a large role in determining his or her overall happiness level, and this is perhaps best illustrated by the nursing home study. In this study, Adam Galinsky, a professor at Northwestern University, gave a group of senior citizens in a nursing home a plant to care for, and a control group nothing to care for. It was found that the group that had the plants to care for tended to live longer, happier lives than those who didn't, mostly because they felt that they had an element of control over their plants. They therefore felt more purpose in their lives and the psychological state of control - of being able to choose their attitudes - translated into a physical ability to live a longer, richer life.

A person's attributional style is perhaps the biggest determining factor in how happy a person can be said to be - someone who blames himself when things go awry and assumes that the negative circumstances are permanent rather than temporary is more likely to spiral into a pattern o unhappiness than someone who is able to see the situation in the big picture and acknowledge how realistically temporary and negative circumstances are. In a study by Seligman and Maier, two groups of do were left in harnesses for a period of time and then given electric shocks at different intervals. One groups was given a lever to press that would stop the shocks, and another group had levers that did nothing to stop the electric shocks. Dogs from the second group developed something known as "learned helplessness" - that is, that nothing they could do would change the situation that they were in. As a result, these dogs would refuse to try anything to stop their pain, showing signs of what can best be described as an equivalent to human clinical depression. Translated into human-relatable terms, this shows that people who adopt the attitude of learned helplessness do not bother to venture to either know themselves or establish relationships with other people and therefore are a cause of their own unhappiness.

In order to structure a life wherein happiness is a constant, then, it is necessary for individuals to build upon their own internal satisfaction and extend that into interpersonal relations with others. It is without a doubt that social connectivity contributes largely to the happiness level of individuals. Studies have proven that the greater the number of social networks a person has, the more likely he or she is to have a higher life satisfaction rating. Being with other people, whether in a companionship or romantic sense, helps to establish a person's sense of self and gives him or her a bigger opportunity to take on social responsibility that might impact his or her own happiness in addition to helping the other party, and this is how happiness is nurtured and sustained. Intangible life assets, such as forgiveness, generosity and gratitude all tie into individuals' overall happiness.

The difference between animals and human beings is their capacity to have a multi-layered happiness that is independent of external factors. For dogs or pigs, as John Stuart Mills pointed out, happiness is contingent on ignorance, and the general consensus is that it is better to be a dissatisfied human being than to be a satisfied animal. Our ability to think about our actions and e a player in our own lives is what sets us apart and what makes our lives richer and happier."