Whatever one does, there needs to be love, an attempt to the highest union. Only then can one be happy. Happiness derived from the pleasure of taking and giving control to each other.Take a socccer ball for instance, inanimate till we bring it to life, but once brought to life it is a pleasure in falling in love with it, trying to understand every interaction it makes with your body.
Such is the beauty of love that it can happen with anything, anywhere. The only criteria for it being a source of lasting happiness though is that u need to give it your all.It is the principle meditation is based on. The principle of meditating on a certain object, a certain God and falling in love with it so deeply that nothing else is important, that you loose all your other thoughts but the one of him .