我們所追求的幸福

We chase after it, when it is waiting all about us.

“Are you happy?” I asked my brother, Lan, one day. “Yes. No. It depends what you mean,” he said.

“Then tell me,” I said, “when was the last time you think you were happy?”

“April 1967,” he said.

It served me right for putting a serious question to someone who has joked his way through life. But Lan’s answer reminded me that when we think about .... happiness, we usually think of something extraordinary, a pinnacle of sheer delight---and those pinnacles seem to get rarer the older we get.

For a child, happiness has a magical quality. I remember making hide-outs in newly cut hay, playing cops and robbers in the woods, getting a speaking part in the school play. Of course, kids also experience lows, but their delight at such peaks of pleasure as winning a race or getting a new bike is unreserved.

In the teenage years ....

the concept of happiness changes. Suddenly it’s conditional on such things as excitement, love, popularity and whether that zit will clear up before prom night. I can still feel the agony of not being invited to a party that almost everyone else was going to. But I also recall the ecstasy of being plucked from obscurity at another event to dance with a John Travolta look-alike.

In adulthood the things that bring profound joy---birth, love, marriage---also bring responsibility and the risk of loss. Love may not last, * isn’t always good, loved ones die. For adults ....

, happiness is complicated.

My dictionary defines happy as “lucky” or “fortunate”, but I think a better definition of happiness is “the capacity for enjoyment”. The more we can enjoy what we have, the happier we are. It’s easy to overlook the pleasure we get from loving and being loved, the company of friends, the freedom to live where we please, even good health.

I added up my little moment of pleasure yesterday. First there was sheer bliss when I shut the last lunchbox and had the house to myself. Then I spent an uninterrupted morning writing, which I love. When the kids came home, I enjoyed their noise after the quiet of the day.我們追逐幸福，而幸福其實就在我們身邊，只等着你去爭取。

一天，我問哥哥朗：“你幸福嗎?”他回答說：“可以說幸福，也可以說不幸福，這要看你指哪方面了。”

“那你告訴我，”我說，“最近一次你感到幸福是什麼時候?”

“1967年4月，”他答道。

對一個玩世不恭的人提出一個這麼嚴肅的問題，這個答案是我自找的。但朗的回答卻給了我一個啓示：當我們思索幸福時，我們通常想到的是一些非同尋常的事，純粹的快樂極致——但是隨着我們年紀越來越大，那些極端的快樂好像越來越少了。

對一個孩子來說，幸福有一種不可思議的特徵。我記得曾在新割的乾草叢中玩捉迷藏；在樹林裏玩“警察與小偷”遊戲；在學校的戲劇表演裏扮演有臺詞的角色。當然，孩子也有情緒低落的時候；但是，在贏得一場比賽時，或獲得一輛新腳踏車時，他們會毫無保留地釋放這種極致的快樂。

在青少年時期，對幸福的概念在變化。突然間，幸福取決於激動、愛、聲望甚至是臉上的青春痘能否在畢業舞會前消失等等這樣的事物。我仍然清楚地記得我未被邀請參加一個聚會的痛苦——幾乎所有人其它人都被邀請了。但是，我還記得，在另—次活動中，我被挑中與—個貌似約翰·特拉沃爾塔的人共舞時的興奮。

成年後，帶來極度喜悅的事物是——分娩、愛情和婚姻——也帶來責任和損失的風險。愛可能不會長久，性愛也不總是如意，心愛的人可能會死去。對於成人來說，幸福是複雜的。

在我的字典裏，對幸福的定義是“幸運”或“好運”，但我認爲對幸福更佳的定義是“享受快樂的能力”。如果我們能夠更投入地享受所擁有的一切，我們就更加幸福。但是，愛與被愛、友人相伴、高興住在哪裏就住在哪裏的自由、甚至身體的安康，我們從以上事物中獲得的快樂卻很容易被我們忽視。