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大学の過去問なのですが解いた後も内容が掴めなくて困っています…
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Everyone knows that happy feelings are beneficial for our minds and bodies. In fact, people who live a happy, positive life are less likely to suffer from depression, are generally healthier, and live longer than their sad, negative counterparts.
The question is, what is happiness and how can we achieve it?
Many people think wealth makes us happier. Indeed, not having sufficient money can cause unhappiness to some extent, but it has been shown that there is no significant relationship between how much money a person earns and whether he or she feels good about life. We need a certain level of income to meet our basic needs, but once these needs are met, additional income has little influence on our sense of satisfaction with life.
In the past, having a good educational background seemed to guarantee a happy life, but today people realize that neither advanced education nor a high IQ can substantially raise one’s level of happiness.
Being young, beautiful, and healthy seems to be an important factor in happiness. Yet studies show that older people are generally more stable and satisfied with their lives than the young. A recent survey found that people between the ages of 20 and 24 have 3.4 sad days a month, as opposed to just 2.3 days for people between the ages of 65 and 74. Research also suggests that beautiful or healthy people are not always happier than those without such advantages.
Job satisfaction can also lead to fulfillment in life. Most of us would be happy to have a job that affords a certain amount of decision-making power and peer recognition. In contrast, when people are forced to work with less freedom, more responsibilities, and little satisfaction, they will not fell very happy.
Married people tend to be generally happier than singles, and religious people are usually happier than non-religious people. Marriage and religion seem to give us the social support and human bonds that can help make us more stable and better balanced.
Friends and family are also an important factor in happiness. A 2002 study conducted at the University of Illinois found that those students with the highest levels of happiness and the fewest signs of depression had stronger ties to friends and family.
Whatever the ultimate source of happiness may be, factors like income, social status, and education do not contribute as much as we think to our overall well-being.
After all, happiness depends on how good a person feels about life and how well he or she manages his or her emotions. When we are not feeling happy, we should try playing the "Being Glad" game of Pollyanna, a young girl who always tries to find something to be glad about in every situation, and manages to hold on to a positive attitude toward life even after her father's death.
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