If it makes you happy then why the hell are you so sad

Whoever wrote this Shery Crow lyrics was maybe thinking of where most of my conversations seem to end up. The search for happiness is a fairly universal aspect of human life. Looking back at it though, after a while it feels as if the times when you were happy for extended periods of time, when life was static, were relatively empty, nevermind the pervading happiness: playing videogames in the dark. By comparison, the hardships of not-so-happy times feel fulfilling, our biggest conquests. This is not as politically incorrect as noticing that a long period when you had a good job or a stable relationship or any kind of safety was completely uninspiring compared to that one day you were trapped in the middle of nowhere without food in the cold. What does this mean? Is happiness an empty goal and should we just subject ourselves to increasingly strenuous situations, mental and physical, because that's where it's at? Therein lies a deeper dimension of living? Very questionable, as anyone living in a violent third world country can tell you. The absence of safety in your basic living conditions is hell, the absense of fear is a main component of a sane existence. Perhaps a complementing compromise is the answer? A life of stable periods periodically interrupted by brief leaps of faith into the unknown, forcing a  restructring of your world start from scratch the return to stability. Then a repeat. The conflicting worlds will have an impact on each other. Being whisked away into a completely new setting, or, on the flipside, what you find proceeding deeply into a familiar one. Both reveal to us the deep face of the world and ourselves, who are too the world. And predictably you'll have to give back to the world. A world unfed closes its doors eventually. Thus a never ending always expanding loop between you and the world is established until that ultimate point where all you are will have to be returned to the world, reminding you were in the game from the beginning. It seems you just have to do how much you can be bothered with in the meantime.