I like to use Hegel’s ideas in the form of a simple set of questions to help temper my nature. Perhaps this checklist can be useful to you as well.
1. Where can I find happiness in the ordinary, unremarkable points in my life? What gifts am I overlooking because they are not bright and shiny, although they are beautiful in their smallness? Perhaps this is a peaceful evening at home, a quiet walk before dawn, or a little contemplation over a delicious cup of coffee.
2. Am I looking for a lift in my mood today from my personal ambitions and primal drives? This is Mother Nature with her false promise that satisfying this or that urge will give me the satisfaction I seek. Instead, what individual desire can I shed today?
3. Am I asserting my views in a way that ignores others or is disrespectful to their dignity? Am I attached to my opinions as if they were precious jewels? How can I let go of my own rightness today and listen with love more to others?
4. How might I balance my own needs and desires with those of my family and community today? How can I be a better spouse, a better parent, a better colleague and friend, and a better citizen?If you’re anything like me, there’s little danger that the fire of your individualistic nature will be extinguished by this interrogation.
Instead, it should just sand down your edges a bit, make you more cognizant of your strong self-focus. With that awareness to keep you in check, you might just find yourself happier as a result.
— Arthur C. Brooks, from “Hegel’s Rules for a Happier Life” (The Atlantic, March 6, 2025)
Good info
“Instead, it should just sand down your edges a bit, make you more cognizant of your strong self-focus. With that awareness to keep you in check, you might just find yourself happier as a result.” Bam! It’s a great checklist – and I nodded with unity between self-focus and finding the joy in moments outside of one’s self. Thanks Dave
Yes! Thanks Mimi.
well said. the sanding of the rough, helps a lot and goes long way, not perfection, but with an easier feel and less splinters
Less Splinters! Yes!
“Where can I find happiness in the ordinary, unremarkable points in my life? What gifts am I overlooking because they are not bright and shiny, although they are beautiful in their smallness?” This hit me big time. It’s not an exact fit and yet….
Yesterday I joined my fellow Princeton Club members for a tour of our local hospital…thought it would be interesting to see what was happening ‘behind the scenes.’ The hospital is something I take for granted, it’s there when ya need it, but I don’t think much about how it works or rather the MANY individuals who make it work.
I walked away so inspired by the practices and accomplishments of a legion of doctors, nurses and ancillary staff. Dedicated people doing important work, oftentimes in the shadows. Brahms’ Lullaby plays throughout the hospital every time a baby is born, some 5,000 times each year. How lovely is that? The trauma center treats over 1500 patients every year, helping people in their most frightening and vulnerable moments. The AI team employs tech to make every department run more smoothly, predicting patient loads three days out based on a plethora of indicators, from weather to holidays to day of the week, frequently anticipating the number of patients the trauma ward will have in a given day within one…amazing.
The experience took me out of myself for a few hours and made me realize that despite all the sturm and drang surrounding us of late, some things still work. And for that I am incredibly grateful, and somehow a bit more mindful of my many blessings.
Wow. Amazing Lori. Thanks for sharing. Comment of the Month (Year!)
{Blushing}…awww, thanks pal….
All*
“Better than you found it”
Dammit, another great Should! Why’d I read it? Why am I always glad that I did? 😉👍
Smiling! Thank you!
Thank YOU.
I confess that Brooks incessant use of the word “happiness” often turns me away from his work; I suppose you can label me a bit “snobby,” insofar as I read that word as a “mushy, Hallmark-kind-of-word” that far from piques my intellectual curiosity. So perhaps it was the use of Hegel’s ideas that drew to me read this morning. I know, I know, “get over it” I say to myself. So yes, I liked this piece a lot, because of its beautiful foray into dense ideas, complicated ideas and difficult original texts. It’s not like I find reading these philosophers a pleasurable, easy breezy activity, but I prefer wrestling with layers of meaning, blah blah blah. The tension between Individualism and community consciousness certainly speaks to our entire political ideological divide, oh, that little thing…but more specifically, to my own daily values. I want to be a “team player,” someone concerned with the welfare of the whole, but my individualism pushes back…so yes, I’m IN the very crosshairs that Brooks explores. Do I want this “happiness” that he writes about? Those calm and more peaceful periods of contentment? Of course I do. Yet, it’s the moments of tension that drive me, dare I say, drives us to explore how to make our lives “better” and sometimes that does not always procure “happiness,” but more purpose and truth. Yes, I want both…and yes, the path is somewhere in between, as usual. Thanks for the spark this morning.
Brilliant comment that has me still noodling it. Thank you.
This speaks to me, just a little earlier I posted a quote on Little Happinesses which is similar to the thoughts in Number 1 here. In recent years, I’ve come to value a general contentment over happiness, with small moments of wonder providing small bites of happiness. There’s so much emphasis on being happy all the time, I wonder how it affects overall day to day wellbeing.
So true!
I’m all for anything that deepens our ability to appreciate life. How wonderful that Brooks instituted this course at Harvard…all schools at all levels would do well to riff on this theme.
Yes!