4 ways a happiness expert uses life’s challenges to find deeper meaning

"Without the friction of life, you wouldn't appreciate anything that makes you happy at all," Brooks said.

Author of the article:

Washington Post

Maggie Penman

Published Aug 10, 2026  •  Last updated 25 minutes ago  •  6 minute read

Arthur Brooks researches, writes and teaches about the science of human happiness. (ACB Ideas) jpg

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When Arthur Brooks was 55, he found himself burned out and at a loss for what to do next.

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He had resigned from a high-stress job as the president of the American Enterprise Institute, a career that had consumed his life for more than a decade. His kids were growing up and didn’t need him as much as they used to. He was too young to retire but felt like his “tank was empty,” he said during a recent interview. The achievements he thought would make him happy hadn’t been the answer after all.

So he went for a very long walk.

Like countless searchers before him, he set out on the Camino de Santiago, a multiday trail walk through Spain, ending at the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela.

As a practicing Catholic, Brooks had a religious motivation to make the pilgrimage. As a social scientist, Brooks also knew there would be lasting mental health benefits. But mostly, it was about unplugging from his busy life and his devices, and surrendering to sore feet and exhaustion, sleeping in cheap hostels for weeks. He hoped that aching muscles and a quieter mind would bring him clarity.

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It worked.

After the walk, he found his new purpose: studying happiness, and helping other people find it. He’s spent nearly a decade doing just that, teaching, researching and writing about the science of human happiness.

In his most recent book, “The Meaning of Your Life,” Brooks argues that in trying to avoid discomfort, we’ve inadvertently eliminated some of the meaning in our lives. The solution, he said, is counterintuitive: It involves embracing a little more struggle.

Every year since 1975, thousands of teenagers and young adults have been surveyed as part of the Monitoring the Future study out of the University of Michigan. Since 2008, there has been a marked rise in the number of young people who say that “life often seems meaningless.”

“What started entering our lives after 2008?” Brooks asked. “Technology and the way that we use it.”

The iPhone was released in 2007, and now the vast majority of adults in the U.S. own a smartphone. While having a computer in everyone’s pockets has made many things easier, social scientists like Brooks argue that having the internet at our fingertips has “broken our brains.”

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Brooks said that we’ve basically eliminated boredom, which means that our brains never get into what scientists call “default mode.” That default mode allows your mind to wander, which is good for solving problems, exploring creativity and ultimately finding meaning. The reason people would rather pick up their phone than enter default mode is that it can be uncomfortable in the moment.

“It’s uncomfortable because, you know, your mind is going to wander to your mom was mean to you, or you’re not getting along with somebody in your life, or you’re really worried about that doctor visit that’s coming up,” Brooks said. “So people don’t like to be bored. They like to get distracted. And we created the ultimate distraction machine,” he said, holding up his smartphone.

We’ve also eliminated a lot of friction from our daily lives, and while next-day delivery is convenient, it means fewer opportunities to socialize with strangers and fewer small challenges in our days. Some research suggests that the more time we spend on our phones, especially on social media, the lonelier we feel.

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It seems counterintuitive that adversity might ultimately make us feel better. But there’s research to back up the idea that making sense of struggle and even suffering is often what gives our lives meaning.

“Happiness doesn’t come if it doesn’t have any unhappiness in it, because to be a happy person you need to be fully alive,” Brooks said.

Part of this is because negative emotions have a purpose. We’ve evolved to feel shame, sadness, anger, disgust and fear because these emotions keep us alive and help us function well in society. Researchers have found that learning to accept negative feelings and use them as information is connected to psychological well-being.

“Your negative emotions are an alarm system,” Brooks said. “If you didn’t have negative emotions, you’d be dead, which is worse than being unhappy, I dare say.”

The human ability to adapt, not just to hard things, but also to really lovely things, can also make us lose sight of what’s worth appreciating. If you visit Southern California from the Northeast in winter, you’ll enjoy how good the sun feels on your face and how nice it is to be outside. But if you live there, you’ll inevitably get used to that temperature and stop savouring it unless you consciously work on practicing gratitude.

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“Without the friction of life, you wouldn’t appreciate anything that makes you happy at all,” Brooks said.

He defines a happy life as having three key ingredients: enjoyment, satisfaction and meaning. In his view, all of them involve some amount of suffering, even enjoyment, since pure pleasure-seeking without any amount of moderation can lead to addiction and pain. Satisfaction is the pleasure of accomplishment, but you don’t get satisfaction without some challenge or struggle.

“The part of the brain that processes suffering is the same part of the brain that processes meaning, which means that suffering is actually what turns on the sense of meaning in the right hemisphere of your brain,” Brooks said. “Bottom line, if you’re trying to eliminate your unhappiness, you will inadvertently eliminate your happiness.”

Negative emotions are part of life, but Brooks said we shouldn’t “waste” our suffering. As he teaches his students, it’s possible to use it to learn and even find meaning.

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Here’s how.

Don’t try to eliminate or ignore pain – physical or emotional. Brooks has chronic back pain, and he said this is a useful example when thinking about how to accept and manage pain rather than trying to eliminate or ignore it. While trying to fully eliminate pain could lead to a harmful addiction to opioids, accepting and managing the pain means he might take an ibuprofen or acetaminophen now and then, but he also sees his back pain as a reminder to do the strength training and stretching that make him feel better.

Retrain your brain. Using cognitive behavioural therapy and mindfulness techniques can also help with managing pain, Brooks said. Continuing with the example of back pain, Brooks tries to notice the pain and then immediately think about something he’s grateful for.

“What you start to do is you start to associate discomfort with gratitude,” Brooks said. “It actually, in a weird way, reminds you that you’re alive.”

Keep a “failure journal.” Brooks advises his students to write down in a notebook or in their notes app whenever there’s something really weighing on them: a worry or a disappointment or even a loss.

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A month later, he has them return to that entry and write down what they’ve learned since then, or what they have to be grateful for because of the negative event. And then a month later, they do it again.

Brooks does this himself. He said even when facing truly grave problems, he can always find something to be grateful for or something he can learn from them. With this practice, he’s started to see that even tough moments can lead to learning, progress or something positive.

Help other people. Often when we’re struggling with something, helping others with the same problem can be the best way to make meaning from it. A growing body of research demonstrates that helping others makes people feel better, as does being vulnerable and seeking connection with other people.

“If you want something, give it away,” Brooks said. “If you have a problem with something, find somebody who has that problem and help them.”

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