PRECIS 2011

The psychological causes of unhappiness, it is clear, are many and various. But all have something in common. The typical unhappy man is one who having been deprived in youth of some normal satisfaction, has come to value this one kind of satisfaction more than any other, and has, therefore, given to his life a one-sided direction, together with a quite undue emphasis upon the achievement as opposed to the activities connected with it. There is, however, a further development which is very common in the present day. A man may feel so completely thwarted that he seeks no form of satisfaction, but only distraction and oblivion. He then becomes a devotee of “Pleasure”. That is to say, he seeks to make life bearable by becoming less alive. Drunkenness, for example, is temporary suicide; the happiness that it brings is merely negative, a momentary cessation of unhappiness. The narcissist and megalomaniac believe that happiness is possible, though they may adopt mistaken means of achieving it; but the man who seeks intoxication, in whatever form, has given up hope except in oblivion. In his case the fist thing to be done is to persuade him that happiness is desirable. Men, who are unhappy, like men who sleep badly, are always proud of the fact. Perhaps their pride is like that of the fox that had lost his tail; if so, the way to cure it is to point out to them how they can grow a new tail. Very few men, I believe, will deliberately choose unhappiness if they see a way of being happy. I do not deny that such men exist, but they are not sufficiently numerous to be important. It is common in our day, as it has been in many other periods of the world’s history, to suppose that those among us who are wise have seen through all the enthusiasms of earlier times and have become aware that there is nothing left to live for. The men who hold this view are genuinely unhappy, but they are proud of their unhappiness, which they attribute to the nature of the universe and consider to be the only rational attitude for an enlightened man. Their pride in their unhappiness makes less sophisticated people suspicious of its genuineness; they thing that the man who enjoys being miserable is not miserable. (Words Count: 391)

Solution

Title: 'The psychological causes of unhappiness'

There are various causes of unhappiness. The most common cause is deprivation from normal satisfaction at young age. This cause badly affects in future performances of an individual. Another present day man finds no satisfaction because of the frustration and depression from his work. So he uses intoxication for momentary happiness. Some people think that happiness is achievable by what so ever means to be used for it. Finally a group of individuals are there who deliberately want to stay unhappy. They think that this unhappy attitude towards the society would lead them to the great success. But they are unaware of the fact that this will make them less sophisticated and fake personalities. (115 words)

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