After all, what is happiness?

I have yet to finish "The Witch of Portobello", which is the story of a woman named Athena, and the central question posed by Paulo Coehlo (one of my favorite authors) is this: "How do we find the courage to always be true to ourselves - even if we are unsure of who we are?"

At this point, I'd like to share an excerpt, which pertains to happYness. These lines came from Edda (Athena's teacher):

"Everything is at once so simple and so complicated! It's simple because all it takes is a change of attitude; I'm not going to look for happiness anymore. From now on, I'm independent; I see life through my eyes and not through other people's. I'm going in search of the adventure of being alive."

"And it's complicated: Why am I not looking for happiness when everyone has taught me that happiness is the only goal worth pursuing? Why am I going to risk taking a path that no one else is taking? After all, what is happiness?"

"Love, they tell me. But love doesn't bring and never has brought happiness. On the contrary, it's a constant state of anxiety, a battlefield; it's sleepless nights, asking ourselves all the time if we're doing the right thing. Real love is composed of ecstasy and agony."

"All right then, peace. Peace? If we look at the Mother, she's never at peace. The winter does battle with the summer, the sun and the moon never meet, the tiger chases the man, who's afraid of the dog, who chases the cat, who chases the mouse, frightens the man."

"Money brings happiness. Fine. In that case, who earns enough to have a high standard of living would be able to stop working. But then they're more troubled than ever, as if they were afraid of losing everything. Money attracts money, that's true. Poverty might bring unhappiness, but money won't necessarily bring happiness."

"I spent a lot of my life looking for happiness; now what I want is joy. Joy is like sex - it begins and ends. I want pleasure, I want to be contented, but happiness? I no longer fall into that trap."

"When I'm with a group of people and I want to provoke them by asking that most important of questions - Are you happy? - and they all reply: Yes I am. Then I ask, But don't you want more? Don't you want to keep growing? And they all reply: Of course. Then I say, So you're not happy. And then they change the subject."

True, ain't it?