This Harvard Professor told 17,000 Catholic college students that “happiness is a gateway drug to Heaven.” He just might have the secret formula to attain happiness that will last.
FOCUS’ SEEK25 conference commenced on New Year’s Day with thousands of college students from across the country gathering in Salt Lake City, Utah. With five days of keynote talks each focusing on an aspect of the Gospel, the first day concentrated on humanity being created to be in relationship with God.
Following the opening Mass, professor, author, and columnist at The Atlantic Arthur Brooks took the stage and began by sharing that he is a teacher of happiness.
As a professor of one of the most popular classes at the Harvard Business School, Brooks said 450 students are on the waiting list to take his “Happiness Class.” He also emphasized the demand, saying “There’s even an illegal Zoom link they think I am unaware of.”
The class is purely science-based, yet Brooks says the top question he receives from students is “How do I fall in love and get married and stay married and start a family?”, only to be followed by questions about his faith.
Brooks mentioned that on the first day of class each semester, he opens by telling his students that his Catholic faith is the most important thing in his life and he attends Mass every single day.
“They come looking for happiness, but they are really looking for God,” he said.
Brooks then broke down the meaning of “happiness” and the three “macronutrients” it is comprised of:
1) Enjoyment
“The modern world often confuses enjoyment with pleasure,” Brooks shared.
While pleasure is simply a perception of something one likes, enjoyment is the ability to experience pleasure with other people and to retain the memory of the experience. This is the first part of happiness.
2) Satisfaction
Similar to hunger, when a meal is eaten while starving, greater satisfaction is achieved. Yet this satisfaction is always temporary. Brooks provided another definition for satisfaction that lasts longer than just a meal or a good grade on a test.
“Real satisfaction is all the things that you have divided by what you want.”
While the numerator can infinitely increase by chasing money, fame, and success, our wants decrease as we detach ourselves from worldly desires by chasing after that which serves our faith.
3) Meaning
Two questions have been scientifically tested to prove whether someone knows that there is meaning to life.
Brooks said, “The way to pass this test is to have answers to these two questions, the way to fail this test is to say… there are no answers.”
The questions were as follows:
1) Why are you alive?
2)What would you happily give your life for?
For years these have been questions Harvard Business students have written essays about, asked questions about, and searched for answers to. As for Brooks and his family, he shared that the answers are found in their Catholic faith, love of family, and service to others.
Brooks ended by stating that the true importance of being able to turn pleasure into enjoyment, decreasing our wants, and finding meaning in our lives is because, “nobody wants to follow an unhappy missionary… the happier you are, the more curious they will be about the source of your happiness, and they will follow you more willingly. They’ll follow you to Mass, they might- who knows- just follow you to Heaven.”