Because optimizing happiness (at best) leads to pointless bliss, a la Goodhart's Law. Happiness is the coarse measure of your brain/subconscious/whatever estim

Because optimizing happiness (at best) leads to pointless bliss, a la Goodhart's Law. Happiness is the coarse measure of your brain/subconscious/whatever estimate of how you're doing at life: are you effectively working at achieving your goals? This is why people reporting being happy when they are focused on doing what they really want to do, and lack of happiness is just a sign that, at some deep level, you do not believe you are trending toward success at your goals. You might need to fix your goals. You might need to fix your trend. But happiness is more likely to come as a side effect of doing the right thing (in your own estimation!) than as a direct effect of trying to be happy.