The happiness meme

It is fascinating to me that nearly all my areas of interest are currently pointing in the same direction–toward happiness. In design, the emerging economy is one of experience and transformation, where the user is treated to a personal, customized set of experiences, mediated by specific products and services, in order to become happier at the end of them. In business, the frantic pace of the dotcom days has run its course, and journalists are taking note of the ways people are taking back their lives, finding that business is no longer a source of true fulfillment and happiness for them.

Sociologists note that in the rush for globalization and efficiency, we are losing personal, human contact, which is the source of most of our happiness. Evolutionary scientists and psychologists write about how the body has evolved to seek survival and success–not necessarily happiness—and that finding happiness must be a separate, conscious effort. Even technology is seeking happiness, as software creators seek usability and transparency, and the dominant web services are those that connect people with shared interests and thus the potential to love.

Perhaps the exemplar of this is the annual TED conference in Monterey, California. Created in 1984 by Richard Saul Wurman, it seeks to unite thinkers from Technology, Entertainment, and Design. This year’s conference has the theme “The Pursuit of Happiness“, and features no fewer than six of the authors I’ve read this year, which have led me to the same meme–Steven Strogatz, Virginia Postrel, Stewart Brand, Malcolm Gladwell, Joe Pine, and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.

Interestingly, this is almost full circle from my position three years ago, reading The Fountainhead and dreaming of individual greatness. An Amazon review turned me on to this, by comparing a book about progress and happiness to Ayn Rand’s philosophy of success and money being everything you need.