{"id":407,"date":"2018-10-07T09:58:26","date_gmt":"2018-10-07T16:58:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/create.twu.ca\/insightsofakahuna\/?p=407"},"modified":"2019-10-23T12:45:21","modified_gmt":"2019-10-23T19:45:21","slug":"the-secret-to-happiness-is-something-to-do","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/create.twu.ca\/insightsofakahuna\/2018\/10\/07\/the-secret-to-happiness-is-something-to-do\/","title":{"rendered":"Light From Many Lamps I: The secret to happiness is something to do."},"content":{"rendered":"

In John Burroughs story, \u2018The Secret to Happiness is Something To Do,\u2019 he practically relays the message of the story in the title itself. John argues that \u2018the best thing for a man is that which keeps the currents going – the physical, the moral, the intellectual currents going\u2026 Take away the occupation of all men, and what a wretched world it would be (Watson, 1998).\u2019 Also earlier in Burroughs\u2019 story he argued that men (and women) having congenial work is more important than any other common associations to happiness such as money, power, fame, or friends because those who lack either money, power, fame, or friends will constantly strive for them (Watson, 1998). A woman with money, for example, isn\u2019t necessarily happy because wealth may have come at the cost of true friendships or love which then is something she thinks she needs to be happy whereas a poor woman with good friends may feel that money is what would make her happy. These things are all the product of people wanting what they don\u2019t have. What many fail to realize though, is that it is in the journey of attaining these goals that produces true happiness, not necessarily the end goal itself. It also seems Watson was aware of Maslow\u2019s hierarchy of needs as he mentioned that people also need food, shelter, and clothing to feel any sort of happiness before they can find the sort of work that\u2019s fulfilling. This is similar to Maslow\u2019s idea in that physical and security needs take priority over any kind of happiness but people should work towards \u2018self-actualization\u2019 which partially involve finding congenial work to truly experience happiness.<\/span><\/p>\n

I wholeheartedly agree with Burroughs\u2019 story about finding true happiness in work that you find fulfilling. As someone personally trying to adapt the principles of transformational servant leadership in my interactions with others, one of the things I try to do is help enrich the lives of those around me by helping them find their passions. To me, pursuing passions is one of the best reasons to get up everyday as I feel it gives life purpose and direction. With each passing day, it feels like another productive step closer to achieving my dreams. For those around me who feel lost in what to do in their lives, my best advice to them is pursue the things you love to do and try to incorporate those passions either in your job, your recreational time, as a side business or with your family. And if they\u2019re not quite sure what they identify as passions, then those are journeys that I would be happy to take with them.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

References<\/b><\/p>\n

Maslow, A., & Lewis, K. J. (1987). Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. <\/span>Salenger Incorporated<\/span><\/i>, <\/span>14<\/span><\/i>, 987.<\/span><\/p>\n

McLeod, S. (2018). Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs [Digital image]. Retrieved October 7, 2018, from https:\/\/www.simplypsychology.org\/maslow.html<\/p>\n

Watson, L. E. (1988). <\/span>Light from many lamps<\/span><\/i>. New York: Simon & Schuster.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n\n

\n <\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In John Burroughs story, \u2018The Secret to Happiness is Something To Do,\u2019 he practically relays the message of the story in the title itself. John argues that \u2018the best thing for a man is that which keeps the currents going – the physical, the moral, the intellectual currents going\u2026 Take away the occupation of all […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":889,"featured_media":408,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[114,117,97,118,120],"tags":[121],"class_list":["post-407","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","category-ldrs-500","category-ldrs500","category-light-from-many-lamps","category-unit-2","tag-unit-2","has-post-title","has-post-date","has-post-category","has-post-tag","has-post-comment","has-post-author",""],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/create.twu.ca\/insightsofakahuna\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/create.twu.ca\/insightsofakahuna\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/create.twu.ca\/insightsofakahuna\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/create.twu.ca\/insightsofakahuna\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/889"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/create.twu.ca\/insightsofakahuna\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=407"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/create.twu.ca\/insightsofakahuna\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":420,"href":"https:\/\/create.twu.ca\/insightsofakahuna\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407\/revisions\/420"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/create.twu.ca\/insightsofakahuna\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/408"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/create.twu.ca\/insightsofakahuna\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=407"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/create.twu.ca\/insightsofakahuna\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=407"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/create.twu.ca\/insightsofakahuna\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}