[TheSkronkDonkey]

Originally Posted by thedrift

Well, firstly - happiness is NOT the purpose of life. Life's a lot easier when there is happiness around, but happiness is this illusion people keep trying to find, and when they do, it's transient. Please be happy, but when you're not, understand that life is about what you feel, even if it hurts really badly.

Originally Posted by thedrift

But, before you change your life drastically, consider how good your life actually is. That you can eat, sleep, go to a movie...freely. Don't mess with that, appreciate it. Life will find you in time, make you whole and full, grow you and utilise you - so stay innocent, be simple, be unhappy when you're unhappy, and have fun when fun comes along.

These comments remind me of an essay by Einstein. Here is the relevant extract:

From "The World As I See It":

I have never looked upon ease and happiness as ends in themselves -- this critical basis I call the ideal of a pigsty. The ideals that have lighted my way, and time after time have given me new courage to face life cheerfully, have been Kindness, Beauty, and Truth. Without the sense of kinship with men of like mind, without the occupation with the objective world, the eternally unattainable in the field of art and scientific endeavors, life would have seemed empty to me. The trite objects of human efforts -- possessions, outward success, luxury -- have always seemed to me contemptible.