“The pursuit of happiness is a most ridiculous phrase; if you pursue happiness you'll never find it.”

“We have forgotten what Thomas Jefferson told us in 1776: that we are endowed by the Creator "with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness." Not happiness, mind you, but its pursuit. By implication Jefferson warned that if you pursue happiness for someone else, you deny him the right to pursue it on his own.”

“ALRIGHT then, be a Zen monk. But you wait and see. You'll be happy and bright. You'll laugh. People will envy and ridicule you. You won't care. (sigh)”

“In America, we are entitled to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."There is no such expression in France. In fact, in France, the equivalent expression is la recherche du bonheur (looking for happiness). On the surface, this might seem as if I am splitting hairs, but if you really examine the idea of "looking" for happiness as opposed to "pursuing" happiness, you'll see there's actually a big difference.If we're looking for something, it feels as if it's there hiding in plain sight. And all we have to do is be patient and when the room is quiet, quickly lift up the tablecloth and voilà! There it is! Happiness!On the other hand, pursuing implies a kind of chasing after something."Looking for happiness" seems gentler. There is happiness and we just need to look.”

“If you pursue happiness, you are an ordinary person. If happiness pursues you, you are an extraordinary person. Do not chase happiness; let it chase you.”

“It was right then that I started thinking about Thomas Jefferson on the Declaration of Independence and the part about our right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And I remember thinking how did he know to put the pursuit part in there? That maybe happiness is something that we can only pursue and maybe we can actually never have it. No matter what. How did he know that?”