Brendon commented to my post "Re: Joel's physiological time vs. Psychological time. " Through out his comment he talked about qualitative hedonism and epicureanism, then asked if I thought it was philosophically equivalent to the happiness archetype. I looked up what a qualitative hedonist was and found that they believe that pleasures differ in quality and quantity and the pleasures that are more pleasureful are the ones that are sought after. I don't deny this theory, but that is not what the happiness archetype suggests. The happiness archetype does not deal with the quality or quantity of pleasures per se.
Epicureanists believe in finding simple pleasures, yet not indulging yourself in what you want. This along with avoiding physical pain will allow you to feel “free from fear” and understand the way the world is. These theories are not the equivalent of the happiness archetype. The happiness archetype involves pain where hedonism and epicureanisim does not. The most equivalent philosophical term is a mix between (regular) hedonism and eudaimonia.
Eudaimonia is a Greek work that is roughly translated to "happiness" or "well being." According to Aristotle, eudaimonia is the highest state of happiness and is achieved over a life of: pleasure, practical activity, and philosophy. (In my own philosophy, this is similar to "ultimate satisfaction," but that's another story.) It's funny, because the keynote speaker at the undergraduate research conference was talking about eudaimonia. She said, "the idea is to make small goals, but have a bigger farther-in-the-future goal at the same time." The smaller goals are like check points.
According to her, eudaimonia means to put yourself through some pain now for your well being, while still enjoying that. You don't want to write that 18 page research paper. It will take a really long time, you'll get annoyed by not being able to find the information you want, and you will certainly pull all-nighters. But when you finish it, you are a better writer, an experienced (for example) philosopher, it's on a topic you like, and you know what? You are smarter and you feel accomplished. This is precisely what the happiness archetype entails. This is precisely why I am a musician. You get a piece and it's tough and when you look at it you think, "I'm never going to be able to play that." Then it gets broken-down, taken in chunks, practiced repeatedly, and there is frustration -- a lot of frustration. Yet, the more frustration the better, because when you finally get it right, the better you feel. Eudaimonia! Right? ...Wrong.
For a few days now, I have been researching eudaimonia. None of the articles I've read indicate that you have to put yourself through pain now that enjoy, for your well being later. According to Aristotle a doing and living well is different for everybody. So eudaimonia is not the best parallel to the happiness archetype, yet it is closer than epicureanism and qualitative hedonism.
So what would the philosophy of: 'putting yourself through pain (while enjoying that pain) in order better your well being and to achieve a long term goal,' be called?
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