Chapter III: The Basic Human Aspirations – Continuous Happiness and Prosperity

HUMAN VALUES AND PROFESSIONAL ETHICS

LECTURE NOTES

UNIT – I : CHAPTER III 

Chapter III: The Basic Human Aspirations – Continuous Happiness and Prosperity

All human beings basically aspire for/ want the following in their life:

        i.            Continuous Happiness

      ii.            Prosperity

•          If all of us happen to prepare a list of our aspirations, we will find that all our aspirations have an underlying basic desire – the basic aspiration to be happy. Through his life, every human being is continuously trying to do things that make him/her happy. In other words, we always look for continuous happiness in our life.

•          In addition to happiness, we also aspire for adequate fulfillment of our bodily needs i.e. the need for physical facilities. These Physical Facilities are the material things we use in order to fulfill the needs of our body. Having enough physical facilities gives us a feeling of prosperity. We want to have a continuity of this feeling too. Hence prosperity is another basic aspiration of every human being.

Exploring Happiness and Prosperity:

Happiness: Happiness may be defined as being in harmony/ synergy in the states/ situations that we live in. Happiness is being in a state of liking. Unhappiness is a lack of this synergy or harmony. To be in a state of disliking is unhappiness.

Happy situations comprise of feelings such as trust, respect, confidence etc. All these feelings carry an element of harmony in them. Hence they make us feel relaxed and happy.

On the other hand, feelings like failure, disrespect, lack of confidence, doubt etc. lack the element of harmony and hence make us unhappy.

Prosperity:  It is the feeling of having more physical facilities than required. Prosperity creates a desire to share what one possesses. However, since the need for physical facilities is limitless, the feeling of prosperity cannot be assured.

Wealth: Wealth is a physical thing. It means having money, or having a lot of physical facilities, or having both.

Prosperity Vs Wealth: Wealth means possessing more number of physical things while Prosperity is a feeling of possessing more than required physical facilities.

Following are the possibilities:

•            A person may not possess required physical facilities, so he may not feel prosperous.

•       A person may accumulate more and more wealth but still he may be deprived of the feeling of prosperity. 
•           A person may have required wealth and feel prosperous.

Prevailing notions of Happiness and Prosperity: In the modern world, the desire for physical facilities has become unlimited. The physical facilities are no longer seen as objects fulfilling bodily needs but as a means of maximizing happiness. This unlimited desire for physical facilities has become anti-ecological and anti-people endangering human survival itself.

The false notions of happiness and Prosperity have affected human living at all four levels:

At the level of Individual: Problems of depression, psychological disorders, suicides, stress, insecurity, psycho-somatic diseases, loneliness etc.

At the level of family: Breaking of Joint families, mistrust, conflict between older and younger generations, insecurity in relationships, divorce, dowry tortures, family feuds, wasteful expenditures in family functions etc.

At the level of Society: Terrorism, naxalism, communism, casteism, racial, ethnic struggles, wars between nations, genocide, nuclear genetic warfare.

At the level of Nature: Global Warming, pollution, depletion of mineral resources, deforestation, loss of soil fertility.