Kimberly Cristales

Corri, Ditch

English 115

September 19, 2020

Project Space Essay (graded)

What is the definition of being happy? What makes us happy and how do we seek it? All

of us came across what / it’s like to have that sensation of happiness based on what we do, who

we surround ourselves with, and what we deeply want to thrive for but on the other hand, several

people often struggle on how to obtain and identify their main sources of happiness. On the three

researches I read which are, “The Sources of Happiness” by Howard Cutler, “Living With Less.

A Lot Less” by Graham Hill, and “How Happy Are You?” by Sonja Lyubomirsky all provide

several rhetorical strategies to help support their arguments on the topic about happiness. Al-

though, out of the three articles that secures a greater persuasive argument would be “How Hap-

py Are You and Why?” by Sonja Lyubomirsky. The reason behind why this author’s research is a

more reliable source than the others is because the author included pathos, ethos, and much of

logos that affected the minds of her audience into perspective whether they are really satisfied

enough in their lives or not. In the research, “Living With Less. A Lot Less” by Graham Hill, the

author only consists of a bit of logos and pathos to support his main idea that living within a

small space can affect your life being. Lastly for “The Sources of Happiness” by Howard Cutler,

the author provides several logos and pathos and touch of ethos on advocating that the only

sources that change our mentality of happiness is within our mind and heart.
 In “The Sources of Happiness” by Dalai Lama and Howard Cutler, use the following

rhetorical devices immensely on their research to support their argument that focuses on the pri-

mary assets of happiness. Lama and Cutler used only logos effectively. In “The Sources of Hap-

piness” it states, “In another experiment at the State University of New York at Buffalo, subjects

were asked to complete the sentence ‘I’m glad I’m not a…”(18). The information given stated by

these authors it effectively supports their followed up idea by adding in this research. After ex-

perimenting for a while it had likewise boosted each of the person’s self-esteem. The pathos that

Lama and Cutler covered was a story that outlines the person’s life changing experience they

faced and how this person survived throughout this event. As it states, “I just seem to appreciate

everyday things more, and I’m grateful that so far I haven’t developed any severe AIDS symp-

toms and I can enjoy the things I have”(16). Both authors demonstrated this piece of evidence for

the audience to react emotionally by at first feeling wistful for the person that was diagnosed

with AIDS but on the other hand making the audience realize that we should be appreciative for

the little things we have at this very moment. The use of ethos Lama and Cutler included was

used adequately to make their research more reliable. As it states in the introduction, “Tenzin

Gyatso known as ‘the Dalai Lama’ is the fourteenth in the line of Tibetan spiritual leaders known

as Dalai Lamas. Cutler is an American writer and psychologist with a particular interest in bring-

ing together Buddhist practice and Western psychology”(15). In other words, the introduction

implies that both authors are credible based on who they are which shows they are familiar with

their arguments.

In “How Happy Are You And Why?” by Sonja Lyubomirsky, she utilizes all the rhetorical

devices in an outstanding manner by adding in enough knowledge to assist her argument. She
used only logos efficiently. According to the research it states, “For example, one study tracked

Australian citizens every two years from 1981 to 1987 and found that positive and negative life

events influenced their feelings of happiness and satisfaction as we should expect, but after the

events had passed, their feelings returned to their original baselines”(152). Lyubomirsky includes

life events such as marriage, making new friends and etc. can enhance a person’s happiness but

bringing back to where our normal “baseline” of happiness was before the life-changing event

occurred. The author uses pathos by portraying several different stories about people who went

through horrible distasters. One of the stories states, “Randy lost two people close to him to sui-

cide, at age twelve his father and at age seventeen his best friend”(143). This piece of evidence,

the author added this perspective to grab the audience’s attention. Lastly for ethos,

Lyubomirsky’s profile was outstandingly reliable as it states, “Sonja Lyubomirsky is a professor

of psychology at the university of California. She earned a PHD in social psychology from Stan-

ford University”(141). This shows that Lybomirsky is a psychologist.

In “Living with Less. A Lot Less” by Graham Hill, he poorly used all the rhetorical de-

vices. Starting off with logos, Hill presented one research that specifies how stress levels in-

crease by having possessions in the way. The research indicates, “ In a study published last year,

researchers at UCLA observed 32 middle class Los Angeles families and found that all of the

mother’s stress hormones spike during the time they spent dealing with their belongings”(256).

The given source backs Hill’s argument how people’s stress levels increase by only having few

belongings they have in possession. The only pathos Hill included in was his own perspective

how he handled his own issues based on handling possessions. Hill claims, “It took 15 years, a

great love and a lot of travel to get rid of all the inessential things I had collected and live a big-
ger, better, richer life with less”(255). Hill analyzes how his life was full of things that affected

his well being such as his possessions, houses and etc. but overtime once things began to change

he improved himself without having weight on his shoulders. This grabs the audience's sensation

based on how devastating his life was overtime as it grew worse and the turn of events he faced.

With ethos, Hill inadequately used this strategy based on who he is and not seemingly like a

convincing person. Early in the text it states, “Graham Hill as a Canadian journalist, en-

trepreneur, and designer --as well as the founder of TreeHugger, a website devoted to sustainabil-

ity”(254). This shows that Hill isn’t is only a journalist, a designer, and an entrepreneur which

the audience won’t fall as a reliable source.

In essence, all authors include these strategies to finalize and to encourage each and every

counter argument to persuade the audience with their research, opinions, and storytelling. Even

though one of the authors didn’t not subsequently add a bit more of these methods to support his

main idea, although he did provide pathos and ethos to balance his perspective. In conclusion the

most prominent research by Lyubarskiy proved that her research was more dependable on how

she firmly used all these strategies that effectively caught the audience’s attention.