I just picked up a copy of the Happiness Trapfrom my local library and will second the recommendation. I'm about 50 pages in and am really enjoying it

I appreciate your response, I'll look into purchasing that book. I am in the middle of reading a book called The Happiness Trap by Russ Harris and I would recommend that book as well.

Happiness Is a Serious Problem -- that's the title of a book by Dennis Prager, a radio commentator who is Jewish, but whose words are meant for any human being. I had a middle school English teacher who once told me -- she always was coming up with new things for me to learn -- that no great comedian exists who does not come from some great tragedy in his or her life. She also insisted I improve my penmanship, the cursive style lost to today's schoolkids, sadly. So I did. Then. Now it's the pits.

bvw: I love your responses, in all sincerity, I do enjoy them. Frankly, I feel like many people could learn from you and your responses. I'd like to address your comments candidly and in order. Thank you for sharing about your father, my father was in a somewhat similar situation, but rather with extreme bouts of anxiety. I agree completely that the complete deprecation of any type of sad feelings in today's society is tremendously unhealthy for the same points that you brought up. Finally, thanks for clarifying "pablum" so well. I admit, I needed to look it up (dictionary: "bland or insipid intellectual fare") and understood it as, essentially, "being wordy without adding substance" but I stand corrected. I prefer your definition and demonstration of the word.
I do want to clarify one thing, did you mean that happiness is a duty literally or as to point out a folly in modern society?

Also, I know I can be wordy. I don't apoloqize for it, but I do constantly strive to simplify and still expose the obvious and the hidden points I wish to make.

Also, "pablum" has a piquant meaning to me, having made it -- ground up cereal mixed with milk -- hundreds of times in my youth to feed to babies. Pablum to me means pre-digested almost completely obvious material. It's not the volume, it's the banality.

Briandencan: My dad had a almost intolerably dangeorus case of "bipolar", his manic phases were dangerous for everyone around, but his depressive stages took him into the dark depths, and that aspect -- the despairing, hopelessness, constant debilating anxiety is something one of my brothers has experienced most days of the year for over 25 years. Marianne Williamson said something I found very revealing about depression -- that all the chemical pharmacopia of the recent era has made it worse, not better, because, generations ago depression was considered a normal state of being too, and one that can be productive, hard to produce in it I know, but too rise out the depths with some purposeful activity has greated great works and people. For example: Abraham Lincoln.

@bvw I agree with some parts of your comment and disagree with other parts. I don't consider there to be any pablum in these phases at all, let alone "a lot of" it. In fact, these statements are expressed more simply than most people speak to one another. Additionally, I believe there is much more pablum comparatively in your comment. If I understand what you meant correctly then calling happiness a "duty" is inconsiderate to those with depression due to chemical imbalances. I think you have every right to express that opinion or to be inconsiderate if you wish, I just want to throw that out there. To summarize my soliloquy (pablum) I agree that all care should be taken and all things done wisely, including leaving comments on the internet (just a jest ;) ), which I think is the main point of your comment.

Some good advice. But a lot of pablum, and some can be dangerous. There is a duty to be happy, and happiness comes from within at any time, but the internal scarring and hurts can hide that joy or pervert it. Thus we do try to do basically what this good man suggests, but as always, good judgement is needed. For example, especially today, finding an old friend and reaching out to him or her out of nowhere is off-putting and if that friend is an old "friend" or crush it's best not done. But sure, there are some friends we may have lost touch with -- but the reach out is best done carefully and warmly, modestly, however a proper way is, for the improper ways outnumber the proper.