Blog 9

While looking back at Barbra Graham’s and David Brooks’ articles one can see that they are connected by people’s struggle for happiness and the different ways it can be achieved. In Graham’s article, it was interesting that she never really planted roots. She was always moving from town to town and even other countries. Despite all her experiences she was never satisfied. She said, “it had taken thousands of miles and one child for me to understand that the quitting I took for freedom was as much of a trap as the social conventions we were trying to escape.” All of her traveling was her way of searching for happiness, but as Brooks says, “fulfilment is a byproduct of how people engage in their tasks.” This explains why she was never content with her life and always changing what she wanted to do. She thought that avoiding “social conventions” would bring her happiness. When her husband wanted to settle down she did not, so she simply divorced him, packed up, and moved on with her life. Reflecting on her travel throughout her life and having a child she finally was “engaging” in life and  was able to achieve her own happiness. These two articles are connected by the pursuit of happiness that everyone can relate to in their everyday life. Graham’s article shows how someone may be on a journey to find their happiness but ultimately will never know how it will be achieved. Graham believed that traveling and leaving everything that weighed her down behind was what she wanted most out of life. Happiness is described as an internal journey in both articles. Brooks describes how people tell this generation to “find their passion and then pursue their dreams,” implying that “they should find themselves first then go off and live their quest,” which is the opposite of what Graham did. She was unhappy for so long because she had not pursued happiness from within. At the same time though that is nearly unachievable like Brooks claims because “most successful young people don’t look inside and then plan a life,” but rather “they look outside and find a problem, which summons their life.” The journey to happiness is difficult and different from person to person. Some people will find it from within and others will find it through a worldly issue they encounter at some point in their life.