Being Happy is Bigger than Your Life

As we launch into this Fall thinking about the overlap between happiness science (sometimes called Positive Psychology) and our ancient faith, there’s an elephant in the room that has to be named. There are things like climate change, war, and systemic injustice that are a lot bigger than an individual’s personal happiness, and sometimes no amount of positive thinking matters if you’re all wiped out by a giant tsunami.

Ok, that’s a morbid thought to start our devotions, but reality matters, and the big picture is that there are larger forces at play in our world. One of the ways that scripture speaks to this issue is by addressing some of those meta factors like this:

Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper. - Jeremiah 29:7

We have to recognize that in so many ways our happiness is interwoven with that of our communities, our city, our ecosystem, our political system, the economies of nation states around us and even communities around the world.

What might it look like for you today to seek the peace of these other communities today? To seek the peace of creation today?