I find my happiness (2011–2017)

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About this project

»With great concentration and care, a young woman is writing a message on a board outside a restaurant: “I find my happiness w[…]” – the beginning of a clichéd and widely commercialized recipe for inner fulfilment. Well, it’s not that easy, of course: Finding happiness is a difficult undertaking requiring more than just some uplifting aphorism.

But what, then, is this quest for happiness about? Is it about finding something inside or outside ourselves? Is it about trying to change things or about affirmation and stability?

The people we meet in this book seem to have found varying answers: Some, we can assume, seek happiness through love or lust, others through order or diligence. Some seem to be concerned about status or wealth, others seem to have opted for defiance and rebellion. Are they successful? It’s hard to tell. Especially since we catch them in situations in which they seem lost, exhausted, or even beaten, because life has just dealt their aspirations a hefty punch in the gut.

But there are other questions we can ask ourselves: Whom of them do we relate to – or not at all? Whom do we smile upon sympathetically? In this way, they can help us to find our own answers and values and thus our own keys to happiness.«

Andreas Eble