Less stuff, more happiness - Essay Example

It is actually a change of paradigm of how we think, of how we prioritize things in our lives, on how we arrange our values and belief system and what we believe and think that could make us happy. And his idea is grounded on good reasoning, economics and pragmatism and is actually doable. He opened his speech or lecture by asking what’s in the box? This is quite intriguing and invites to listen more to know he is up to. This is actually a good strategy because it engages us and gets us into thinking.

He then outlined his thesis that less may actually be more. Less stuff means less space and it would equal to less carbon footprint saving us dollars and the environment along the way. TED proposed a strategy on how to do this which is he called “Life edited” which is really living little. He enumerated his three approaches that are edit ruthlessly, think small and make multifunctional things. By editing ruthlessly, he meant cutting the extemporaneous things in our lives – to think before we buy if the thing we intend could truly make us happy.

By thinking small, he meant efficiency to limit consumption to what we actually need. In his words, he put forth the idea that small is sexy. And lastly, he put forward the idea of being multifunctional with things that can do several functions. As a conclusion, he answered his question intriguingly of “what’s in the box”. That it doesn’t really matter because he knows he doesn’t need it. Because less is more and we have to lessen to make room for the good stuff. Going through his speech/lecture made me think about lot of things.

He made me reevaluate what does it take to be happy and lead a good life. So I dissected the term in a manner that we study things in school. The term “good” refers to anything that is desirable or can be qualified under specific standards, or a moral occurrence, definitions that are general and relative. Inferring from TED’s lecture, I now define the term from a psychological perspective to be an act or state of mind that yields more benefits than harm and offers a net good. Being happy and leading a good life therefore means engaging in activities that generate net good to a person’s life.

I mention this because TED missed something on what makes us truly happy. He only argued that we do not need a lot of things to be happy but he did not answer the bigger question of what makes us happy. Such, I will pick up where TED ended and will provide my own thoughts on what makes us happy with TED’s lecture in mind. Beyond the material things that get us in debt by our acquisitiveness, I believe that the best things in life that could make us truly happy are free. These things do not come from department stores or do we need to purchase them with our credit cards but actually comes from our social ties that make our heart quiver with joy and happiness.

They usually come from our social ties that not only minimize our sadness but also make us happy. We can find these ties from our family and loved ones and they do not cost us anything except time and our willingness to open ourselves to love and be loved. Like TED, I will also mention an advantage. Unlike him, I will not equate it in dollar terms but rather, in psychological term as what I have previously mentioned. Social ties lead to a person’s longer lifespan in addition to a better quality of life.

The quality of life manifests not only on the person’