The Books Briefing: How to Be Happy
Everyone says they want to be happy. But do we mean the same thing? Your weekly guide to the best in books.
The debate over what happiness is, and how to achieve it, goes back thousands of years: As Arthur Brooks, an Atlantic contributing writer, points out, the Greek philosopher Epicurus believed that happiness involved freedom from mental disturbance and the absence of physical pain. In the Stoic school of thought, happiness could be found only in a virtuous life.
Contemporary research tends to point to external factors that influence our happiness: The anthropologist James Suzman, who spent 30 years The psychiatrist George Vaillant spent decades observing the lives of Harvard sophomores to find out if there was some type of formula for a good life: He that influence healthy aging, both physically and psychologically.
