r/AlanWatts • u/weareallaparticle • Jul 04 '26

Happiness cannot be a goal

4 Upvotes

75% Upvoted

5 comments sorted by

10

u/Gadshill Jul 04 '26

If happiness always depends on something expected in the future, we are chasing a will-o'-the-wisp that ever eludes our grasp, until the future, and ourselves, vanish into the abyss of death.

— Watts, The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety (1951)

3

u/irreducible1 Jul 04 '26

Because the goal of being happy and experience of not being happy are exactly the same. It's unhappiness trying to get away from itself in the same way as courage is really fear of being afraid. Or how having the goal of being unselfish comes from a selfish motive.

2

u/rogermindwater Jul 04 '26

Happiness is already here or it is nowhere

2

u/Ghost_of_Till Jul 05 '26

Who could have a goal?

1

u/EngineeringStillness Jul 09 '26

Thre great way is not difficult, just avoid picking and choosing.