Jump to content


Photo

Search For Happyness


  • Please log in to reply
30 replies to this topic

#21 Armen

Armen

    Veterinarian

  • Members
  • PipPipPipPipPip
  • 3,456 posts
  • Gender:Male
  • Location:Yerevan

Posted 12 August 2004 - 09:45 PM

QUOTE (anoushik @ Aug 12 2004, 09:38 PM)
So, what are you saying? I have no idea what we are discussing now. smile.gif Are you saying that every artist is unhappy and that their art is the product of their state of mind?

No, I am saying you can never tell. But content is usually not a good state of mind for creating something. Just like when you're hungry you're more active.

#22 ED

ED

    Քեռի

  • Nobility
  • 5,960 posts
  • Gender:Male
  • Location:Los Angeles
  • Interests:Music, traveling, Salvador Dali, Tolstoy, Sevak, Charents
    wine, sushi and lots lots more

Posted 12 August 2004 - 09:48 PM

If it wasn’t for the age old endless search for happiness this whole thing as we know it would collapse, I believe the search for happiness when possessed its easily abandoned in search for greater happiness. Its just the way it always was, is, and it’s going to be.

Edited by Edward, 12 August 2004 - 09:48 PM.


#23 gamavor

gamavor

    -= Nobility =-

  • Nobility
  • 5,049 posts
  • Location:Houston, TX

Posted 12 August 2004 - 09:53 PM

QUOTE (anoushik @ Aug 13 2004, 03:38 AM)
So, what are you saying? I have no idea what we are discussing now. smile.gif Are you saying that every artist is unhappy and that their art is the product of their state of mind?

I think Armen is trying to tell you that a great artist might be unhappy and still be great artist, or maybe happiness is not an issue for a great artist because he is always happy as a result of his greatness, or maybe his greatness makes him happy, thus his art great. It is simple as that! smile.gif

#24 Armen

Armen

    Veterinarian

  • Members
  • PipPipPipPipPip
  • 3,456 posts
  • Gender:Male
  • Location:Yerevan

Posted 12 August 2004 - 09:58 PM

QUOTE (gamavor @ Aug 12 2004, 09:53 PM)
I think Armen is trying to tell you that a great artist might be unhappy and still be great artist, or maybe happiness is not an issue for a great artist because he is always happy as a result of his greatness, or maybe his greatness makes him happy, thus his art great. It is simple as that! smile.gif

Gams, this is getting scary blink.gif smile.gif Anyway, you have my permission to post under my name smile.gif

#25 Anoushik

Anoushik

    Veteran

  • Members
  • PipPipPipPipPip
  • 3,973 posts
  • Gender:Female
  • Location:Los Angeles
  • Interests:Armenians, music, philosophy...

Posted 12 August 2004 - 10:00 PM

QUOTE (ArmenSarg @ Aug 12 2004, 07:45 PM)
No, I am saying you can never tell. But content is usually not a good state of mind for creating something. Just like when you're hungry you're more active.

ArmenSarg, when one is creating a work of art one has to follow countless number of rules. It's not that one suddenly comes up with a melody, develops this melody a bit and says that it's a symphony. In music, for example, one has to know and follow the harmonic rules and the differing musical forms. I'm sure the same applies to art. This already requires a lot of attention from the composer. The composer has to wholeheartedly dedicate himself to this work, that means he has to forget everything else around him and just surrender himself to composing that music. Again, I say, that if one is not content with oneself, if one is unhappy, that means that one is very much aware of himself and is not entirely thinking about his work. Of course, one can be unhappy about the work itself, like Beethoven, who constantly rewrote a piece of music that he had finished years before. Not being content with one's work has nothing to do with not being content with oneself. It is this difference that I'm talking about.

#26 Anoushik

Anoushik

    Veteran

  • Members
  • PipPipPipPipPip
  • 3,973 posts
  • Gender:Female
  • Location:Los Angeles
  • Interests:Armenians, music, philosophy...

Posted 12 August 2004 - 10:02 PM

QUOTE (gamavor @ Aug 12 2004, 07:53 PM)
I think Armen is trying to tell you that a great artist might be unhappy and still be great artist, or maybe happiness is not an issue for a great artist because he is always happy as a result of his greatness, or maybe his greatness makes him happy, thus his art great. It is simple as that! smile.gif

OK! tongue.gif

#27 Armen

Armen

    Veterinarian

  • Members
  • PipPipPipPipPip
  • 3,456 posts
  • Gender:Male
  • Location:Yerevan

Posted 12 August 2004 - 10:20 PM

QUOTE (anoushik @ Aug 12 2004, 10:00 PM)
ArmenSarg, when one is creating a work of art one has to follow countless number of rules. It's not that one suddenly comes up with a melody, develops this melody a bit and says that it's a symphony. In music, for example, one has to know and follow the harmonic rules and the differing musical forms. I'm sure the same applies to art. This already requires a lot of attention from the composer. The composer has to wholeheartedly dedicate himself to this work, that means he has to forget everything else around him and just surrender himself to composing that music. Again, I say, that if one is not content with oneself, if one is unhappy, that means that one is very much aware of himself and is not entirely thinking about his work. Of course, one can be unhappy about the work itself, like Beethoven, who constantly rewrote a piece of music that he had finished years before. Not being content with one's work has nothing to do with not being content with oneself. It is this difference that I'm talking about.

Well, I agree but I would say cases differ.

#28 gamavor

gamavor

    -= Nobility =-

  • Nobility
  • 5,049 posts
  • Location:Houston, TX

Posted 12 August 2004 - 10:34 PM

I'm too lazy to search right now, but I'm pretty sure there are dozen of threads about happiness. Of course one can look at it from many different perspectives one of which might be this:

"Happiness is a warm gun" - the moment that your breath were taken away, the moment that you feel all powerful, your eyes are wide open, you feel the moment, every second and every bit of time, and unexplainable feeling to share it with somebody…

How many of you have had such moments… please say YES! smile.gif

#29 Anileve

Anileve

    Epicure Maximus

  • Members
  • PipPipPipPipPip
  • 2,201 posts
  • Gender:Female
  • Location:NYC
  • Interests:Running around at dawn and poking innocent bystanders with pipe cleaners.

Posted 12 August 2004 - 10:52 PM

I can’t write too much tonight because I have to hit the sack so that I won’t be late tomorrow and in the event make my boss unhappy which may result in my unhappiness. tongue.gif

I don’t know if anyone has seen Tarkovsky’s “Stalker”, if you haven’t, you absolutely must! It’s one of the most amazing films I have ever seen from one of the most talent directors of all time. He addresses humanity’s idea of this eternal search for happiness. For some time I wasn’t sure why he decided to entitle his masterstroke “stalker” and then I realized….we are all haunted or stalked if you will, by this illusive ideal of happiness.

I know I used the term “content,” but it’s a false term on its own. There is no condition of being content, it only exists in our pretenses, a self deception. We lead ourselves to believe that we must be satisfied with ourselves and reside in that medium or stability, so we assume this position of minimal emotional fluctuation by restricting most of our emotions which may cause instability. In other words we search for a script which will always provide us with the predictability of our actions which we are comfortable with. However it’s an impossibility since we are constantly influenced by our environment which is never predictable and demands for a continuous change of emotions pertaining to various situations which we aren’t always prepared for. That’s what makes us human after all, being unprepared and dealing with a situation at hand to experience the excitement of something new.

Now back to this “happiness” theory. The whole idea is a paradox on its own. I happen to believe that a larger dose of happiness is accessible by children. Why? No, it’s not because they are so pure and innocent and cute, it’s because they are stupid or ignorant whichever term tickles your fancy. Now this might sound cruel but that is the reality. They are at the threshold of learning where they are absorbing every bit of information for the first time, it is an overwhelming amount of feelings and new experience where they are too occupied by sponging instead of contemplating about the means of achieving happiness.

Pursuit of happiness….What is it to us? It could be a desire to solve a mathematical problem, paint a masterpiece, build a house, grow a palm tree or feed a rabbit. They are just that, goals to achieve which in the event will bring us happiness, so in the essence we are not seeking happiness but we are seeking to accomplish these tasks. If this is true, then once those tasks are complete we are again searching for something else which might bring us fulfillment. There are two sides of the coin, which I was never able to refine.

Pursuit of Happiness is the drive to keep the civilization alive and progressing. However this pursuit of happiness is the main factor in our unhappiness, since those who seek it will never be able to really satisfied. I think gamavor said it best with the line from Rouben Hakhverdian’s song “Yerdjankutyun”. It’s something we all know about but something which we can never possess.

There is really only one solution, it is not to seek this happiness. But if we don’t we might as well lay down and wait for our death. So this thing happiness is one tricky bitch, no matter how you look at it you lose. Ok and I mentioned that I won’t write much. But there is much more to say on the subject.

#30 Anileve

Anileve

    Epicure Maximus

  • Members
  • PipPipPipPipPip
  • 2,201 posts
  • Gender:Female
  • Location:NYC
  • Interests:Running around at dawn and poking innocent bystanders with pipe cleaners.

Posted 16 November 2004 - 11:49 PM

One of my favorite poems by one of my favorite poets.

Happiness
by Carl Sandburg


I asked professors who teach the meaning of life to tell me, what is happiness.
And I went to famous executives who boss the work of thousands of men.
They all shook their heads and gave me a smile, as though I was trying to fool with them.

And then one Sunday afternoon I wandered out along the Des Plaines River
And I saw a crowd of Hungarians under the trees with their women and children and a keg of beer and an accordion.

#31 Takoush

Takoush

    Veteran

  • Banned
  • PipPipPipPipPip
  • 3,025 posts
  • Gender:Female

Posted 20 January 2006 - 01:10 AM

QUOTE (QueBeceR @ Aug 17 2003, 11:19 PM)
I though of one thing the other night(Domino new wondering).

What makes us wanting to live? I mean, what makes us wanting to wake in the morning, dress and go out? What are we searching, why are we not just taking off the plug?

Search for Happyness and making us happy, those are what makes us wanting to live, it is happyness... everything we do, this is our goal. We work to make money, to have what we want, we do what we want, because it makes us happy. All our life is centered on that. If we were not able to be happy, and more importantly, at the same time, losing FAITH of finding happyness, dying would not threaten us, living would be just suffering and boring.

EVERYTHING we do, we do it for one of those two reasons.

1- It makes us happy.
2- We expect that it would serve us to make us happy.(Faith in finding happyness)

Think about that, it is so true.

Yes absolutely true, Domino.

Why do loving and thoughtful parents always strive and aim for their children to be happy. Whatever it takes for them to be happy people when they grow up. This is ultimately true!! Also, "HOPE". If we lose hope in life, we might as well be dead or close to it. Yes, Hope for finding or for having happiness. That's it. That's what we search in life, and that's what keeps us alive. That is the ultimate philosophy of life and of us to be wanting to be living beings.

HOPE + HAPPINESS!!

Edited by Anahid Takouhi, 20 January 2006 - 01:11 AM.





0 user(s) are reading this topic

0 members, 0 guests, 0 anonymous users