On our own, feeling alienated from the world we had been
created from, cut off from the full extent of its abundance,
people were no longer happy. We began to search for the
happiness we had lost. When we found something that
reminded us of it, we tried to possess it and accumulate
more--thereby introducing Stress into our lives. But searching
for lasting happiness and accumulating temporary
substitutes for it brought us no satisfaction. -Benjamin Hoff, The Te of Piglet
When he's using the word "us," Hoff is talking about the people who live in western societies, those places where success has been defined as earning more money and having more things, and those people who have unique skills and talents end up working for some corporate giant or another, never using those skills and letting life slip by without developing their skills in ways that can help others. It's hard for us to imagine now, but many people used to be able to find happiness without having much to do. They didn't have computers with which to spend their spare hours; they didn't have movies and television shows that could help them to "escape" reality every now and then; they didn't have boatloads of activities to partake in to keep their minds off of themselves and the lives that they're leading.
Of course, just because people didn't have all of these things in their lives didn't mean that they were necessarily happy. There were many problems that people dealt with in the past that we don't have to face today--family and friends dying from what are now minor illnesses and injuries; being "stuck" in the town you were born in, without having a real option of leaving; having to take on the family trade for the rest of your life even though you end up doing something that you don't really like. These are just a few of the many ways that life was harder for many people in the past than it is today.
I don't know if even Hoff could tell us when we started to feel "alienated from the world we had been created from." My guess is that it's long, long, long ago, because we are now truly separated, most of us completely. There are many people who never spend any time in nature, even for a walk in the park. Most of us use the natural world as a short-term escape from what basically has ended up being our lives: stress, work, tension, deadlines, judgment, conflict. Many of us do search out activities that can help us balance these things, but doing that doesn't eliminate the effects that the modern world has on us; rather, it simply provides us with moments of clarity and even happiness, but these are moments that we almost inevitably leave behind us in order to go back to our daily lives.
So are things hopeless? I don't think so. Can our happy moments be extended and expanded, meaning that we're happier more often than not? I think they can.
So does Hoff, of course. His first sentence tells us very clearly that he sees the way to be happy as not "feeling alienated from the world we had been created from." This simply means looking at the lives that we're living and identifying the things that we do that alienate us from the world. Do we spend too much time indoors, being entertained passively by television or Internet? Do we spend too much time in our cars, never going for walks and feeling the fresh air and smelling and hearing the world around us?
Do we make time for experiences with the natural world, including getting together to talk with friends? They're a part of the natural world, too, but we see them so rarely, or only during certain occasions, like church services or activities at our kids' schools. Do we know someplace where we can buy tomatoes straight off the vine instead of buying them at the supermarket, where they're typically anywhere from one to six weeks old. Do we have any places in nature where we can go for some simple quiet time, where we can listen to nothing but the sounds of the birds and bugs and any animals, and simply enjoy not having anything that we have to be doing at the present moment?
We don't need to become hermits, and we don't have to go for extended camping trips in the middle of nowhere if we want to counter the alienation that we feel from nature. We simply need to make decisions that put us with it and in it. Instead of a trip to the mall, a hike could be invigorating. Instead of another lunch in a restaurant or fast-food joint, a picnic lunch by a lake or in a park can give us energy and raise our spirits. Many, many people have pointed to our loss of connection with nature as a major cause of unhappiness, so perhaps it's time to pay attention to them and make some sort of connection that can help us to feel more at home in the world.
I felt my lungs inflate with the onrush
of scenery-- air, mountains, trees,
people. I thought, "This is what
it is to be happy.”
Sylvia Plath
