Cultivating Happiness

Happiness is not only a feeling, but also a skill that can be cultivated, according to Harvard Business School Professor Arthur Brooks. 

“What is your goal in life? I daresay it’s love and happiness,” Brooks said. “You can take your life with the same level of seriousness that you would take any management position that you ultimately have.”

Brooks, a professor at both the Harvard Kennedy School and the Harvard Business School, is also a social scientist, columnist at The Atlantic, and a bestselling author. He previously served as the eleventh president of the American Enterprise Institute. 

Brooks explained the definition of happiness in three parts: enjoyment, satisfaction, and meaning. “Understand what those things are, and you can start getting good at happiness.”

Brooks highlighted a key difference between enjoyment and pleasure, particularly in humans versus animals. “Enjoyment takes place in your prefrontal cortex, pleasure takes place in your limbic system,” he said. “Pleasure is an animal phenomenon. All the animals can feel pleasure just like you can, but they can’t enjoy things.”

Brooks also emphasized that the pursuit of satisfaction is uniquely human, driven by the reward that comes from struggle. “Satisfaction is a weird human phenomenon of the joy that you get when you accomplish something after struggle,” he said. “Only humans want to struggle. Humans want to sacrifice. Humans want to have even a little bit of pain for what they get because that makes the reward sweeter.”

According to Brooks, meaning in life can be broken down into three essential components that shape how we live our lives. “The meaning of your life has really three aspects to it,” he said. “Coherence. Why do things happen the way they do? Purpose, which is your goals and direction. And the last, of course, is significance. Why does your life matter?”

Brooks asked attendees to reflect on two questions about meaning: Why am I alive? and For what would I be willing to die, now, happily? “The only way to fail this exam is to not have answers, or say there aren’t answers,” Brooks said. “If you fail, that’s good news, because now you know what to go in search of.” 

Although we have control over our happiness, Brooks said that genetic and habitual factors still play a role. “Fifty percent of it is genetic,” he said. “Your mother literally made you unhappy, or happy depending on your circumstances.” Understanding your genetics can help you form better habits to counteract inherited tendencies, Brooks explained. “If you came to me and said, ‘Professor Brooks, I got a big problem. Both my parents drink too much.’ I say ‘You missed a step,’” he said. “Here’s a hack to turning the 50 percent genetics on alcoholism to zero: don’t drink. That’s a habit, but you’ve got to know your genetics.” 

So, what habits do the happiest people have? According to Brooks, they share four key practices. “They pay attention to their faith, their family, their friends, and their work,” he said. 

Brooks encouraged students to continue their pursuit of happiness and to share what they learned with others. “Maybe the happiness movement starts on the second of December at Boston College,” he said. “If it does, that would make me very happy.”

Adapted from The Heights article by Carina Murphy '27 

Presented with the Portico Program