[mattejade]

I think many of the people who say that "happiness must come from within" are making a logical leap. It's true, you could go out and make lots of life changes yet still be unhappy. But that doesn't mean /every/ life change is futile for our happiness. Perhaps you just didn't change it in the right way!

From a more scientific perspective, there have been plenty of studies done on happiness, and it's virtually undeniable that our external environment has at least /some/ effect on our happiness.[1] I'd argue that one has to ignore or dismiss a massive wealth of studies in psychology to insist that happiness only comes from within.

[1] Since I'm talking broadly, this might act as a good summary - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedonic_treadmill