Epicurus’s Art of Happiness

Epicurus’s Art of Happiness
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Epicurus’s Art of Happiness
Epicurus defined happiness as tranquility, ataraxia, and painlessness. When talking about happiness in terms of tranquility, Epicurus posited that happiness is about abstaining from worldly cravings for power, sensory pleasures, and material things. In his opinion, abstaining from these things could bring a sense of peacefulness and ultimately, happiness. Ataraxia refers to a state of being free of “mental anguish and disturbances (Strodach, 2012).” Epicurus indicated that happiness is freedom from worry, which not only affects the current state but the future state of the happiness that human beings can experience. In terms of painlessness, Epicurus posited that happiness is the lack of mental and physical pain. In his view, preventing current and future pain entails being happy. Epicurus posited that the “absence of all pain should be the goal of living.” The lack of pain is characterized not by the “product of one drinking party after another…” but by the product of “sober thinking.” The presence of peace, freedom from worry, and freedom from pain are the key ingredients of pain according to Epicurus.
He also indicated that the principal causes of suffering were the fear of the gods and death. He associated the fear of the gods with suffering because people believed that the gods punished wrongdoings even in the afterlife. He opined that “the opinions held by most people about the gods are not true conceptions of them but fallacious notions, according to which awful penalties are mete...