And yet we might wonder whether happiness is all that really does matter in
life. I might sacrifice my happiness for the sake of other values. But if I do this,
is my life as good as it otherwise would have been? I might choose to remain
with my wife and children even though I would be happier as a single man. If I
do this, then remaining with my family is more important to me than being
happy. Still this doesn’t mean that by staying with my family I have a good life,
or even a better life than I otherwise would have had. It makes perfect sense to
say that even though I have the things that matter to me most in life, my life is
not as good as it would have been if I had made different choices, because I am
not as happy as I otherwise would have been