A
recent article in The Washington Post
identified a rising “sea of despair” among the white working class and a surge
in suicides from 1999 to 2015, when a record high of 600,000 Americans took
their own lives. In a country as free and as prosperous as the United States of
America, where the pursuit of happiness is enshrined as an unalienable right in
the Declaration of Independence, why do so many of its citizens seem so increasingly,
desperately unhappy?
That paradox is what
drove Emily Esfahani Smith to write the important new book The Power of Meaning: Crafting a Life That
Matters. Smith, with a master’s degree in positive psychology, is an
editor at Stanford’s Hoover Institution where she manages the Ben Franklin
Circles Project, the aim of which is to build community and purpose across the
country. Her writing has appeared in The
Atlantic, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, The New Criterion, and more.
Smith points out
that the boom in positive psychology since the late ‘80s has spawned an army of
personal coaches, motivational speakers, and celebrities pushing the “gospel of
happiness,” but the “happiness frenzy” has failed to deliver on its promise.
“Indeed,” she writes, “social scientists have uncovered a sad irony – chasing
happiness actually makes people unhappy.”
It turns out that what we should be pursuing is not happiness but meaning, and those who choose the latter ultimately live fuller and happier lives – even though meaning and happiness sometimes are at odds with each other and the meaningful life incurs more stress and anxiety than the “happy” life. What does meaningful mean? It means that people see their lives as significant and worthwhile, believe their lives make sense, and feel driven by a sense of purpose.
One significant
insight from the book is that “meaning is not something we create within
ourselves and for ourselves. Rather, meaning lies largely in others,” Smith
notes. “To Kant, the question is not what makes you happy,” she continues. “The
question is how to do your duty, how to best contribute – or, as the theologian
Frederick Buechner put it, your vocation lies ‘where your deep gladness and the
world’s deep hunger meet.’”
The pursuit of
happiness takes all manner of forms, of course, but they will all fall short
unless they can provide satisfying answers to two questions that lie at the
roots of philosophy, religion, and art: “What is the meaning of existence?” and
“How can I lead a meaningful life?” The
Power of Meaning maps out the paths to the answers of those questions.
In her research for
the book, Smith identified recurring themes that she calls the four pillars of
meaning: Belonging, Purpose, Storytelling, and Transcendence. “They are sources
of meaning that cut through every aspect of our existence,” and they are
accessible to everyone. Belonging is the sense that we matter to others, that
we feel we are part of a community of like-minded people who appreciate our
value. Purpose, of course, means an overarching goal – whether large or small –
that serves as a sort of through-line in our lives and impels us to persist
even through suffering. Storytelling is the process whereby we craft –
consciously or not – a coherent narrative that helps us shape a positive
identity for ourselves and makes sense of our lives. Transcendence is the transformative
mystical experience – “a brush with mystery,” Smith calls it – that enlarges
our perception of ourselves to include a sense of connection to something bigger and more important than ourselves. It is the moment when we leave behind our
temporal anxieties and embrace the serenity of a higher reality.
Although the book
is grounded in psychological theories and studies, it is far from a dry read.
Insights abound on every page. Smith is a compelling storyteller and skillfully
engrosses the reader in instructive examples from the lives of individuals
ranging from Tolstoy, Camus, and Will Durant to the residents of a Chesapeake
Bay island, the members of a society of medieval re-creationists, a Detroit
zookeeper, a Mumbai photographer, and many others, including her own
experiences growing up in a Sufi family. Those stories often are woven from a
common pattern in which the subjects, or characters if you will, move from
suffering to salvation, from transgression to redemption, from aimlessness to
meaning.
At the risk of
overselling the book, I can hardly overstate how deeply the denizens of America’s
fast-paced, socially disconnected, shallowly distracting, and endlessly
materialistic culture need to absorb the revelations contained within it. I
have read the book twice, a rarity nearly on the scale of an appearance by
Halley’s comet, and wish that I had been exposed to its wisdom decades ago when
I was lost and flailing about, directionless.
Unhappiness, of
course, is not limited to the United States. For untold millions here and
elsewhere, “the search for meaning on earth has become incredibly urgent – yet
ever more elusive,” as Smith puts it.
The good news is
that today there is “a larger shift in our society toward meaning.”
Dissatisfied people of all walks of life are pushing back against the frenetic
nature of modern life and seeking ways to enhance those four pillars of meaning.
Nothing will propel them on their search faster and more purposefully than sitting
down with a copy of Emily Esfahani Smith’s The
Power of Meaning.
From Acculturated, 7/21/17
