Entertain me: The Secret of Happiness is...

Thanks for that, David. It is the 'Entertain Me/Be Entertained' Group, so you need to read the original with tongue in cheek. The 'low expectations' answer Schwartz is talking about is in the context of constant consumer dissatisfaction - the 'you can never get enough of what you don't really need' thing that The Zen Master put into The Zen Garden recently. In being glib, I didn't give enough background on Schwartz's book.

He is talking about 'customer expectation inflation' - The more customers expect (the more an offer is hyped, or the higher that standards are pushed as luxury offers become commoditised), the less satisfied/happy they are likely to be.

So, we get the situation of quality constantly improving but customer satisfaction rates within whole countries (like the American Customer Satisfaction Index) not improving. And we get a surfeit of material goods and food and comfort in the West, but not a corresponding increase in happiness.

He also cites a lot of research showing that too much choice leads to stress, as it raises our expectations that if we choose right, we will be happy. But, the research shows, the path untaken - the lingering thought that the choice we didn't make is the better one - creates anxiety and blunts happiness with the choice taken.

In the context you are talking about - life, work, challenges, personal fulfilment and achievement, I absolutely agree with you. Schwartz's 'don't expect much and you'll be happier with the outcome' refers to consumer purchases and the idea that we can make our life perfect if we just choose right.

Charles Handy talks about the Greek word 'Eudamonia', commonly translated as 'happiness', as being really about fulfilment and the kind of stretch and learn and achieve that you refer to. And that doing what we do best and feel fulfilled in doing - being in the flow, in particular - is what we really need every day to be happy. He points out that Jefferson understood this when he wrote 'life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness', but that the 'happiness' part is too often misconstrued as hedonism, a life of leisure, a surfeit of choice, of material goods etc.

So, that's the tease in the original post. It wasn't really trying to say 'Have low expectations' as a general rule of life.

I'm not sure about 'achievable challenge'. I'm more taken with the idea that our reach should exceed our grasp, or whatever Browning said, or our aspiration should always be an inch or two beyond what we think we are capable of. And 'achievable challenge' might be close to an oxymoron. If it's achievable, then surely it isn't a real challenge.