Happiness has dropped
The United States is no longer one of the top 20 happiest countries in the world.
I didn't realize we were ever in the top 20.
According to this 2023 study conducted by Gallup in conjunction with the Walton Family Foundation, US happiness fell from 15th to 23rd. It's the youngest of our population, Gen Z, that is fueling the mass decline.
Young people between the ages of 15 and 24 are experiencing a decline in happiness likened to a midlife crisis. I am the mother of two Generation Z humans. I can attest that this generation faces anxiety and despair over ALL our world struggles.
Here's what my Gen Z adult says: "We can't buy a house, can't rent an apartment, and the world is burning. Even with a college degree, you can't make any money, and if you have a college degree you are buried in debt." And to the criticism that they are all on their phones "Of course we are on our phones. It's the only way to drown it all out."
Gen Z feels over-burdened from the immediate tasks of each day, but also from bigger concerns like housing, inflation, war, and climate change. It makes it difficult for them to find hope, joy, and purpose.
Here's my positive Mom perspective.
To be alive is to feel joy and pain, happiness and despair. There is no other way but to feel it all despite the hardness.
Over a hundred years ago, Leo Tolstoy said the most difficult thing to do is to love life.
"The Most difficult thing but an essential one – is to love Life, to love it even while one suffers, because Life is ALL...”― Leo Tolstoy
I know the world is challenging, but while I am alive, I still need to LOVE LIFE.
I am a realistic optimist. I like to look at the hard, scary, and uncertain things of life squarely in the eye and maintain a belief that we will prevail despite our current reality.
Yet, just like my Gen Z children, I still often feel anxious, upset, and worried about the state of the world.
However, I believe that as long as we have breath, we have choice.
It doesn't mean I don't get upset, or feel let down, or even feel great sadness or loss. I try to remember that there is purpose–and as Hamlet says, a method in all the madness.
It is my daily practice of yoga that provides perspective.
I often feel that a personal yoga practice is the one thing to keep me grounded. One of my very favorite yoga practices is chanting, and the Mangalam Peace Chant helps me when I am down.
Chanting is a practice that resets your thinking process. When you repeat a chant or mantra, a set of words with a specific intention, you create a new pattern in your thinking mind. It definitely helps me to find a glimmer of hope in what can often feel like a hopeless world.
Mangalam Peace Chant
In Sanskrit:
Bhumi-Mangalam, Udaka-Mangalam, Agni-Mangalam, Vayu-Mangalam, Gagana-Mangalam, Surya-Mangalam
Chandra-Mangalam, Jagat-Mangalam, Jiva-Mangalam, Deha-Mangalam, Mano-Mangalam, Atma-Mangalam
Sarva-Mangalam-Bhavatu-Bhavatu-Bhavatu…
I enjoy the Kirtan singer, Girish's English translation of this chant, and it speaks directly to finding more hope:
The earth is good, the water is good, the fire and the wind, they’re good. tThe sky is good, the sun is good, the moon and the planets... they’re good. All Beings are good, and our bodies are good, and our minds and our spirits, they're all good.
All things are good.
So I do my best to tell my adult Gen Z daughters that when the world feels overbearing and your mind wanders towards hopelessness, remember that these basic natural things are very good, and we humans are an intricate part of that goodness.
We have to find the small ways to make each day feel good and remember to love life.
