How Would We Look At Trees - Happiness and Success

When American parents are asked what they want for their children, parents tend to put happiness first.  I imagine success ranks up there as well.  Recently, a local school even advertised that they foster happiness and success.  Send your children to that school and they will be more likely to be happy and successful.  Who wouldn’t want that?

It starts to get messy when we try to define what happiness and success mean.  In our society, we have been conditioned to believe success is tied to economics.  We begin to measure success based on grades, grades that lead to college, which in turn leads to a good job.   A good job often means a good salary, and that is how we define success in our society.  Now our economy is in trouble. A big fear of today’s parents is that our children will not be as well off as we were.  That statement alone speaks volumes about the value of success and happiness and from where it is derived.

Many parents also determine their children’s value based on what he or she achieves in school or on the field.  These ‘trophy children’ are a reflection of their parents’ success, and the children are, according to their parents, successful and happy.  Today’s parents are so concerned about their children’s happiness that they will go to extraordinary lengths to protect them from failure, discomfort or responsibility for their actions. Many parents believe happy children are children who choose things for themselves, such as where they go to school; get what they want; and are rarely told ‘no’.  “Happy” children are protected, coddled and rewarded.  

I would like to offer another way to understand happiness and success. If we knew this would be our last year on earth, how would we look at the trees?  This thought crossed my mind as I took a walk on a blustery morning. The colors on the trees were radiant, and I just had this overwhelming need to absorb the magnificence of nature – the full glory of the moment before all goes dormant.  What if this were the last year I ever saw the miracle of autumn?

How would we live our lives differently if we knew our time was coming to an end? Would we observe our world with a greater sense of awe and appreciation?  And what about our relationships?  This brings me to my understanding of success and happiness.

Eulogies at funerals give us insight into what we truly value at those moments of great vulnerability.  I have never attended a funeral where they praised the deceased’s home, car or other possessions.  I have never heard a eulogy that focused on the hours clocked at the office or away from home.  Eulogies usually focus on the person’s character and the quality of their relationships with others.

If we knew this was to be our last year on earth most of us would not spend more hours at the office.  Most would choose to spend as much time as possible with family and friends, and perhaps say the things we had always meant to say.  We would be concerned about the loved ones we would be leaving behind and try to help them prepare. And we would probably savor each and every day – recognizing beauty and miracles where we may have never seen them before.

I imagine we all hope that at our funeral, the eulogy will be about not what we did for a living or what material wealth we amassed, but who we were as a child, spouse, parent, friend and community member.  How did we touch the lives of others?  What difference did we make?  How will our names be remembered?  That’s all we have in the end, and that is what really matters in life – our character.

Our society is so death-adverse that we fool ourselves about our own mortality, enabling us to create and embrace priorities that are truly secondary to the profound path of living a meaningful life.

In the end, true happiness, contentment, is found in our meaningful relationships and in the differences that we can make in others’ lives.  

Success in school, at work and in our professions is meritorious and of value.  These are important parts of our lives. 

Ultimate success is in knowing that we have lived our lives with meaning, sustained our family, helped others in our community and beyond, and spent time caring, loving and being with other people.  We know this – we are just not always skilled at practicing it ourselves or demonstrating and relaying it to our children.  The question is why?