The Impossible Dream

There will always be something to strive for. Without bad there's no good. Happiness is like a garden.

"The modern self is the product of this subjective turn, when the real self becomes internal (the mind in the English language; the soul in French, which has no word equivalent to mind), not some external thing embodied in robes of office or tools of a trade."

The parenthesis could have been avoided entirely because it is absurdly false. Luckily, that's irrelevant to the argument.

But no: the French language doesn't have to fallback to the soul by lack of a word for "mind". There is one.

Absolutely.

Happiness or any other emotion is just some chemicals in our brain. We can release those anytime we want (certainly it will take some practice)...

But America has built the culture of production and consumption. Most producers know that they're fooling people to buy their products, but anyway they're free to do it.

Certainly it is possible to maximize economic wealth through the production and consumption culture, but happiness will always remain hard to come by.

The sentiment, as expressed by Goethe adequately explains this human condition: “From desire I rush to satisfaction; from satisfaction I leap to desire“.

It’s a strong theme in Schopenhauer’s (and also therefore Nietzsche’s) writing. But I’ve found it most practically dealt with by Buddhism.

> Forbidden

> You don't have permission to access /happiness/impossible-dream on this server.

Sounds like an appropriate TL;DR

> Jefferson meant, I think, that we have a right to certain preconditions that will allow us to pursue happiness: freedom of speech, so we can speak our minds and learn from others; a career open to talents, so our efforts may be rewarded; freedom of worship, so we may find our way to heaven; and a free market, so we can pursue prosperity.

Yep, that's what he meant! Stop right there, sheesh!