Say It Isn't So

Way of the Emotional Warrior

www.kaiehnes.com

Ep49 Say It Isn’t So

Hello and Welcome to the Way of the Emotional Warrior Podcast. My name is Kai Ehnes and today we will be answering the question of: Do most people really Not want to be Happy?

When I first saw this, I thought I simply read too fast and made a mistake. After double checking, the statement really said People Do Not want to be happy…well time to take a deeper look.

On a podcast episode by economist Tyler Cowen, he interviewed the 2002 Nobel Prize winner in economics, Cognitive Psychologist Daniel Kahneman. He contends that happiness and satisfaction are uniquely different. Happiness is a momentary experience that comes about impromptu and is temporary. Meanwhile, satisfaction lasts longer rooted in achieving goals and building the life you are proud of.

Ok…I can see that. In either case these are feelings or emotions. If we pursue everyday, the feel-good or happy emotions then that will set a certain set of priorities into motion. Maybe you skip work and go and do some things that feel good in that moment. Maybe you simply go shopping online because it allows you to temporarily feel good because of mundane repetition in a job that pays the bills. In either case, what you find is that the happiness you thought was yours, disappears as fast as it came. Now you have to go back to your baseline. This means that you sort of live a drab non stimulating life unless you inject moments of happiness. Wow…was Kierkegaard right?

According to Kahneman, “Altogether, I don’t think that people maximize happiness in that sense…this doesn’t seem to be what people want to do. They actually want to maximize their satisfaction with themselves and with their lives. And that leads in completely different directions than the maximization of happiness.”

Instead, he argues that satisfaction is based mostly on comparisons. “Life satisfaction is connected to a large degree to social yardsticks–achieving goals, meeting expectations.”

What about money? “He says it has a significant influence on life satisfaction, whereas happiness is affected by money only when funds are lacking. The lack creates suffering, but once you have above a certain income level that satisfies our basic needs, wealth doesn’t increase happiness. The graph is surprisingly flat”

Kahneman adds that memory is important in this process. Happiness is elusive because a lot of it simply never gets registered in long term memory.

Have you ever experienced a great moment and wish you could somehow preserve it? Maybe you run to get your camera but by the time you get it, the moment is over. Maybe it simply can not be captured by the camera the way your consciousness does.

Satisfaction on the other hand is the ongoing story of our lives. We add pieces to the story ongoing. We tell our story to ourselves and others throughout our entire life. Of course we tell the story quite often to elicit some sort of response. How often do you tell about an event in order to get sympathy? Do you notice that you slightly tell the story a different way to get noticed?

So when do we feel this elusive happiness? We feel happiness primarily in the company of others, Kahneman argues. So back to that wonderful moment you were experiencing. If no one else is around simply enjoy how special it is. Don’t do anything other than absorb it, soak it in, enjoy it. Then if you want, you can tell someone about it. Both moments will let you feel happy.

Enough happy moments will let you build a life that works for you and now your life’s story adds experiences of satisfaction. You will become way more fun to be around which means better interactions with others which leads to more life satisfaction.

Good luck with your journey.

~Peace