Interesting as ever, Tyler Cowen answers a reader who asks why Cowen thinks being interesting is more important than being happy.

"Happiness" to me sounds boring, as if the person has a limited imagination when it comes to wants and an inability to be frustrated by the difficulty of creating new peak experiences.

I'm not sure if I believeHe points to a Penelope Trunk post on the same topic where she posts a survey to test whether you're inclined towards one pole or the other. The test indicates that I'm inclined towards being interesting, and perhaps that explains why I feel like I could be happier.

Writes Trunk:

The culmination of my four-year obsession with happiness research is that I think people need to choose between an interesting life or happy life. (Note: This does not mean you are interesting or not interesting. I am talking about what values guide your decision making.) I think the things that make life happy have to do with complacency, and the things that make life interesting have to do with lack of complacency.