The Harvard scholar offers a new formula for being happy and improving the world

By Mariya Manzhos

BOSTON — When it comes to happiness, Americans have been on a downward slide, with depression and mental illness spiking since the 1990s and people feeling less connected. This trajectory mirrors the decline in four main areas of our life — faith, family, friendships and work — says Arthur Brooks, a social scientist and professor at Harvard Business School who recently co-authored a book with Oprah Winfrey, “Build the Life You Want.”

“We find that people are less likely to practice any sort of faith, spirituality or life philosophy, that people are less likely to get married and form families. People are less likely to say that somebody knows me well and have deep friendships, and people are less likely to see their work as a calling and vocation less and less,” Brooks said Tuesday at an event sponsored by the Harvard Catholic Forum, an organization that fosters engagement between Catholic tradition and science, arts and scholarship.

The rise of social media, the growing political divides and the COVID-19 pandemic have made things that much worse, said Brooks, who was raised as a Protestant, but converted to Catholicism when he was 15 years old.

The modern culture has offered ideas to combat these challenges, but they often involve the pursuit of material things and professional success, often at the expense of relationships with people: “Love things, use people, worship yourself — that’s the world’s formula,” Brooks said.

In his talk, Brooks proposed a new formula: “Love people, use things, worship God.”

“We need to subvert the culture with our love,” he said, offering three practical ways to do this.

Make your faith public

The pull to be among like-minded people who share our values often means avoiding the challenge of being among those who don’t, Brooks said. “It’s a tendency to only be in this sort of company, in church, in community organizations that share our values,” he said. “And the reason is because it’s the most comfortable thing to be around people just like us.”

https://www.deseret.com/2024/2/7/24064812/subvert-culture-love-happiness-arthur-brooks-harvard