The Concept of Happiness

I’ve been wondering about this for the longest time: What is happiness? It’s never a constant thing – in fact, different eras have had different ideas as to what makes their inhabitants happy. For us now, it’s wealth, and the accumulation of material possessions. In this day and age, we often are implicitly told if you’re not rich and don’t have a lot of stuff, then you won’t find much joy in life.

To simplify this rather philosophical notion, let me ask one question: Because we don’t own fancy cars, a big house and have lots of spending money, does that mean we’re not happy? Do we need to live the perceived lifestyles of celebrities, rappers and billionaires in order to obtain it?