Happines and Contemplation

“Happiness is Contemplation”
Happiness is secured through virtue; it is a good attained by man s own will. In his book “Happiness and contemplation” Josef Pieper; reassures this statement. And, in a systematic way he devoutly presents, the first half of his book to the examination of happiness; the importance of its linguistic extraction, from the simple way to the spiritual, why we desire happiness, and the nature of our longing for it, The metaphysics of happiness, the possibility of happiness and goodness of being stand or fall together, the cause of happiness, the relationship between happiness and joy, as well as the means to happiness. The latter he argues is contemplation; which he sees as an intuitive perception of the Universal good enthused and sharpened by love. Contemplation us such is gradually assembled to the idea of the need of human happiness; with different meanings and aims he concludes that Contemplation is “a focusing on the inner gaze, undistracted by anything from outside, but troubled from within by the challenge to achieve a profounder… peace.”
Happiness is sold as a product in the marketing world and we as humans boldly buy it, we as society fall into the trap of the old formula “greatest happiness, for the greatest number.” (13) So it comes to us like a surprise when we hear that man’s ultimate happiness consists in contemplation. It would not be wise to discard the proposition that contemplation is man happiness, however we deeply analyze the meaning of the word and the roots of it. Happiness is rooted in God and therefore in beatitude. Happiness has many meanings in vernacular language, but, none of them have any connection with the spirit or virtue of the person, they are all related to the enjoyment or pleasure of the body. St. Thomas estates “happiness” as an “attainment of a created good” and all humans can experience it in many different ways, from the drinking of water when thirsty to the enjoyment of the company of a loved one. However the appearance of happiness in satisfaction is not enough. “The pursuit of happiness” comes to us as human nature, we want happiness by nature, because we are the only beings that can feel it, it would be unnatural to think that an animal feel happiness. So, to us is a necessity and should be our ultimate human goal because this is something that we cannot control, with this we conclude that happiness should be the ultimate goal of human life. Human nature conditions human souls to desire happiness, even though arguments against this concept might arise; ultimately we can say that men will have not the power to not want happiness. Happiness as a concept of satiation of our own pursuit, provides for us the drink that will satisfy our thirst, and analyzing the complexity of human nature and all the needs of humans we only have to look up to the only perfect being, The only one who is Happy by his mere existence. “To God alone may perfect beatitude be attributed, by virtue of his nature.” (28) Looking to “happiness” as part of human nature and looking up to God as the ultimate happy being, the summa reassures this for us as St. Thomas concludes that “Any human being who is happy share in happiness that is not of himself. For God, however, being and being happy are one and the same: God is happy by virtue of his existence.” By this we conclude that God and happiness are the same, we fall in the same conclusion God as an impaired divine being. Exploring more the concept of “Happiness” as a pursuit and an end; we come to explore a metaphor where we see happiness as a thirst and we relate this thirst, as seeking happiness as a satiation of the will which demands quenching and this quenching of the thirst is happiness. However, this simple metaphor can unfold in two parts one looking to “happiness as drink” and the other with “happiness as drinking” This can fall into the satisfaction of a non virtuous nature, as humans our thirsts sometimes go to extremes, man seek fame, fortune, wealth, and pleasures to quench our thirst but ultimately we realize that our happiness depends upon the glory of God. Because of this holy longing we are guided to conclude that the greatest happiness is sharing in eternity. So the satiation of this hunger and thirst only will not be satiated unless we partake of God himself. Is happiness nothing but gladness overflowing, infinite joy? St. Thomas will say NO. Happiness without joy is unthinkable; but they are two different things. In the Summa both concepts get clarified as Thomas explains it. “Therefore a person rejoices because he possesses a good appropriate to him—whether in reality, or in hope, or at least in memory. The appropriate good, however, if it is perfect, is precisely the man’s happiness. . . Thus it is evident that no t even the joy which follows the possession of the perfect good is the essence of happiness itself.” Enjoying life, filling with meaningful things, like serving others, being charitable, surrendering yourself to God, doing the right thing when is needed. All these things bring joy to my heart; the ends of my dedication to them are only building on my happiness as a man. Differentiating we conclude that joy is essentially secondary, the response to happiness. But, joy has not purpose beyond itself. Happiness as the attainment of “the whole good” even though is difficult to find the meaning of the word attain we can conclude that is the means we use to reach our goal, so we find happiness being the result of acting and doing. The idea of happiness as action reach to three propositions, happiness means perfection; perfection means realization; realization comes from acting. Happiness means perfection, “In perfect felicity the whole man is perfected,” Perfection means full realization” felicity must consist in man’s attainment of the uttermost degree of being real. “Realization is achieved by action” in analyzing this concept one might think of this of being an outward action, but, this should be done so this remains within the person himself. Though happiness comes from this the action this has to be a fulfilling act to humans but does not ignores or absorbs the creator. We have to be aware of our own ego and always include the one who created us. “The essence of happiness consist in an act of the intellect” The connection of happiness with a total awareness of reality aimed to the attainment of insight. Then we can say that the person whose been thirsting has finally been satisfied. Usually, humans don’t connect the intellect with happiness, when is done is only through material goods. But, happiness through the intellect only occurs with the thirst for insight. Through this insight perfect happiness consist in seeing. In that seeing is where man can connect happiness with contemplation; On the other hand there is an opposite argument: “Do we love in order to know” and no, Thomas disagree saying knowing is “the noblest form of possession,” indeed we have to know to love; once we know something or somebody we are to love it. Once again the will comes up we cannot talk about happiness without speaking of it. So happiness to this point becomes an act of cognition, because is only through happiness that we can obtain the whole good. Possession of the beloved object is knowing it. “Eternal life is knowing Thee…” (John 17:3). Happiness as affirmation; St. Thomas says that there are two ways where we express affirmation, in the yearning and in joy. Yearning is desire, craving, striving, and urgent longing, until the beloved object becomes our possession. Joy on the other hand, is rapture, well being. Happiness occurs in the maxim expression when we see what we love, when I drive by a lake with a sunset I am in love, when I am with my community I am happy, in this instance happiness is equivalent to being together with those we love. So it means that togetherness occurs when we see our loved ones. Now in a more evident way we see the presence of Contemplation, and the first definition for it. Contemplation is the act of knowing. A person, who is empty and doesn’t have any love, will never experience the flavor of contemplation, for without love there is not contemplation. Contemplation is a loving attainment of awareness. It is institution of the beloved object. Contemplation is constituted of three components; first: silent perception of reality. Second: not thinking, but intuition; which is knowledge of what is present. Third: knowing accompanied by amazement. From the first component we can draw that this intuition is a type of knowledge which does not merely moves toward its object but already rests in it. The experience of this step happens quite often during Eucharistic adoration the automatic fixation toward the tabernacle which can last from a second to an hour. When sightseeing the beauty of nature; from that perception of reality turns into a physical presence. And lastly the amazement, I contemplate the presence of God in nature and in people, when I see the potential of a young person, or when I see the beauty of the reflection of the sky on a lake. I can fully perceive the presence of the something I love. This contemplation can be called “earthly contemplation” and even though I feel the divine presence there is nothing religious about it. For as humans we have been denied to see the physical figure of God. But the fulfillment of our happiness will occur in the next life when we are going to be able to see God face to face. To want to know God is not what will bring happiness to us, however contemplation in all its forms brings the satiation to the thirst of the perception of the presence of God; therefore contemplation is the form in which we par-take the highest degree of happiness. Contemplation common elements are loving, yearning, affirming, affirming bent toward that happiness which is the same as God himself, and this is the aim and purpose of all that happens in the world. The practical man longs for contemplation in his work or his doings but issues of morality, ego, and point beyond themselves. Love comes into play and is seeing as a desire for the loved one to be happy, and happiness once again comes from intuition. It is not right to rest our happiness and contentment in the daily activity of life. If we look at contemplation as a goal for politics, we will find that the practice becomes meaningless when it is an end of itself. The perfection of the artistic work, in order for it to be finished it has to be perfect. And we see how contemplation becomes for these men only a desirable mean. The ultimate meaning of the active life is to make possible the happiness of contemplation. “My own load was lifted, and I saw how instrumental were all the labor and history of man to be crowned, if crowned at all, only in intuition. The great danger of a contemplative life is to fall into a continuous activity with no end, forgetting the meaning of the work and loosing the end of it. The happiness of contemplation is not a comfortable happiness, It would be a crude misunderstanding to consider that that contemplative life is a life of pleasure, even St. Teresa de Avila asserted that to lead a life of contemplation requires more courage than martyrdom. This contemplation has to lead to seek the facing of God, It is important to note the existence of fear, and to recognize that earthly contemplation is imperfect contemplation. As a Salesian religious, I have been introduced to a way of life filled of contemplation that fixes itself perfectly into the idea of “happiness and contemplation,” I as a Salesian am supposed to be a contemplative in action, and as I have discovered in this book, all is doable, the analogy of the book thirst for happiness, clarifies it. And, I find myself satiated when I am working in my apostolate or working on my intellectual formation. I have learned to differentiate the kinds of happiness and the differences between joy and happiness and the real mean of contemplation.