Science of happiness: Happiness doesn't just come naturally like you think

If there's 21 minutes to say, 2 million years seems to be an extremely long time. But compared to evolution, 2 million years is nothing. Yet in 2 million years, the human brain has tripled its mass, from 567 grams like our ancestors, to the Habilis who became a 1.360 gram mass of meat between the ears that every person on Earth has .

When brain size tripled, it not only grew in volume but also new structures appeared. Two of the new parts are the frontal and frontal cortex. So what can the prefrontal cortex do for us to explain an architectural overhaul of the human skull in just one "blink of an eye" of evolutionary history?

The prefrontal cortex can do a lot of things, but one of the most important things is that it has the ability to simulate experiences. For example, pilots train by visualizing the early flights to not make mistakes when flying. Humans have great adaptability that we can really experience everything in our heads through experiencing them in reality. This is something that none of our ancestors can do and no other animal can do. It was a great adaptation. It is the opposite thumb of the hand, standing upright and inventing the language is one of the great things that make people no longer climb over the branches and start confidently entering the mall. shopping.

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Now, try to imagine your house destroyed in an earthquake or you experience a serious injury in an accident and your leg is paralyzed. When asked to describe the impact of this event, most people talk about its horrific nature. Many people also say that they would rather die than suffer them.

However, the researchers found that after six months, the happiness of the two people (whose homes were destroyed in the earthquake and people paralyzed by accident) were the same.

The Impact Bias - impact bias

"My laboratory has done a lot of research and drawn a concept called The Impact Bias . In fact, this has been sought by economists and psychologists before. "Impact bias" is something that tends to make poor simulation function work, making the division responsible for simulation make you think that different results become much different than the real ones. - Dan Gilbert - the author of the interesting discovery of The Impact Bias phenomenon.

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According to Gilbert, "From field research to the lab, we have found that winning or losing an election, whether or not to lose a lover, is or is not promoted, parked or slipped in one. college exams, high scores or low scores on tests . all have impact, intensity and especially time is much less than we think . " It turns out, life's incidents don't have much impact on your happiness.

Happiness can "be aggregated"

In 1642, Sir Thomas Brown once wrote that "I am the happiest person alive. I have in myself what can turn poor into rich, adversity into success. I am more inviolable than Asin, fate is also there is no way to make me fall ". So what makes us so terrible?

It turned out to be "psychological immune system" (psychological immune system) - something that we can all think of. This is a system of cognitive processes, mostly unconscious awareness that helps humans change the worldview, so that we feel better about the world in which each person can find self.

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We always think that happiness is something to look for. But reality, people accumulate happiness.

Example 1 : Moreese Bickham spent 37 years in a prison in Louisiana by a crime he never caused. At 78, he was vindicated by DNA evidence and after being released, he said, "I don't regret taking a minute. It's a glorious experience."

The "secret of happiness" here is: Accumulate wealth, power and prestige, then lose it.

Example 2 : Jim Wright - a former president of the House of Representatives - decided to resign when a suspicious mission about the book he had made was discovered. He lost everything after all these years of trying to build. However, Jim Wright still said: "I am much better physically, financially, emotionally, spiritually and almost anything else."

The "secret of happiness" is here: Spend life in prison for as long as possible.

Example 3 : Pete Best - The Beatles' first drummer but was later "kicked" out of the group and replaced by another. In 1994, in an interview, at that time, he - still a drummer and studio musician - shared: "I'm happier than I would be if I stayed with The Beatles."

The "secret of happiness" here is: Never join the Beatles band.

"Natural happiness" and "synthetic happiness"

"Natural happiness is what we get when we get what we want," and "aggregate happiness is what we create when we don't get what we want . " What still exists in society is that many people do not appreciate "aggregate happiness".

You don't know that "synthetic happiness" is as practical and long-term as the happiness you get when you get exactly what you've been aiming for.

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We all have psychological immune systems, the ability to synthesize happiness but not everyone is equal, some people perform better than others and depend on the circumstances. It turns out - the ability to make decisions and change decisions - is YOU of natural happiness, because it allows you to choose between all the bright future and find what you like best. However, the freedom to choose - to change and make decisions - is the ENJOY of synthetic happiness.

We tend to overestimate the impact of major events on our lives. However, no matter how good or negative they are, they do not affect our level of long-term happiness as much as we think.

Lesson learned from "The Impact Bias"

There are two things we can learn from "impact bias".

First , we tend to focus on things that will change and forget things that can't be changed. When we think about winning a lottery, we imagine that event and all the money we will win. However, we forgot the existence of the remaining 99%: 1% of the rich hold 99% of the world's assets, genius includes 1% of talent and 99% of training. Mostly, this rule is the same and in this case, we have 99% chance that it will not win the lottery.

We will behave harshly if we don't get enough sleep. We still have to wait hours and hours in congested traffic. We still have to go to the gym if we want to have a nice physique. We still have to pay taxes every year no matter how much more we have to pay.

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We will still suffer when we lose the person we love. We still feel great when we sit and relax in front of the porch and watch the sunset. We imagine change but they forget that there are things that don't change.

Secondly , challenges are obstacles to achieving something specific, not your obstacles - a person . The Greek philosopher Epictetus once said: "Going lame is an impediment to your leg, but not to your will" (Crime is a problem with your feet and not your will). We overestimate negative events that have a serious impact on our lives with the same reason that we overestimate the value of positive, good situations. We focus on what happens (losing one leg) but forget all other life experiences (which can be achieved by will).

Write thank you cards to your friends, watch your favorite weekend shows, read a good book, eat a delicious meal . whether paralyzed or your feet are healthy There are countless wonderful things that you can enjoy in this life.

Negative events can create challenges for specific tasks, but people's experiences are changing and varied.

About the author : The article is translated from sharing by James Clear - who specializes in behavioral science and how to create good habits.