On Monday, the U.N. General Assembly asked the tiny Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan to host a daylong special session on Happiness. As Patrick Stewart, author of a CNN article called The U.N. Happiness Summit, puts it:
What the heck is going on in Turtle Bay?
I don’t think it is any coincidence that Bhutan is a Buddhist country. Buddhism 101 famously explains how happiness is tied not to external happenings but to internal states of mind. As Geshe Kelsang puts it on the very first page of Modern Buddhism:*
In recent years our knowledge of modern technology has increased considerably, and as a result we have witnessed remarkable material progress, but there has not been a corresponding increase in human happiness.
My grandfather lived to 100, through some of the most dramatic changes in human history. A cardiac doctor with an inquisitive mind and big heart, he was always fascinated in external development and technology, and drove all over Europe in a car almost as soon as they were invented. He kept abreast of all modern progress through magazines, TV, and conversations with anyone who would talk to him, and, had he lived long enough, I bet he would have surfed the net and enjoyed every minute of it. When he was about 98 I asked him what he thought about all the changes he had seen since 1902. He told me that he found them exhilarating. But, he added unprompted, they also added a layer of complication to life such that he felt people in general were not as happy as they used to be. Life was too fast for many people. People had become more materialistic as a result of all the societal emphasis on scientific, technological and material development, and although it was necessary for us to have food, shelter and medical care, materialism itself didn’t make anyone actually happy. He told me he personally managed to stay happy and enjoy watching the rate of progress due to his close, stable relationships with his family, and especially due to his inner life [which I wrote something about here.]
That happiness is a state of mind, and therefore depends on what we are doing with our mind, is obvious when we stop to think of it, but often we are so busy chasing dreams (or trying to avoid nightmares) related to fame and fortune that we don’t stop to think of it. We get caught up in material markers, not spiritual ones, and our life is poorer and more anxious as a result.
But perhaps the tide is turning a little? In answer to the question he asks above, Patrick Stewart replies:
More than meets the eye, in fact. One of the hottest fields in development economics has been, believe it or not, happiness research…. In recent years, a small but influential group of economists has concluded that traditional measurements of national progress, typically couched in terms of per capita Gross National Product (GNP), don’t actually tell us much about the wellbeing of citizens. This is partly a critique of modernization theory, which suggests that human welfare advances in lockstep with material enrichment.
Who is happier, your average Iowan or your average sub-Saharan African? We might assume this to be a daft question, but according to this article some of the highest levels of happiness have been recorded in low-income countries in sub-Saharan Africa.
When I was in my late teens I lived for a while in Ghana, West Africa, where my father was posted as a diplomat, and I couldn’t fail to notice how cheerful and basically happy most people were. Even after a 1981 military coup, when supplies started to dwindle and life became more uncertain, my own and my parents’ Ghanaian friends (with some exceptions of course) seemed determined to maintain their joie de vivre. (We had quite a number of parties staying out after curfew, making the most of being unable to drive home.) I’m not recommending anyone seek out a shortage of food, or soldiers driving around in trucks waving guns, of course, but for me it was a pretty compelling example of the power of attitude.
As for Bhutan, it is apparently the happiest country in Asia and the eighth happiest in the world. Their gauge of national progress is the Gross National Happiness (GNH) index, replacing the GNP! As Stewart says:
Improbably, the concept has taken off….
So much so that the U.N. General Assembly has passed a Resolution entitled: “Happiness: Towards a Holistic Approach to Development”, conceding:
The gross domestic product indicator by nature was not designed to and does not adequately reflect the happiness and well-being in a country.
As a society I agree it’d be nice to discourage “unsustainable patterns of production and consumption” and have a more “equitable and balanced approach to economic growth that promotes sustainable development, poverty eradication, happiness and well-being of peoples.” Positive attitudes, views, values, and intentions will be crucial for bringing these about. Of course we are all individually responsible for our own states of mind, but as we also always imitate each other, and attitudes are infectious, don’t you think it’d be quite fabulous if the concept of a GNH index did take off in our own society, and our governments heeded the call to integrate a “happiness agenda” into public policy?!
And in case you are concerned that all this discussion in the U.N. might just lead to a whole different type of Big Brother, one who says, “You WILL be happy, or else!”, the author 
reassures:
The Buddhists of Bhutan have no designs on the capitalist system, or the rest of our freedoms. In fact, the Land of the Thunder Dragon may have more in common with the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave than you might imagine. After all, they share the fundamental aspiration enunciated in America’s founding document: the pursuit of happiness.
7 Comments
Thanks Luna! I was just told yesterday by a work associate that there is a documentary about this called the Economics of Happiness. May be worth a watch?
This is one reason I picked up a Dharma book in the first place. Imagine how happy I was to read what Geshe-la said about no corresponding happiness in our modern world to match the percieved material improvements. The more I practice Dharma the more I see how having an ordinary view of the world is not all that progressive, spiritually speaking!
I just loved this posting. Thanks Luna! I have embarked on a second version of my career as a financial advisor and the best part is how I get to do things so much differently. I volunteer for SCORE (a resource arm of the Small Business Administration) giving free business counseling one day a week. I found a business partner who has a spiritual bent (totally different tradition) to her business approach. We have a happiness matrix as part of our business plan. Once my basic financial needs are met I am definitely on the happiness train to a much different destination. A place built on compassion and a much deeper understanding of the human condition and how to construct a life building a longer lasting sustainable state of happiness. As Geshe-la says in “Eight Steps to Happiness” – “Happiness from a different source!”
Sometimes we may think long term on our path, however we do choose what gives us instant benefit at any given moment. The reason we become despondent in our practice is because our expectations are so high, we want bliss on tap without putting effort in. Spiritual materialism is the new post modernity that all social scientists are discussing at present. It raises questions that we all should ask ourselves regarding our own journey. Are we looking for a quick fix and is spirtuality becoming just another commodity in our life? Interesting questions!!
Consumerism apparently has become the new spirituality. The quick fix, buy it now, has replaced traditional values and commitment. We may have advanced in a materialistic way, yet weve lost the sense of commitment and based our happiness on a lifestyle we can buy.
Instead of committing to one path that leads to happiness, we pick and choose, and spirituality becomes just another loose concept that’s wrapped up with social status and identity. The countries that have not progressed or advanced like the West seem to still share common values and commitment to one journey, and happiness is much more apparant.
We may now live in a modern world, but are we any happier? Do we ask what religion can do for us on a personal inner spiritual level, or is it tied up identity and popular culture? A question we need to ask ourselves.
This is perceptive. I think, especially, you are getting at something quite significant in asking whether as members of a society we are now trying to follow a spiritual path to lasting spiritual results, as it were, or just picking and choosing our spirituality based on what is popular at any given moment and perhaps on what gives us a spiritual high. Spiritual materialism would be the term for that, I think. What do others think? I’d love to hear.
I often hear from people that they favour Buddhism, and like the idea of living spiritually. But there doesn’t seem to be any depth to these ideas, so of course they stand little chance agaist the perceived ‘happiness’ money can bring.
It’s like folk are seeing the light, then turning away from it because the gold’s glitter is more enticing.
This is just the impression I get from people I meet – they sense that money can’t buy happiness, but don’t have faith in an alternative. Good on Bhutan for showing there is another way.