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I saw The Pursuit Of Happyness (2006) three times but I can't understand what was the actual happiness?

Can anybody help me?

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  • Johnny mentioned it in his answer, but I'll make it explicit. The happiness Chris is pursuing is that of his own definition, meaning that he doesn't want to struggle, he wants to be capable of providing for his son and to not suffer a loss like he did with his wife due to financial hardship. In other words, he wants what everyone wants, to be financially secure (not necessarily rich).
    – DustinDavis
    Commented May 9, 2018 at 15:48

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The title of the movie actually comes from a sign at the day care that his son went to. Chris (Smith) complains to the teacher that the word "Happiness" is misspelled.

Later on, Chris explains:

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?

The happiness that Chris pursues is the luxury that he sees; the box seats at a 49ers game, the mansions, the nice cars. He wants all of this for himself and for his son, especially after tasting homelessness.

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Chris himself says it in the movie

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?

Pursuit of Happiness is like something which we have to get and it is a kind of thing which must be pursued; we don't simply get it.

In the title itself it suggests that Chris pursues the happiness because what we do in our life for earning ultimately our goal is to get the happiness in the end. Also, happiness is kind of something which can be started from the inside of yourself.

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  • Where are these quotes from? Can you edit your answer to add the sources and explain a bit better? Right now it looks like you just copied the whole thing from somewhere else.
    – Luciano
    Commented May 9, 2018 at 11:56
  • @ayushs27 I edited your response to be more grammatically correct. If I accidentally changed the meaning of anything, feel free to edit/rollback.
    – Charles
    Commented May 12, 2018 at 16:12

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