Would you rather be happy or deep?

Hmm...
The bongo playing physicist Richard Feynman seemed both happy and deep to me ! We might note however that he did avoid 'philosophical discussion' when questioned about 'time reversals' in his celebrated diagrams, but whether he would equate 'depth' with 'misery' remains unanswered.
And meditators might argue that what some might call 'depth' is for them 'transcendence' in which 'suffering' dissipates.

I'm not saying that wisdom brings misery, but that misery can bring wisdom. Happy, extroverted people don't seek wisdom; they are content. Unhappy people seek a way out, and in their struggles often stumble onto wisdom. A bipolar or manic/depressive person gains insight and depth not in the manic phase but in the depressive phase. That's why many manic/depressives are creative and resist medicines to even them out. They enjoy the manic phase, but the depressive phase--as awful as it is--gives them insight and depth. They are aware of that .

The person on a hallucinogen having a good trip can have a life-changing experience, but a person on a bad trip can have a profoundly life-changing experience.

I want to be an amoeba at the bottom of the sea.

Maybe you are. Are you happy and fulfilled as an amoeba, or are you seeking a deeper meaning?

Graham's has to much depth for me to count it till I get the meaning...
...oh well I still want to be an ameoba if you don't mind it.

Why is it either or?

I'm happy. But I also like to ponder and think about the world. I have personal philosophies and simple explanations for certain aspects of personality and psychology. I like cosmology and physics but it only helps in my contentment.

Either and or is the modus operandi 90% of the time.
Ppl want left or right sort of directions....life is more like moving in 6 DoF.
You rotate, go forward n left all at the same time!
I can be intentionally and deeply shallow not necessarily flat.
Equally I can be deep n lost, a vagrant in a mad kingdom, out of touch with my human condition n limits.
What to be?
I rather be what it comes to me. I take it all!

i tend to defer to the HHGTTG's character Slartibartfast and his philosophy on being given Africa to design in the Earth MKII, after winning an award for designing the coastline of Norway on the original Earth, he's decided to add fjords to the coastline of Africa, even though he's been made aware that people think it's wrong

Slartibartfast: Science has achieved some wonderful things, I know, but I'd far rather be happy than right any day.
Arthur Dent: And are you?
Slartibartfast: No. That's where it all falls down, of course.
Arthur Dent: Pity, it sounded like rather a good lifestyle otherwise.

Thanks for the reference to The Hitchhiker's Guide. Probably, humor ties happiness and depth together, or misery and happiness, or something or other. Sheet! I don't know. Maybe you can explain it better than I can.

I can't really remember ever being happy. Oh, I've had my fleeting moments of happiness, but in my search for meaning--probably as an escape from misery-- fell down a well metaphorically. That's where I found true depth, but nothing in the intellectual sense. I don't think happiness or depth comes through the intellect. The intellect bings this: "Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything (42)". For those of you who aren't familiar with this statement it's the ultimate statement from the "hitchhiker's guide to the Galaxy".


I've found my relationship to the universe, which is my definition of religion, and I don't think the universe is an especially happy place, but the perception of it--with its good and bad--can be sublime.

Now, would I trade all this depth for happiness? In a second.