We all strive for happiness. We pursue it, we search for it, we feel as though we are about to grasp it… and we lose it again in a misstep. This insatiable pursuit is, at times, the heaviest burden. We want to feel good, to find meaning, to reconcile with who we are. And yet, the more we chase that light, the more shadow we encounter on the path. That paradox walks with us at every step, and we cannot ignore it.
This constant tension became evident to one of the greatest thinkers of existentialism: Albert Camus, a philosopher, writer and Nobel Prize in Literature (1957). In his Carnets, he reflected with voracity and without refinement on what led him to declare that “we must imagine Sisyphus happy.” For him, the pursuit of happiness was at once the essential reason to live, and the greatest obstacle to living.
The Absurd
For Camus, life, at its root, is absurd. No matter how hard we strive to find a meaning to our own existence, the truth is that no meaning is guaranteed. That divine promise that would assure us a harmonious destiny is false. The world is not designed to satisfy our deepest longings. We must accept that the world is absurd, that the universe is indifferent, and that our lives lack inherent meaning.
It may sound dramatic, but accepting this reality is liberating at the same time. Becoming aware that there is no meaning makes us free. We can be defiant and cling to life in its total fragility.
Within this context, Camus explains that happiness is inevitable. It comes to us without warning. And we, finite beings, cannot stop yearning for a sense of purpose. But it is important to understand that this absurd search does not allow us to live in peace.
Sisyphus: the Hero of Perpetual Struggle
It is inevitable to turn to Sisyphus if we want to understand Camus. This figure from classical mythology was punished by the gods. His punishment consisted of lifting a huge rock up a slope. When he reached the summit, the rock inevitably rolled back down to the base, and Sisyphus had to start again. It is a tragic image of endless repetition, of futile effort.
Thus, it is hard to grasp that Camus told us “we must imagine Sisyphus happy.” Yet, there lies the key. In imagining Sisyphus happy.
Imagine Sisyphus Happy
Life may have no inherent meaning, but our mission as humans is to try to confer one upon it. We cannot avoid it. The key, therefore, is to be happy in our eternal, absurd and futile task. To find happiness along the way.
Because Sisyphus’s happiness is not naive, nor is it illusory. It is the absurd victory of one who accepts his fate, even when that fate offers no guarantees.
If we imagine the character mindful of his task, we can create a Sisyphus who owns his rock. His moment of lucidity occurs in his descent, when he returns for it and contemplates what he has accomplished. It is in that moment—not at the summit, but in the fall—where his happiness resides.
Neuroscience Confirms It
Albert Camus’s theory stands in contrast to that of other great thinkers earlier still, such as Aristotle, who believed happiness could only be attained through learning and virtue. For the Greek, happiness was a byproduct of a life of effort. For Camus, happiness is absurdly inevitable.
Curiously, neuroscience studies seem to support Camus. Modern research has shown that the human brain is plastic. Neural networks change, emotional states fluctuate, and emotional stability does not mean the absence of ups and downs, but the ability to manage them.
In fact, there are studies showing that variability in brain activity during emotional experiences is normal, not the exception. That is to say: in response to the same experience, our brain can react in different ways.
Research has advanced to such a degree that we now know, even, that the brain circuits regulating reward, pain, loss and emotional balance are connected. And these mechanisms do not guarantee permanent happiness, but they do allow us to feel good even amid adversity.
That is why you can laugh at a joke at a funeral, even if you are going through an incredibly painful moment. Or feel joy while you are a patient in hospital.
Aristotle’s theory then collapses under its own weight. We do not need to attain any state of harmonious virtue to be happy; happiness finds us because it is inevitable. And as Camus sensed, life is not an eternal ascent to a happy peak, but a balance in which bright and dark moments sit side by side. Our task is not to remain forever at the top, but to learn to move within that oscillation.
