Breaking Down the Search for Happiness in Dan Buettner's “Excerpt from Thrive: Finding Happiness the Blue Zones Way

What does happiness mean to you? How do you know you are happy or not? In today’s

world, happiness is an ambiguous word. Dan Buettner is a New York Times best-selling

author. In his article, “Excerpt from Thrive: Finding Happiness the Blue Zones Way”, he aims

to inform people different levels of happiness and where is the happiness come from.

“Through …experimentation…, they’ve …, focusing not only on the nature of human

happiness, but also on discovering ways to improve our chances for personal well-being.”

(5) As all people have different views and meanings toward happiness, it motivates Buettner

to write the essay and giving a sense of what is happiness to other people. By gathering

experts’ opinions, the essay can be concluded as there are no ways to measure happiness.

Every one’s meaning towards happiness is different. It is possible that people can control

happiness. Buettner uses the technique of personal anecdote, organization, diction and

contrast to point out how people have ability to control happiness.

Buettner starts his essay with a personal anecdote to tell the readers that people’s

meaning toward happiness is based on ones’ behaviors and perspectives. Personal anecdote

means a short account of personal event. He brings out three different people cases to test

readers that who is the happiest person. The way of Buettner doing this can arouse readers’

interest to keep reading the story. “Jan Hammer, a 42- year-old father, has to wake up earlier

at each morning and do his job as a garbage man.”(1) “Norridah Yusoh, a

43-year-old-housewife, has to cover her hair as religious requirement and show respect to

his husband by kissing his hand every night.”(1) “Manuel Uribe, a 45-year-old...

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...bring people with happiness, but it will not continued for a

long time.

Buettner’s essay is mainly focused on using rhetorical analysis strategies to point out

the different definitions of happiness and how do people get happiness. The writing

strategies that he is using help to enrich the content of the essay and consolidate his ideas

towards happiness as he cited several experts’ opinions in his writing. Also, he bought

several life cases with dialogue to explain what happiness is. And the word choice is mostly

understandable for the public people to read. Thus, it can prove that the Buettner’s writing

is informal. Informal essay is good for not making the readers get bored but arousing their

interests in the essay. Buettner is successful to catch readers’ attention to the essay. Readers

will be more willing to explore deeper about happiness.