Three Rules for Happiness

First of all, congratulations, soon-to-be alumni!

I have a special place in my heart for Harvard, since my sister graduated from the College in 1986. Her graduation came four years after I graduated from the University of Pennsylvania. Needless to say, there have been some good-natured rivalries over the years, particularly during the two years when we overlapped as students: that is, when she was still at Harvard, and I was still at Penn.

By Courtesy of James Martin

On her first Thanksgiving visit back from school, my sister was bursting with Crimson pride. At the dinner table, she began dilating on the magnificence of Fair Harvard: The Yard, her friends, her classes, her professors, and so on.

I rolled my eyes and said to my parents, “Was I this bad as a freshman?”

“Oh,” said my father without a trace of irony, “much worse.”

As wonderful as is your Harvard education, and as rich as your experience has been in Cambridge, there is a lurking danger of which I’m sure you’re aware: the patented arrogance that comes with having graduated from an Ivy League school. So my advice to the graduates of the Class of 2016, are three easy things to remember, passed on to me from an elderly Jesuit. They will help you combat the inevitable feelings of vanity, entitlement and general arrogance that all of us, Harvard or no, are tempted to.

So, remember the following:

Let’s take these dicta one by one.The first is essential for life in general, but has special meaning for anyone, like yourself, who has just spent four years being told by many people that you’ll be able to change the world. Of course it’s important to work for change, but there are limits.

“You’re not God,” then, has multiple implications. First, you can’t change many things, so stop trying. Second, you’re not in charge of the universe, so stop acting like you are. And third, you don’t know everything, so stop acting like you do.

Simply reminding yourself of this can bring calm, perspective and humility. It may also save you some heartache in relationships with friends and coworkers. As the Bible says, or at least should have said, “No one likes a know-it-all.”

The second dictum, “This isn’t heaven” can help to reduce, by a factor of ten, the amount of complaining you do. For example, if you an app on your phone isn’t working, if your internet access is on the fritz, if you’re stuck on a subway (or, variously, the T, the El, or the Metro), you can remind yourself that life isn’t perfect. This will cut down on how much you complain and, therefore, how much you bother everyone around you.

If you’re still tempted to carp, think for a minute how much easier your life is than that of most people on this planet. I used to work with refugees in East Africa, and when I get annoyed by those “first-world problems” just mentioned, I try to think of people who have far less. Gives perspective.

But it’s that last apothegm that I wish more people remembered: “Don’t be a jerk.”

Look, I’m as guilty as the next person of being a jerk. It’s hard not to be today, since jerkiness is contagious. In my first job after graduation, the company seemed to prize managers who were “tough” and “demanding.” Sometimes this meant lauding men and women who were tough and demanding. But sometimes it meant promoting people who acted like jerks—throwing their weight around, screaming at underlings and basically acting like, to use an underutilized word in corporate America, babies. That meant, in turn, that some who aspired to management positions emulated them. So, more jerkiness.

There will be many times when you feel like you’re entitled to be a jerk. You’ve got a cold. You’re hung over. Your roommate has again forgotten to put his dishes in the dishwasher. You left your credit card in the restaurant last night. The person in the airplane seat next to you has just taken his shoes and socks off and is scratching his feet. So you’re annoyed. I get it.

But that doesn’t mean you need to pass on your misery to the next person you meet. Let the jerkiness cycle end with you. Be nice. Be kind. Try to smile. Yeah, I know it’s hard. Do it anyway.

Do all these things anyway.

Why? If you put these three simple rules into action, you’ll be a lot—a lot—happier. And you’ll make everyone around you happier too. And that’s the Veritas.

The Rev. James Martin, SJ is a Jesuit priest, editor at large of America magazine, a frequent commentator in the media on religion, and was for a time the “Official Chaplain” on “The Colbert Report.” He is the author of many books, including Jesus: A Pilgrimage.