4 Pillars of a Happy Life
“Rejoicing in the Lord is your strength!” (Nehemiah 8:10).
Pope Benedict XVI famously said, “The ways of the Lord are not easy, but we were not created for an easy life, but for great things, for goodness.”
If we’re not made for an easy life, are we at least made for a happy one?
Well, kind of. We’re never going to experience perfect joy here on Earth; it’s saved for us when we are united with God in Heaven. However, God doesn’t necessarily want us to be miserable.
What’s more, science tells us that happiness is something we can work toward—something we can achieve, not something only the lucky people experience. In Build the Life You Want, Arthur C. Brooks (a columnist at the Atlantic, a fellow at the Word on Fire Institute, and a professor at Harvard) and Oprah Winfrey share the social science behind what makes people happy.
Thinking About Feeling
The foundation of becoming happy, Brooks and Winfrey argue, is metacognition, which literally means “thinking about thinking.” In this context, they use the term to describe thinking about and managing your emotions.
They introduce the idea using the metaphor of weather and construction: Sometimes, the weather impacts a construction crew’s ability to complete its work. But, they can’t change the weather or sit around wishing the weather were different. Rather, they know ahead of time that bad weather will happen, make contingency plans accordingly, and manage projects in a way that accommodates the weather on any particular day.
Similarly, we can’t always control what happens to us. God allows bad things to happen, and we have to cope with them. Brooks and Winfrey share strategies to help reframe emotions so that we’re in charge, not them.
Replacing Our Idols
Brooks (who is Catholic) and Winfrey cite St. Thomas Aquinas, pointing to four idols “that occupy our days and waste our lives: money, power, pleasure, and prestige.” They say that the ability to manage our emotions makes those idols less distracting and enables us to build a happier life. They focus on four pillars to focus on instead of those idols: family, friendship, work, and faith. We can build a happy life on these four pillars.
Family
In the family pillar, Brooks and Winfrey focus a lot on conflict, which they say is “the cost of abundant love.” Managing conflict well, being positive and truthful, and forgiving each other are challenges that, if you can handle them well, can become “sources of growth.”
Friendship
Research tells us that happiness generally requires between one and 10 close friendships (other than our spouse). The specific number depends on the person and his or her personality, but even the most introverted people need close friends.
Work
“Engaging in work with your whole heart is one of the best ways to enjoy your days, get satisfaction from your accomplishments, and see meaning in your efforts,” Brooks and Winfrey write. “Work, at its best, is ‘love made visible,’ in the elegant words of the Lebanese poet Kahlil Gibran.”
Work can be a calling, a way to share the gifts God gave you, and even an offering to Him. But, everything in moderation—and Brooks and Winfrey warn against the very real physical and emotional dangers of workaholism and self-objectification (when you seek your whole identity and value in your work).
Faith
Finally, even secular social science research has found that some kind of faith life or search for the transcendent is necessary for true happiness. As Catholics, of course, we believe that the fullness of truth is found in the Catholic Church—but Winfrey and Brooks recommend spending some time each day in some kind of contemplation or prayer.
Ultimately, God is our source of joy. We will never find perfect joy until we reach Heaven, and we will never find any meaningful joy during our Earthly lives unless we find it in Him. Still, by grounding ourselves in Christ and following some of the tips in Build the Life You Want, we can find more happiness, no matter what storms may come.
Taryn DeLong is a Catholic wife and mother in North Carolina who serves as co-president and editor-in-chief of Catholic Women in Business. Her writing has appeared in publications such as FemCatholic, Natural Womanhood, CatholicMom.com, and Radiant Magazine, among others. Her first book, written with her co-president Elise Crawford Gallagher, will be out in fall 2024 from Ave Maria Press.
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