Positive Psychology - What Makes People Happy is Pleasure

Smart Alek: I have been working very hard lately.learning how to become a happy person requires you
Soon I will have my great reward.to understand and develop the activities that you find
Aleks Psych: What will that be?the most pleasurable and know how to use them in
Smart Alek: I will never work again.order to increase the quality of your life. I have broken
Aleks Psych: What will you do if you do not work?up the pleasurable things that make people happy into
Smart Alek: What else, expect everyone else to look2 categories, they are Regular Pleasures and Reward
after me and vehemently complain if they try to stop!Pleasures. In daily life, it is important to have a few
Their frustration and pain will be my ultimate pleasure.standard pleasures that are practiced regularly to
All positive psychology practitioners agree that onemake life enjoyable but in order to pull yourself
crucial aspect in the psychology of what makestowards growing as a person and achieving your
people happy is the development of pleasure. Thegreater goals, you need to create reward pleasures
seeking of pleasure underlines everything that we do.that you can only receive once you have earned
Even when we decide to do an activity that we knowthem.
will not be pleasurable in the short term, we do it in theOne of the flaws in the common psychology of what
hope of it leading to an eventual outcome that will bemakes people happy in modern life, is many people
pleasurable.are so used to immediate gratification that they will
The research into how to become a happy personnever obtain the full pleasurable feeling that comes
has shown that the pleasurable feelings and things thatfrom a reward that they have worked to earn.
make people happy in the short term are not the mostCompared to previous generations, luxury item debts
important factors in living a fulfilling life. Having a life filledare ludicrously high, and yet current generations are not
only with pleasurable activities will not sustain mosthappier. That is because the novelty of a fancy toy or
people as we need to have a greater sense ofexperience that you did not work hard to obtain wears
purpose that is effortful and aimed at benefiting others.off quite quickly. You can not live a non challenging
I will address these issues in other articles. However,lifestyle and expect to feel intense pleasure. However,
becoming a martyr is not how to become a happyif your toy or experience is an honest and fair reward
person either. A life with little to no pleasure will lead tobased on what you have accomplished, the potential
burn out.pleasure of that reward once obtained is considerably
When it comes to the psychology of happiness,greater.