The Happiness Myth

The author of the bestselling Doubt: A History turns her skeptical eye on what we do to try to be happy.The Happiness Myth is a fascinating cultural history that illuminates who we are today and why we live the way we do. It looks at ways of seeking happiness -- wisdom, drugs, money, bodies, and celebration -- and shows how many of our modern assumptions are very strange and will seem silly to future generations. In the Victorian age, people put skirts around their pianos so that you wouldn't see the legs. We are just as odd. They had bustles. We have small bustles we put under the skin -- as breast implants. We act like our allowed drugs are medicine but that drugs that were allowed in the past (mostly opium and weed in the West)were recreational. We just like drugs that keep your desk. Opium tonics were replaced by Zoloft for instance, because we drive cars and work ATM machines, so clear-headedness is what makes us decide that a given drug is recreational or curative. Even among common drugs: people used to think of drinking as interesting, it helped you make your move, make your confessions, and cry when it was time to cry. Now we treat it as a stupidity drug. Among the other things that have drawn praise for the book, has been that the questions raised here will be difficult for the Drug Warrior to manage.This book is philosophy and cultural studies, but it also helps alleviate anxiety. Happiness by historical perspective works because it liberates us from today's scolding, quasi-scientific messages that cause more guilt and anxiety than health and happiness. It also helps make sense of history.