Laughing Buddhas and Chuckling Creators: Happiness in American Policy and Politics

Good Evening everyone…

JJ aka Minkoff Minx here with a quick note of introduction. Yes, we have a new front-pager here on the blog. Someone who has been a welcomed and rather vocal addition to the comment section of late. After finding her remarks so interesting and thoughtful…well argued and considerate…we decided to ask if she would like to become a Sky Dancer…and it is with fantastic joy that I can come here now and tell you that her answer was a resounding “Yes!”

So, without further ado, please welcome peej…

Thanx to Minx for the warm welcome, and to all the Sky Dancers for inviting me into Sky Dancing! A very special thanks for your patience with me as I unfurl my dancing-wings!

And salutations to all! I’m Peej, and I’m what you might call a chronic dabbler. I dabble in art, science, geology, writing, history, archeology, literature, rhetoric, philosophy, folklore, cookery, gardening, and vermicomposting. That’s not an exhaustive list, but it’s a good overview of my dabbling! I have a weakness for books, flyting (a contest of insults in verse), scathing satire, and for anything that pertains to bees and frogs. I’m neither mechanically nor technologically inclined, and I hope to someday perfect a flaky pie crust. I try to keep my mind open, so I appreciate a good nudge in the ribs if anyone notices it shifting toward closed!

This first post I’m hoping will be a jumping point for a number of others with the same theme: happiness. Contextually, happiness in a socio-political context, a lens from which perhaps we may all scrutinize intently or lightly ponder the issues of our day. I’m not an expert on happiness, but I have a penchant for noodling on happiness in a political context. I keep on my desk a torn scrap of barcode I retained from a  package of postage stamps to remind me of this ongoing project always going on in the back of my mind: to understand “the pursuit of happiness” as it relates to the confluence of individual, society, government, and politics. This little postage scrap is an impressionistic American flag with four words superimposed on each of the stripes: Justice, Equality, Freedom, and Liberty. But not happiness. I suppose I was so bothered by its omission and its omission just niggled and niggled on my back burners until I had to act on it: I began my pursuit of the pursuit of happiness. My thought is that this could be a mutual pursuit. Rather than keeping my mullings all mulled in my mind, I can share my pursuit of the pursuit; and all of you can share yours with me. Perhaps we can come to some meaning for ourselves individually and together as a society with a government whose stated purpose includes “the pursuit of happiness.”

My inspirational postage scrap. As you can see, there’s plenty of room for “happiness” on the top line. 🙂

Tally Ho! Let the pursuit begin! Our goal; together to find happiness!

First up on our quest, an article published recently in the Atlantic titled: Meaning Is Healthier Than Happiness – Emily Esfahani Smith – The Atlantic

What came to mind immediately while reading it was Barbara Ehrenreich’s Bright Sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America.  Here are some clips of Ehrenreich discussing it: Barbara Ehrenreich – Bright-sided: How Positive Thinking is Undermining America

I also thought of Chris Mooney’s Diagnosing the Republican Brain: Diagnosing the Republican Brain | Mother Jones

With these as jumping points Let us talk happiness!