Happiness....

Is sustained happiness truly possible in a world where the troubles of humankind invade the living room at the touch of the TV button. Where sometimes, the lonely, mentally disturbed and beggars, haunt the road outside your front door?

Most of us can look back to a happy period when he or she could lie for hours on the grass looking at a sunny blue sky through a patchwork of white cherry blossom - but childhood can’t last forever.
Anthropologists tell us that the last time when the majority of the human race was happy was when we were all hunter-gatherers. After this, humankind was dominated first by farming, and lived in predominantly peasant community with all its worries and deprivations. Later the majority of people were ruled by ruthless commercial interests, which brought with them a multitude of complexities and troubles.

Even if unalloyed happiness can rarely be sustained, the opposite - misery and depression - can and should be avoided. It has become difficult to be constantly happy now we are aware of such things as nuclear warfare, weapons of mass destruction, disease and psychiatric illness.

We may regret the loss of hunter-gatherer days with its low cholesterol vitamin rich diet but we should thank our lucky stars that we are no longer peasants toiling in a Devon field, or in constant danger of being enlisted into military service by a feudal landowner. Nor are we wage slaves forced into soul-destroying factories or down lethal mines. We are fortunate. We can order our lives as we like, controlled only by the constraints of society and our feelings of obligation to our family. We should be grateful that we are warm and well-fed, we can control many of our diseases with our knowledge of hygiene and immunisation; babies can be brought forth painlessly (in the best units) and fertility can be controlled. Weapons of mass destruction may threaten us but diphtheria is no longer the ever-present worry. Neighbours’ children don’t die from scarlet fever, whooping cough isn’t a killer and our children’s form-mates are not paralysed by polio.

Whatever the anthropologists and psychologists may say, I would opt for life in 2004 rather than 1004. I would however beware that if I didn’t plan my lifestyle so that I could take advantages of the benefits of the 21st century and avoid some of its pitfalls, I would be wasting the opportunities given to me and might fall prey to unhappiness.

The hunter-gatherers, who lived in the anthropologists’ dream time of happiness for all, had to live off the crab apples, rough grain, hips and haws and anything else they could forage. We have choice. We can choose from shelves of fruit, gathered from around the world, so as to vary the five vegetables or fruits a day we need to meet the target necessary for remaining healthy. We can select from a variety of fish rich in omega 3 essential fatty acids. We don’t have to rely on catching a squirrel or rabbit but can enjoy a prime steak or joint of lamb (always remembering to cut off the fat before we eat it). Nor do we have to fish, unless for pleasure. The fishmonger’s slab will give us a greater choice than was ever available to the hunter-gatherer and our zinc-rich oysters can be eaten for relish, rather than sustenance. If we worry about our vegetables being too old by the time they reach the shelves, or our fish being too expensive we, unlike the hunter-gatherer, can keep malnutrition at bay by taking a good quality multi-vitamin and mineral supplement every day and fish oil to go with it to provide the necessary essential fatty acids. Zinc, magnesium and selenium tablets will supplement soils over-tilled and denuded of minerals.

Exercise was a necessity for early human-kind. Whether the ‘happy’ hunter-gatherers were defending themselves from neighbouring unfriendly families or merely looking for the next patch of mushrooms, they were compelled to walk. We still need to take exercise, but it can be as a pleasure rather than a means of evading capture or starvation. Our exercise can and should be enjoyable, brisk without being strenuous, and should take place every day. A lively walk daily provides enough exercise, so long as it is, for most people, of at least half to three quarters of an hour. For those who already know that they suffer from one or other of the degenerative diseases such as diabetes type 2, high blood pressure or obesity, the amount of exercise should be twice the standard amount recommended for those who know they are healthy.

Even if well-fed, warm and pleasantly exercised and living in a comfortable house with a loving family, some people are not going to be happy. They may well be suffering the loneliness of those whose life seems depressing and even hopeless. If the symptoms are not too severe, unhappiness rather than misery they may like to try St John’s wort. For those whose misery is greater than this, then a visit to their own doctor for advice may be the best way forward.