If you live in the land of Disney, Hollywood and year round sun, you may think people in such a glamorous, fun filled place are happier than others. If so, you have some mistaken ideas about the nature of happiness. Many intelligent people still equate happiness with fun. The truth is that fun and happiness have a little or nothing in common. Fun is what we experience during an act. Happiness is what we experience after an act. It is deeper, more abiding emotion. Going for a picnic, a movie or watching your favorite sport, are fun activities that help us relax, temporarily forget our problems and maybe, even laugh. But they do not bring happiness, because their positive effects end when the fun ends.
I have thought that if Hollywood stars have a role to play, it is to teach us that happiness has nothing to do with fun. We all think that these beautiful individuals have constant access to glamorous parties, fancy cars, and expensive homes, everything that spells happiness. But in reality, celebrities reveal the unhappiness hidden beneath all their fun: depression, alcoholism, broken marriages, troubled children, and profound loneliness.
The way people cling to the belief that a fun filled, pain free life equals happiness actually diminishes their chances of ever attaining real happiness. If fun and pleasure are equated with happiness, then pain must be equated with unhappiness. But in fact, the opposite is true: more times than not, things that lead to happiness involve some pain.
Ask a bachelor why he resists marriage even though he finds dating to be less satisfying. If he’s honest, he will tell that he is afraid of making a commitment. For commitment is in fact quite painful. Single life is filled with fun, adventure, excitement. Marriage has such moments, but they are not its most distinguish features.
Similarly, couples who choose not to have children are deciding in favor of painless fun over painful happiness. I don’t know any parent who would choose the word fun to describe raising children. But at the same time, couples who decide not to have children ever experience the pleasure of hugging them or tucking them into bed or night. They never know the joys of watching a child grow up, of playing with a grandchild.
Of course I enjoy doing fun things. I like to play tennis, joke with kids, and probably have too many hobbies. But these forms of fun do not contribute in any real way to my happiness. More difficult endeavors, writing, raising children, creating a deep relationship with my husband, trying to do good in the world will bring me more happiness than can ever be found in fun, at least permanent of things.
Understanding and accepting that true happiness has nothing to do with fun is one of the most liberating realizations we can ever come to. The moment we understand that fun does not bring happiness, we begin to lead our lives differently. The effect can be, quite literally, life transforming.