As happy as it can get...

Many of us spend our entire lives searching for that one moment or phase in our lives that will make us truly happy. In fact, many of us tend to waste our entire lives searching for this, others may even die without even having the slightest glimpse of what absolute happiness feels like. In other cases, we may even believe that we have reached happiness with material things or with the help of certain subjects such as religion. Personally, I believe happiness is only achieved within yourself. It cannot depend on the environment your in nor on material things you attain throughout your lifetime. Partly, I believe it is a problem of self-esteem and confidence. Once your confident in yourself you may view the world from a different perspective and realize that the only one who can end all the problems that do not allow your happiness is yourself. But I also contradict myself because you can never achieve complete happiness. As humans, there will always be those factors that will always be on our minds that will prevent this from happening. For example, according Sigmund Freud in his book called "Civilization and it's Discontents" he states that humans will never reach happiness not only because of the way their minds our divided but also because of factors such as anger, love and even society.  He also mentions that the only way for humans to feel safe is to conform to society. We see it everyday in school. There is always that 'peer pressure' to fit in, etc. 

What I am trying to get at is that when Billy Pilgrim is asked if he is happy during his stay in Tralfamadore, he responds with "About as happy as I was on Earth" (pg.113-114). When I read this, my mind immediately referred back to what I had read on humans in relationship to their happiness. This opinion could have been affected by the way I had read the text. As if to say, what tone I felt the author put it in. I took it as a sarcastic tone and with the tone of 'conformity' to it. I mean if you think about it, Billy Pilgrim's life has not been the easiest nor the happiest one. He has experienced not only war but also many losses in his life and occasions where he has even had to question himself (sink-or-swim).  Many readers would believe that Billy has had a rough time and it does not get any better over the years (we know this because of his time traveling), so when he compares he life in Earth to that of his stay in Tralfamadore we assume that his stay isn't the best or at least not what he has expected it to be.