Caila Anzalone

LBST 2101-338
Interview Paper
Word Count: 1,509
The Good Life
My mother was the one for spontaneous actions, for example, she has had jobs from dog

training, to real estate, to having her own dog boarding company, to bank telling, to mortgage

brokering. Another example would be her closing her eyes and randomly choosing North

Carolina to move all of us, from New Hampshire. My sisters and I would always think that it was

because she was not happy. We did not know how to make her happy. But I sat my mom down

for about an hour to interview her, and it turns out she is living a life without regrets.
I started the interview to get a good background (and this is something I have been

curious about so what better way than to bring it up in the interview?) I started with how was

your childhood. Her response was a little heartbreaking, I did not have the greatest childhood,

but did not have the worst I guess. I had an alcoholic, abusive father who abused my mother and

us. I had a mother who was physically there but was not there emotionally or mentally. I lived in

an area where there was a ton of bullying, and they liked to target me. I had no support from

school or home. I felt a little guilty for making her have to talk about that. She began to go on a

tangent on how kids these days have it easier, there has been an established line between abuse

and discipline; she never saw the line in her childhood.

I quickly switched gears to a religious aspect, I asked, I know you are catholic but what

do you truly believe in? This was her answer, my religious belief is not what I was raised to

believe, I do not really know what I believe but I believe in something. I do not believe in

evolution, I believe there is something I just do not know what. I do not believe in the God I was

taught to believe in. To me, it was two thousand years ago, someone was buried alive, and they

thought he was dead and he came back and they thought it was a miracle but he was not really

dead. The bible to me is just a book someone wrote. My belief is that, if that were true we would
still be seeing that today. I was a little thrown off; I did not expect that to be her answer. She

began to tell me that religion angers her because she was grown up to have a literal fear of god.

She feels as though we misinterpreted religion along the way. We do not see it as a happy lining

anymore; we make people fear their every move.

I wanted to change the topic because I did not want her thinking I was trying to dig up the

sadness. I wanted this to be based on the good life. So I just asked the broad question, what do

you think a broad definition of a good life is, for everyone to go by? Her answer made me tear

up, I think I am living the good life! I have three beautiful, smart girls, it was not always easy

with two marriages but I do not ever think to myself and wish I had done things differently. I

look back at my life and I think everything that I did and every decision that I have made led me

to where I am right now, I am living somewhere where I have never been happier, my girls are

all successful and awesome people, and yes I do take some credit for that. I found an awesome

husband and I am financially comfortable and live in a beautiful house, I could not be happier.
Her answer reminded me of Anicius Boethius in chapter 2 of the Happiness Hypothesis,

he said, nothing is miserable unless you think it so; and on the other hand, nothing brings you

happiness unless you are content with it. I believe her answer is very similar with him because

she had so many things that she can be sad about, her childhood was awful, my mother does not

make a lot of money and religion makes her angry, yet she still finds happiness within others and

her surroundings. A lot of people cannot overpower the bad, but my mother does it every day.
My final question to her was, what if someone isnt living a good life, how can they

change that? Her answer was, I think you have control over it, well there are somethings out

of our control like our health and natural things, but if you are not where you want to be

financially or religiously, you can help yourself and you can handle that. You have control on

how you accept it and you can choose to feel sorry for yourself or you can change it. I think her

answer was something I kind of believe in; she went on to say happiness is being content and
appreciating what you have. She defines the good life for others in a negativity bias sort of way;

you need to overcome the good. You need to know that bad is not stronger than good, do not

react to bad, and always react to the good.

I was curious to know if she would have any advice for me, she told me, live my life to

the fullest and ever regret anything you ever do, you never know where life will lead you and if

you do not take risks, you will not be happy with your outcome. Her answer was one I was not

expecting, you expect your mom to tell you to always be careful and to not do anything risky, my

mom told me to do the opposite. She tells me she does not regret any decision because every one

of them led to her having us three girls.

Chapter two in the Happiness Hypothesis is what came to my mind the whole time I was

interviewing my mother. She even mentioned Prozac! She told me she was depressed when she

was younger and she told me how her parents got her on all of these medications. She had really

bad side effects and that is why she does not push medications on us unless they truly make you

feel better. I mentioned affective style, which according to Haidt is a persons average or typical

level of happiness. She told me she saw that to an extent. She did not believe it was a magic

tube filling up in your brain, she believes it is different for every person and it changes over our

lifetimes. I asked her if she has reached her affective style she told me yes and no, she believes

she can less stressed but she does not think she can be more happy than where she is now. I told

her to get rid of her stress she should try meditation, she said that maybe she will. I tried to base

my whole interview on this chapter because it reminded me of my life and my mothers so I tried

to touch on every aspect of it.

In conclusion, I believe that my mother is really living the good life. I think that everyone

else can too. We just need to push ourselves. I believe in the conclusion at the end of chapter

five, the Pursuit of Happiness, we just need some balance and some specific guidance about

what to strive for. I believe if everyone lived their lives with a positive outlook and something
to strive for everyday, then we can all live the good life. My mom tied into all the ideas of a good

life. We talked about religion, money, childhood, depression and almost everything else covered

in class. She always has an opinion for everything. I told my mom about some of the quizzes we

took in class too, I watched her take one of the quizzes to realize we got the same answers! The

quiz was the one about the empathy quotient, she had an opinion on that too, I think if you are

not empathetic, you will have a hard time in this world. She explained it by saying that living a

good life means to be happy with yourself and others around you. You need to be able to share

your thoughts with people because bottling up your feelings will not make you happy either. My

mom told me time and again in the interview that she was living a good life; I always thought

she did not see her life in that way. My sisters and I were wrong about my mother in many ways,

but especially about her happiness. We were so focused on finding physical things and mental

things to make her happy, but we never realized that we, ourselves, are her happiness.