The Pursuit of Happiness

Thanksgiving over and diving into Advent. Here is the tenth and last in a lovely list of ten lessons essential for every high school graduate preparing to venture out into the “real world.” While Elaine Bransford, the AP literature teacher who composed them did so for students, they carry applicability for us all. Number 10:

You should understand that the relationship between happiness and fun is a complicated one.

We seem to go through this American life expecting ease and entertainment, so much so that when the hard work necessary to make it through life inevitably presents itself, we press back. Some of this is what the retailers have sold us. Most of it we have bought ourselves. Surviving hardship elicits happiness in ways that ease and prosperity can’t. Adversity clarifies priorities in ways that abundance only obscures.