versus those who focus on only misery and pain?

i've been pondering this for a bit...what is the difference, why can some people be happy with what they have, grateful for having it and spend their life joyously celebrating their blessings, while others focus on the more negative aspects of life, reveling in misery and pain, and then trying to inflict it upon those with a more...rosy view of the world.

i'm not saying rosy as in absolute denial of the nasties in this world, but being secure and confident enough with your life to address those issues, do what you can, and accept that you can not change anything in the world, except yourself, and what you have the influence over to change...

is it just luck of the draw, personal view, an approach to life...why is it some people get what they need, and others never seem to have the ability to get what they want...

is it a grand force dishing it out, or more human reasoning between hope and despair?

is the cup half full, or is it half empty?

The cup is neither half full nor half empty. It is at half capacity.

No, but seriously, pessimists will persistently looks for proof that they are right and, unfortunately, easily find it. Optimists are perpetually disappointed. Realists waste their lives trying to determine what is real.

Happiness is when you believe nothing to be innately true.

i'd have to disagree, i believe in a lot...maybe idealism is the key?

just gonna go out on a limb here.....i think happiness/sadness has to do with psychology more than philosophy........

well, i wasn't sure whether psychology would be a sience since it's the study of the mind, or philosophy because it's figuring out how the mind works...

oh....well, psychology is actually a study in science/medicine.....yet, philosophy is in itself a science as it is that which heeds way to new scientific discoveries.........here is something: ok, i'm always like "oooh, i study philosophy, blah blah blah"....i took a philo of the mind course and emotions were not brought up in at all; because, according to science, emotions are based on bahviorism-like-ideals.....emotions are characteristics of the body.......however, i do not quite agree because it does seem that emotions definately have prescence within the mind....and i would even go as far to sepculate that emotions might be (at least one) connection between the mind and the body

well, i'm sure they are related to the body on some level...if you get hurt, you're definitly sad, and if someone hurt you, then you get angry...so i can see the physical ties to emotion...

but you don't believe it to be innately true.

depends on what it is...

exactly.

I fit perfectly well in this subject of your's Jordyn. I'm glad that you've made a post about it. But i'm pissed that I can't answer it. I was sitting here jotting down a few things to your post. Maybe it's because I can't find the right words that I want to jot down in here. But don't worry i'll come back and try to post.

there's just so much to happiness and the entire realm of emotion in general...it would seem even when people have their greatest happiness, they occasionally feel something is lacking...is it human nature to always want?

can man as a creature ever be truly happy, or because we are...animals, never achieve a sense of...emotional completeness?

Life can only be happy if something joyous occurs.

not all joys are large displays, it's the little joys in life that mean so much more...how many styles of happiness are there? There's material happiness, emotional happiness, content happiness, jovial happiness...maybe it all goes back around to being a state of mind? are joy and happiness the same emotion, or different experiences, related.

All one must do to find happiness in this world is to find God and the rest will fall into place for you .

Now im not saying ya gotta go to a church etc. but live right with the One in your thoughts and deeds and yer covered ..

Yeah self gets into this with the more religious ( book followers ) as self is NOT yer typical example of a God follower by public eyes lol ..

hmmm.....interesting, but i don't think its very justified......your saying that happiness for yourself (the self) depends on another........that doesn't seem very happy to me

Happiness is something that needs to be worked on, like anything else in your life. I believe you have to find your own tools for happiness, whether it be through religion, meditation, awareness. I believe we can alter the chemical reactions in our brains using different methods and disciplines.

so you think happiness is something based solely on physical properties?

No, because I believe we have both physical and spiritual(metaphysical) components.

yet you said "chemical reactions"..............and bravo for being a substantial dualist....or a dualist of sorts......you are correct