Very well said throughout, DJ. I have written many times I also do not believe in happiness as a goal. Happiness, like sadness, is an emotion meant to come and go and from which we learn. I believe in ever higher baseline levels of contentment, or serenity, or two of the words you chose, peace and tranquility, as the goal. Seeking contentment is not settling but a hopefully high-altitude baseline, coming from within and connection to without. As you said, it doesn’t stem from the acquisition of attachments, but rather from awareness of connection to the world and the universe as a living, breathing, and heart-beating organism and from alignment of mind and soul and discerning my why — my drive — from discovering who I am at my core.

Mirroring what you said in the lines I highlighted above, a stanza of one of my poems, https://medium.com/channspirations/lifes-contradictions-and-paradoxes-8c99c537a3c0, which I just checked and I do not think you read:

Try viewing life as an amusement park

Rides for both thrill seekers and faint-of-heart

Do you see light or only dark

or realize that one cannot exist without another

Contrast and perception

Faith

Purpose and place

Must these be known or just that they exist?

Must a journey have a destination

or would you prefer an endless series of waystations?

Every action has an equal and opposite reaction

as butterfly effects ripple in all directions