What is Happiness? 

How can one achieve it? 

What must we do to achieve happiness? 

So, today I went to a special guest lecture @ yorku concerning Happiness, Racism & Empire. It barely touched upon the importance of racism and colonialism but I guess she wanted to keep our attention but playing up the pop culture aspect of Happiness. So, here I am on my computer at 3 in the morning wondering how can I define my happiness? Is what I think that makes me happy really and truly makes me happy? It's a huge concept to grasp but I really think that society is told and forced to believe that certain 'rights of passages', events or even possessions would and should make us happy.

For the longest time, I worked really hard in school and did everything possible to keep my parents happy. A couple of years ago I went to my parents confused and asked them for some guidance regarding the direction of my education. All they said is "Do whatever you want, I just want you to be happy." Ok, I must admit, it's a pretty awesome thing for my parents to say but when I look deeper into its meaning. I figured out something. Happiness to them is - graduating, getting a good paying job, getting married and having kids. Why are all these 'rights of passages' what we consider to make us happy? Why is marriage the true definition of happiness? Why should the unit of two people be the very underlining pinning of how our society should behave? I don't know perhaps I am thinking too much. It's just interesting how everything perceives that certain things would bring us happiness when we don't know the very definition of happiness. 

To be rich, to find love....these very factors should make us happy but does it really? Or are we just tricking ourselves because society says  if you have these things then you should be happy? Who knows. I guessing I am just trying to figure out and define my own happiness. Regardless of society's norms or values, how should we define what happiness is? 

Just some food for thought.