I cannot think of a person who is not glad we’re turning the page on 2023 and moving into a New Year, if not for themselves, for others. Global wars, economic struggles and inflation, personal loss and the proliferation of loneliness, depression, divisions, drugs and demoralization experienced by tens of millions of Americans has hurt if not crippled nearly every family and, hence, our society. You know the statistics.
So, the big question is: Will a new year bring us brighter times? Will you and yours be happier in 2024? The answer is definitely YES, at least it can be. However, it genuinely doesn’t take a new year to find it, including in times we’ve suffered great hardships. Let me explain.
First, America definitely needs a reset. Most of us can use a new beginning in a big way. The truth is, most people are waiting for personal hardships and a bad economy to disappear so that their lives can get “back to normal.” But what is “normal,” and were most of us really happy there?
Studies show that since 1972 to the present, throughout roughly nine presidents, salaries have increased across the fields of employment. House ownership and living space have increased. Material goods in our homes have increased. Technological speed, commerce and social connections via the internet have radically increased. And for those who don’t have much of the above, even government growth and entitlements have increased.
Yet, throughout the past five decades, happiness has decreased, according to Arthur C. Brooks, in his very insightful column a few years back in The Atlantic, “Are We Trading Our Happiness for Modern Comforts?”
Brooks, a professor of the practice of public leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School and a professor of management practice at the Harvard Business School, explained, “But amid these advances in quality of life across the income scale, average happiness is decreasing in the U.S. The General Social Survey, which has been measuring social trends among Americans every one or two years since 1972, shows a long-term, gradual decline in happiness – and rise in unhappiness – from 1988 to the present.”
Dr. Brooks further explained:
“Empty consumerism and soulless government are the traditional two explanations for our modern alienation. These days, there is a brand-new one: tech. The tech revolution promised us our heart’s desires: everything you want to know at the click of a mouse [or touch of an app]; the ability to become famous to strangers; anything you want to buy, delivered to your door in days without you having to leave home.
“But our happiness has not increased as a result – on the contrary. Mounting evidence shows that media and technology use predict deleterious psychological and physiological outcomes, especially among young people. This is particularly true in the case of social-media use. Psychologist Jean M. Twenge has shown that social media increases depression, especially among girls and young women.”
Brooks words remind me of a great book I just finished that was written nearly 30 years ago. It is called “Christianity for Modern Pagans” by Peter Kreeft. It is a reflection on selected Pensees by Blaise Pascal, the brilliant 17th century scientist, philosopher and inventor. Pascal’s main point is that humans create and are consumed with (some say, addicted to) “diversions” in order to experience lasting happiness, all the while running from their real selves and the true path of happiness. What amazes me is that Pascal wrote these things centuries before TV, Super Bowls, eBay, Netflix, social media and internet commerce.
Kreeft summarized the conclusion: “A society or individual with the most amusements and diversions is not the happiest, but the most unhappy. Therefore, our society is the unhappiest. All the social indicators bear out this conclusion: depression, divorce, suicide, anxiety, drugs, violence [workaholism, chaotic busyness?] – you name it. The point is simple, we never want to divert ourselves from happiness, only from unhappiness” (p. 169).
Or in the words of Dr. Brooks: “We don’t get happier as our society gets richer, because we chase the wrong things.” Our “diversions,” as Pascal wrote, don’t stop inner conflicts but only temporarily cover them up.
Winning the culture war for true happiness might be America’s greatest battle, and it’s waging right now at full tilt within hearts and minds across the union.
Dare I say, 2023 hasn’t all been in vain. As tough and even tragic as it’s been for so many, it’s stripped us of our “diversions” and forced us to face the real us. And as painful as that might be, like fall leaves blown away in the wind, it’s also revealed the path to victory and happiness.
Dr. Brooks offers three steps of advice to help get us back to the roots of true happiness, wisdom that can definitely help us in 2024, especially as we pursue a more “normal life” in the aftermath of this last year. It’s worth your very slow read, and maybe even a second read:
- Don’t buy that thing
Marketers know that if they can grab hold of your brain chemistry – get you in a state of “hedonic consumption” in which your decisions are driven by pleasure more than utility – they can probably sell you something, whether you “need” it or not. But we can resist advertising’s pull on our emotions. Next time you are presented with the claim that this or that product will make you happy, channel your inner monk, and say five times, out loud: “This will not bring me satisfaction.” Then imagine yourself in six months looking back on this decision, pleased that you made it correctly.
- Don’t put your faith in princes (or politicians)
If I complain that government is soulless or that a politician is making me unhappy – which I personally have done a thousand times – I am saying that I think government should have a soul or that politicians can and should bring me happiness. This is naive at best.
Some of history’s greatest tyrants have promised that a government or political leader could bring joy to life. In 1949, the Soviet government promoted the slogan “Beloved Stalin is the people’s happiness.” Few leaders have delivered more misery and death than Stalin – but looking at this slogan makes me think twice about my own expectations of governments and politicians. [Don’t many today put their same hope in a president or next one?]
- Don’t trade love for anything
I havereferenced in this column before a famous study that followed hundreds of men who graduated from Harvard from 1939 to 1944 throughout their lives, into their 90s. The researchers wanted to know who flourished, who didn’t, and the decisions they had made that contributed to that well-being. The lead scholar on the study for many years was the Harvard psychiatrist George Vaillant, who summarized the results in his book “Triumphs of Experience.” Here is his summary, in its entirety: “Happiness is love. Full stop.”
The current director of the study, the psychiatrist Robert Waldinger, filled in the details. He told me in a recent interview that the subjects who reported having the happiest lives were those with strong family ties, close friendships and rich romantic lives. The subjects who were most depressed and lonely late in life – not to mention more likely to be suffering from dementia, alcoholism, or other health problems – were the ones who had neglected their close relationships.
What this means is that anything that substitutes for close human relationships in your life is a bad trade. The study I mentioned above about uses of money makes this point. But the point goes much deeper. You will sacrifice happiness if you crowd out relationships with work, drugs, politics, or social media.
The world encourages us to love things and use people. But that’s backwards. Put this on your fridge and try to live by it: Love people; use things.
And if love and romance are our path to true happiness, they find no greater pinnacle and purpose than in our sacred romance: our relationship with God.
The truth is, all good things (including romance in relationships) come down from God, but those good things were never intended to fill up our hearts or bring ultimate satisfaction.
I think America’s founders knew that. That’s why they connected a Creator with our happiness in the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
It is not coincidental that Thomas Jefferson’s original rough draft of the Declaration, which is on exhibit in the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., began with the words: “We hold these truths to be sacred & undeniable ….” Sacred truths? Yes!
Scholars believe one possible source for Jefferson’s thought and phrase comes from the “Commentaries on the Laws of England” published by Sir William Blackstone, from 1765 to 1769, which are often cited in the laws of the United States.
Blackstone argued that God “has so intimately connected, so inseparably interwoven the laws of eternal justice with the happiness of each individual, that the latter cannot be attained but by observing the former; and, if the former be punctually obeyed, it cannot but induce the latter.”
That is why in my New York Times bestseller, “Black Belt Patriotism,” my closing chapter is on “Reawakening the American Dream,” or helping people to really understand how America’s founders intended us to enjoy life, liberty and happiness.
The one constant in life is also the source of all things in the Declaration: the Creator. Our founders trusted not in the supply but the Supplier to acquire life, liberty and happiness, and encouraged us to do the same.
There’s a verse in the Bible that summarizes it for me: “Instruct those who are rich in this present world not to be conceited or to fix their hope on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly supplies us with all things to enjoy.”
The way I put it is: When you’ve got God, you’ve got the gold – and all you need to achieve and experience true love, happiness and the American Dream.
The man who has studied and documented the topic of personal happiness better than anyone else in my opinion is our friend and prolific author, Randy Alcorn, in his book titled simply, “Happiness.” If there is one book you should read in 2024, this is the one, and very affordable at still holiday discount prices (now half off at only $12 from Randy’s website).
The fact is, you’ve had the key to happiness all along. Like Dorothy with her ruby slippers, God is with you now, and was with you even during the hard times of 2023. The good news about that is that we don’t have to wait for a new year, a new day or a new anything to start experiencing happiness. You can have happiness right here, right now, if we turn to the Lord for happiness.
It’s why Randy Alcorn also wrote in his Introduction to “Happiness”: “Anyone who waits for happiness will never be happy.”
Are there better resolutions to make then spiritual ones? Indeed, they “hold blessings for this life and the life to come.”
My wife, Gena, and I wish you and yours happiness today, in the New Year and always!
This article was originally published by the WND News Center.
This post originally appeared on WND News Center.