Why Be Happy? Quotes

“The task is to preserve and promote individual differences in ways that are respectful. Comparable, in reverse, to the American tendency to blame oneself for not achieving the American Dream, in Japan there is a tendency to blame oneself for not fitting in with or conforming to group norms and”
― Scott Haas, Why Be Happy?: The Japanese Way of Acceptance

“I’m not always thinking ahead, and I’m not always thinking back. Ukeireru creates a kind of basic state of immediacy—of being present.”
― Scott Haas, Why Be Happy?: The Japanese Way of Acceptance

“Kikinagasu can mean to hear and listen and let it flow away, meaning that we pretend to listen to somebody’s nagging but not take it really seriously!”
― Scott Haas, Why Be Happy?: The Japanese Way of Acceptance

“If a sparrow comes before my window, I take part in its existence and pick about the gravel… [so] that in a little time I am annihilated.”
― Scott Haas, Why Be Happy?: The Japanese Way of Acceptance