There is something very unique in American iconography about this notion of the pursuit of happiness.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
The pursuit of happiness, which American citizens are obliged to undertake, tends to involve them in trying to perpetuate the moods, tastes and aptitudes of youth.
Americans are good at pursuing happiness. And the Americans who pursue happiness most diligently show that we're also good at running it down and killing it.
Happiness is mostly a by-product of doing what makes us feel fulfilled.
Happiness comes when we test our skills towards some meaningful purpose.
Happiness is that state of consciousness which proceeds from the achievement of one's values.
Happiness is the reward we get for living to the highest right we know.
The art of being happy lies in the power of extracting happiness from common things.
Actual happiness is sometimes confused with the pursuit of it; and the most mindless and crass how-tos can get jumbled in with the modestly useful, the appealingly personal, and the genuinely interesting.
I used to hold a unitary view, in which I proposed that only experienced happiness matters, and that life satisfaction is a fallible estimate of true happiness.
To the European, it is a characteristic of the American culture that, again and again, one is commanded and ordered to 'be happy.' But happiness cannot be pursued; it must ensue. One must have a reason to 'be happy.'