Spring Assessment

Opening the Door to Happiness

Author's Note- A kind smile can make somebody's day so imagine what a selfless act would do; it could do so much more than you could imagine.  One little thing lights the match and  then the fire keeps growing and growing until suddenly the people around you feel the heat of the happiness and want to have the same feeling. Look at the power we all can have, if we choose to use it.

You walk into town and you see shiny stores, jet cars zooming past you at 120 mph You also catch a glimpse of women chatting away merrily while sitting in their parlors.  This town acts as if it doesn’t have a care in the world, then you see him; a man standing alone.  He does not look carefree or happy at all.  It was his perilous search for true happiness that led him to stand alone in a town dominated by materialistic happiness.  Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury demonstrates in a unique way that you will not be truly happy if you search for happiness; nice cars and big houses do not bring true happiness either, it’s doing kind selfless acts for others that make you feel the pure happiness that is so rare and hard to find in these modern times.

True happiness is often confused with materialistic fake happiness.  Fahrenheit 451 showcases the ignorance of all humans.  The government wants peace and happiness but they go about it in all of the wrong ways. They target the books because they believe that books are a source of debate.  Books express author's opinions and experiences in a very obscure way.  By camouflaging their inferences with those of the characters and events in the literature it creates an incomparable story and gets the author’s message across at the same time.  These opinions expressed in the books can also anger other people, because even though everybody is entitled to their own opinion nearly everybody believes that their own personal conjecture is right.  Most debates and arguments lead to unhappiness, the very thing that the government in Fahrenheit 451 was trying to prevent.  So they banned the source of debate and supposed misery, books.  Little did they know, by this one little decision it created a domino effect which eventually led to their perfect little town’s demise.  Even though it ended in disaster there was still some logical reasoning behind this resolution.  The government and many other citizens believed that books were a waste of time because they were just made up and the worlds held no meaning whatsoever, but they never tried to read between the lines.

Meaning is something all people need, people without a meaning in their life feel they have no reason to live.  True happiness and kindness give your life meaning and fulfillment.   Pure Bliss comes from making others happy, and not doing everything in life for your own personal gain.  There is a feeling that comes with happiness, a warm fuzzy feeling that is always there.  This fragile feeling can only come from inside of you not from the things you buy.  It can also come from others, who do something nice for you, or they show that they care for you; which can mean the world, and much more, to you.  Random acts of kindness are what keep the world turning, they are doing things like holding the door for somebody are even showing compassion and care while expecting nothing in return.  If you expect something in return, that is not an act of kindness that is an act of selfishness.  I’ve experienced firsthand of the kindness that some amazing people possess.  I was at the library paying a book fine and I was a nickel short so I was about to collect my money and come back another time when the man who was standing behind me, whom I had never met before, handed me a nickel and smiled.  I thanked him many times and that’s when I realized what true happiness really feels like.  It opens your eyes to a whole new life.  After that experience I went on my way and now I try as hard as i can to make others happy, all because of that man who gave me a nickel.

Too many people in Fahrenheit 451 and the real world have become masked by this materialistic happiness to the point where they forget what it is actually like to have other emotions. The false sense of happiness is like being on a sugar high, it lifts you up and up until you feel like you are on cloud nine, but then there is a sugar low.  When that happens, you crave more sugar and seek it out.  The same thing happens for materialistic happiness, when you are at a low point you seek more materialistic items to make you happy again or at least you think you are truly happy.  This fake happiness is engulfing us.  True happiness is inside of you, materialistic happiness is like a wall that surrounds you keeping you in its control and tricking your brain into thinking you are happy when really you must be depressed or in pain to resort to such false fulfillment.  You may feel that shopping and having everything you want will fill the void in your hear.  That’s not true, it does the opposite, it makes the hole bigger and that’s where the feeling of “more, more, more” comes from.  It’s a terribly addictive feeling that makes you feel like you never have enough.

Big houses and fancy cars do not make you truly happy, acts of random kindness and selflessness that come from your heart are what make you truly happy.  So go hold the door for somebody and see for yourself the kindness you can possess, and pass on to others.