Stumbling on Happiness
If you enjoy reading those articles about the latest strange discovery by psychology researchers, you will love Daniel Gilbert's book. It is 263 pages of "that's really interesting," a string of anecdotes about the things that people don't realize about themselves. It's well-researched, as far as I can tell, but written in a funny, informal style.
On one hand, the book is a bit depressing--essentially, studies show that people are really bad at knowing what makes them happy. However, the fascinating aspects outweighed that for me.
Two parts in particular resonated with me. The first is that our now selves have a really difficult time determining what our future selves will want, even though we most of our decisions are for the benefit of our future selves rather than the here and now. We put money in our 401(k) instead of blowing it on a trip around the world because we want to retire comfortably, but our 70 year old self is disappointed we didn't have more exciting experiences when we were young enough to enjoy them. Now, clearly we can't live in the moment and have to make decisions for the benefit of that stranger waiting for us in the future, but it does explain that moment when you look back 5-10-15 years in the past and say, "Why did I ever think I would(n't) want to do that?" (In my life, see my young self's resistance to sushi and quickly abandoned plans to major in Communications.)
The second is that the reason we sometimes feel much worse about little things is that our emotional immune system doesn't kick in. When something horrible happens to threaten our self worth, our mind starts generating rationalizations--she was having a bad day, he was just joking, they're a bunch of idiots. It happens so automatically we don't realize it's a justification and can believe it. But the small things don't trigger the same defense mechanisms, which is why we have trouble getting over the tiny slights (like the sales manager at work who once condescendingly called me "sweetheart" on the phone--I still regret not hanging up on him) and sometimes resent people more for insults to our loved ones than to ourselves (as much as we'd like to think it's just because we're selfless).
In short, a fast, fun read that will provide you with much psychological trivia.
Personal note: Tomorrow I celebrate my second anniversary with my wonderful husband. I am a very blessed woman, and it's a safe bet that my future self won't disagree with my now self on that fact.
On one hand, the book is a bit depressing--essentially, studies show that people are really bad at knowing what makes them happy. However, the fascinating aspects outweighed that for me.
Two parts in particular resonated with me. The first is that our now selves have a really difficult time determining what our future selves will want, even though we most of our decisions are for the benefit of our future selves rather than the here and now. We put money in our 401(k) instead of blowing it on a trip around the world because we want to retire comfortably, but our 70 year old self is disappointed we didn't have more exciting experiences when we were young enough to enjoy them. Now, clearly we can't live in the moment and have to make decisions for the benefit of that stranger waiting for us in the future, but it does explain that moment when you look back 5-10-15 years in the past and say, "Why did I ever think I would(n't) want to do that?" (In my life, see my young self's resistance to sushi and quickly abandoned plans to major in Communications.)
The second is that the reason we sometimes feel much worse about little things is that our emotional immune system doesn't kick in. When something horrible happens to threaten our self worth, our mind starts generating rationalizations--she was having a bad day, he was just joking, they're a bunch of idiots. It happens so automatically we don't realize it's a justification and can believe it. But the small things don't trigger the same defense mechanisms, which is why we have trouble getting over the tiny slights (like the sales manager at work who once condescendingly called me "sweetheart" on the phone--I still regret not hanging up on him) and sometimes resent people more for insults to our loved ones than to ourselves (as much as we'd like to think it's just because we're selfless).
In short, a fast, fun read that will provide you with much psychological trivia.
Personal note: Tomorrow I celebrate my second anniversary with my wonderful husband. I am a very blessed woman, and it's a safe bet that my future self won't disagree with my now self on that fact.
Labels: Daniel Gilbert, Stumbling on Happiness
posted by Darci at
10:37 PM
2 Comments:
Book suggestion:
If you haven't read it, I would like to suggest "The Power of One" by Bryce Courtenay. It was highly recommended by my South African friends and is a great first person view of SA, race, religion and coming of age during WW2 and beyond.
Thanks for the recommendation. South Africa is actually something know almost nothing about---but feel like I should.
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