Analytic report details the effects that money has on subjective-well-being, addresses "how much money" is enough money, and provides helpful tips on how to spend your money to increase your personal happiness, and the happiness of those around you. This paper highlights the idea that having a lot of money is not what makes people happy, it is how the money is spent that can bring about spikes in subjective well-being.

1. Nadia Blanchard
Michaux Dempster
UNIV 200
1/2/13
Balanced Control and Happiness
In our society, everything we do, whether subconsciously or in a conscious
fashion, is done for one objective: happiness. Every action we carry out, every decision
we make is centered around the idea that it will make us happy in the future. As a result,
control becomes the driving force of our ambition to achieve contentment. Control, in
fact, is considered to be a crucial element of happiness by many experts. However, an
exact measurement of control is not conclusively agreed upon. For example, Gretchen
Rubin, author of The Happiness Project, believes that control of aspects of your life, such
as your behavior and outlook, is a necessary stepping-stone towards achievement, while
Dan Gilbert, from Stumbling On Happiness believes that it is because we have a lack of
control over the way our brain records memories that we are able to obtain happiness.
Other experts such as Peter N. Sterns, who wrote “The History Of Happiness,” and His
Holiness the Dalai Lama and Howard C. Cutler, who wrote in conjunction The Art Of
Happiness would argue that it is control over other people is a possibility that can lead to
unhappiness or happiness. Whatever the relationship may be, it is ascertained that
happiness and control are a congruent relationship. I believe that a person who knows
how to sufficiently balance control will be the most satisfied with their results.
In The Happiness Project, Rubin’s primary objective is to become a “happier”
person. She wanted to be prepared for a moments of adversity, and “didn’t want to wait

2. for a crisis to remake [her] life” (Rubin 15). Naturally, as a self-proclaimed calculated
and contrived individual, she goes about doing so in a very controlled manner. Beginning
with researching different viewpoints on happiness from various individuals for several
months, she then began to expound on those ideas to formulate a plan to execute for
herself. Inspired by Benjamin Franklin, one of the particular philosophers she studied,
and his thirteen virtues, Rubin devised her own list in the form of a scoring chart, rating
herself daily on her new goals for herself. This is an example of how Rubin is taking
control of her own happiness through modifications of her behavior, in preparation of
being unable to control a situation. Rubin’s plan for control was really a striving for the
balance I am suggesting is necessary for happiness. By assuming more control of her life
in general, she in turn would be better able to cope in a moment so could not control.
In Stumbling on Happiness, Dan Gilbert also addresses a sense of balanced
control in relation to our happiness. Gilbert focuses on the fact that our brain
automatically “fills in” our memory— that is we are unable to recall events as they
actually occurred but instead, our brain “reweaves” them. Yet, “we automatically assume
that our subjective experience of a thing is a faithful representation of the thing’s
properties” (Gilbert 97). Because of this, Gilbert claims that the brain deceives us from
the truth, yet it can be argued that some are happier because of the filling-in phenomenon.
Bits and pieces of the severity of a bad event can be lost in translation, and reweaved into
a more positive scenario in the brain for many. Without this phenomenon, perhaps we
would have too much control of every situation, or too much availability of memories of
trauma. Our impossibility to retain every detail experienced is a simultaneously ironic

3. and endearing feature of our brain- and only further supports that this sense of balanced
control is needed to obtain happiness.
The Art of Happiness by His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Howard C. Cutler takes
a slightly different approach and focuses on compassion for others and its relation to our
happiness. The Dalai Lama defines compassion as “a state of mind that is nonviolent,
non-harming, and nonaggressive…a mental attitude based on the wish for others to be
free of their suffering and is associated with a sense of commitment, responsibility, and
respect towards the other” (Cutler 114). The co-author, Cutler, then asks the Dalai Lama
why we would “want to take on another’s suffering when we don’t even want our own?”
(Cutler 117). The Dalai Lama responds by saying that dealing with another’s suffering is
different from dealing with your own because instead of helplessness and burden, “there
is a feeling of connectedness, a willingness to reach out to others, a feeling of freshness
rather than dullness” (Cutler 117). This is true for the same reason that Rubin was for
preparing for adversity. She was intrinsically aware that if she were to go through a hard
time, she would have a reduced amount of control over her happiness. The Dalai Lama’s
response addresses the fact that it is easier to deal with someone else’s hardship as
opposed to your own because you have control over your level of involvement and
emotional turmoil when dealing with an impersonal dilemma. Furthermore, he highlights,
being able to expunge someone else’s discomfort can lead to a sense of satisfaction and
fulfillment of your own. This makes perfect sense to me; compassion is regarded so
highly because it is a path to happiness for both the recipient and benefactor that is
balanced by nature.

4. Finally, "The History of Happiness" by Peter N. Stearns addresses a new outlook
on happiness that has been addressed in Western culture. He argues that there is a new
“happiness imperative,” or in other words, American culture is driven to be happy, and in
order to be so, Americans had to execute control over their lives. This new cultural
revolution has even spilled over into childhood. It is even believed that adults have the
power to control their children’s happiness “There was some tension in the new common
wisdom between a belief that children were naturally happy (all an adult had to do was
not spoil things) and a nagging worry that childhood was actually more complicated
(parents had to produce the necessary joy)” (Stearns 108). However, some would argue
that children are able to produce their own happiness. While this may be true to an extent,
Stearn’s argument is based around the idea that adults are more well equipped to control
circumstances that would provide for a stable and prosperous environment for children,
which further instills that a balanced sense of control is an important facet of the road to
happiness.
When we are in control of our lives we are in control of our happiness. Yet when
we are too in control, we have the potential to become unhappy. A sense of balanced
control over out behaviors, memories, and interactions are the key to the happiness that
all of us are after.

5. Works Cited
Gilbert, Daniel Todd. Stumbling on Happiness. New York: A.A. Knopf, 2006. Print.
Lama, Dalai, His Holiness, and Howard C. Cutler. The Art of Happiness: A Handbook for
Living. New York: Riverhead, 2009. Print.
Rubin, Gretchen. "Getting Started." Introduction. The Happiness Project. N.p.: Harper, n.d. 1-15.
Print.
Stearns, Peter N. ""The History of Happiness"" Harvard Business Review. EBSCO, n.d. Web.