The Three Keys to Happiness

Frustration, dissatisfaction, depression -- these days, it seems they are the plagues of my generation, nay the plagues of society. Why when I complain of unhappiness, do my friends more often echo of my own sentiments than offer words of comfort? I don't blame people for their melancholy, and the fact that it is so pervasive only underscores the likelihood that our unhappiness is not entirely our fault. But that doesn't mean we can't do something about it.

Psychologists often explore the effects of systems that impact people's values, priorities, and goals -- such as religion, tradition, and personal habits. But one thing that psychologists rarely study is the impact of economic systems on mental health. Since I often find myself trying to dissect the psychological effects of all the systems in which I live, I find this lack of research particularly unsettling. However, I recently discovered and read a great article by a team of psychologists that analyzes the ways the human psyche is affected by capitalism -- or more specifically, American corporate capitalism (ACC).

To make a long story short, the team found that the world's most pervasive economic system requires that people place value on wealth and possessions (no big surprise there). The more interesting part is this:

...concern for wealth and possessions conflicts with working “to improve the world through activism or generativity,” having “satisfying relationships with family and friends,” and feeling “competent and autonomous.”... [E]mpirical research, conducted with different methodologies, from different theoretical perspectives, and with thousands of individuals from dozens of nations around the world, leads to a provocative conclusion: The values and goals most closely expressive of ACC’s ideology and institutions are also those that oppose and potentially undermine people’s concern for: a) promoting the welfare of others in the broader community; b) developing a sense of connection and closeness to other humans; and c) choosing paths in life that help them to feel worthy and autonomous. [Kasser, et al. (2007) "Some Costs of American Corporate Capitalism, Psychological Inquiry, Vol. 18, No. 1, 1–22.]

The authors argue that beyond the need for basics like food and shelter, human happiness depends on three major things: feeling useful, having close relationships with other people, and feeling capable and independent. Capitalism rewards working in one's self-interest; it generally does not reward promoting the welfare of the wider community. And self-interested goals often have more to do with wealth and possessions than strong personal relationships. What's more, capitalism often requires that people sell their skills (labor) by performing mundane, repetitive, or simply uninteresting tasks that undermine the sense of being useful and independent. In other words, our economic system is inherently at odds with our happiness.

So what to do about it? Capitalism is far from perfect, but it is an entrenched system that has many advantages. I don't know how to cure what ails our society, and neither do the authors of the article I read this week. But I do think that if we take a close look at the problems with our economic system, we can make conscientious decisions that improve our own odds of shaking the frustration, dissatisfaction, and depression that are far too common among us. We don't have to become communists, we just have to be more aware of the importance of:

a) promoting the welfare of others in the broader community
b) developing a sense of connection and closeness to other humans
c) choosing paths in life that help us to feel worthy and autonomous.

In fact, I feel better already. It's not hard to do those three things -- the hard part is recognizing how often we need to think about them. These principles should be our guidelines for decision-making. Review a decision you recently made. What principles guided your choice? Are you confident with the path you've chosen? If not, maybe you've forgotten how important it is to be kind, have friends, and do what you want to do. When it comes to being happy, maybe that's all there is to it.

I Still Think You Have To Live Your Life On Fire...

I have never been sure what is meant by talk about a "wasted" life or not letting life "pass you by." I think for most people, that which constitutes a meaningful life varies greatly. Because people have different priorities, there is no clear "right" way to live your life. But recently, I have begun to reevaluate my own criteria for such qualification. I am not one to sit idly. I'd say my soul is pretty impassioned (and restless), so for me it is most logical to judge my life from the perspective of action. For a long time, I have repeatedly asked myself Am I doing what I want to be doing? Am I getting as much out of my life as I possibly can? And then not long ago, I began to reevaluate my standards.

Finding myself in doubt of the questions I most commonly ask myself, I began to wonder if perhaps I was unsatisfied with the answers, and simply trying to justify "wasting" my life away. Thankfully, after much introspection, I realized that in fact I am quite happy with what I am doing. I get a lot out of life in every moment! But I also realized that the questions I was asking myself may not have been the right questions. They were important questions, certainly, but they were too self-centered to be accurate indicators of how well I am living my life. After all, life isn't just about me. It's about the world. I preach that all the time! So I turned the questions around. Instead of judging myself by how much I am getting out of this world, I began to percolate on the idea of what I am putting into this world.

At first it seemed I was having a fundamental change of heart. My new standards for judging my own life seemed to be the opposite of my old ones. I wondered if such a swing would force me to dramatically change my habits and my hobbies. I began to remind myself several times a day that I needed to judge myself from the perspective of contribution. Contribution -- that is not the opposite of action. In fact, it is a type action. Was my new approach narrower than my old one? I usually recoil at the thought of narrowness. I like to take as wide an approach to understanding and judging as possible. After all, this is a big, big world. But in thinking about my new question (Are you contributing as much as you can to your world?), I concluded that this is actually a much wider perspective than my previous approach. Even though contribution seems narrower than action, my new perspective embodies my old one.

The world is a closed system. What goes around, comes around. That which we put in eventually returns to us (usually in some new form). By recognizing and prioritizing contribution, and by focusing on putting in, I can still engineer what I get out of life. Only by focusing on contributing to your world can you see that you are also controlling what your world gives you. After realizing that asking myself about what I am putting into my world also captures my need to get as much out of my world that I can, I realized that my original question of introspection still applies. Am I doing what I want to be doing? But instead of determining that want from the perspective of getting what I want, I have to focus on giving what I want.

Focusing on contribution doesn't mean giving everything all the time. It doesn't even mean that I have to be contributing all the time. The importance of the question is that it forces me to be aware of how generous I am, how cooperative I am, and how much I am putting in versus taking out. It's too exhausting to constantly be concerned with the welfare of everyone else. Sometimes we do need to focus on ourselves. Over-emphasizing the importance of contribution can actually create tasks so daunting that we paralyze ourselves, and as a result we end up contributing very little. But recognizing contribution, by extension, leads to a recognition of the balance between give and take. Giving a little more to your world can lead to some surprising gets, as well. I'll never stop judging my life from the perspective of action. I am a do-er. But I am also a thinker, and I think that now I have a better understanding how to live, love, and do.

Using my new question, I realize there are changes to be made in my life, mostly small ones. I have begun to recognize the plethora of opportunities to contribute. I have found I actually have a lot more to share that I thought. I am also beginning to find the limitations of what I can contribute. As a consequence, I have become more aware of what other people can contribute, as well. I'm seeing the big picture in a different way than I have before. I judge people not by what they are trying to get out of the world or make the world do for them (although in many cases I have found quite noble answers to those questions). Now I judge people by their value to society. The theory of evolution suggests that we are all given skills and talents to promote not just our personal welfare, but the survival and advancement of our entire species. Ah yes, this new perspective is indeed much wider than the old. I see a bigger picture than I ever have before. But at the same time, I am realizing that this perspective works in the micro as well as it works in the macro. I can judge not just my life from the perspective of contribution, but also my relationships.

It is still important for me to get as much out of life as I can. Especially in school, I strive to get, absorb, obtain. But I also see that despite my relative ignorance, there is a lot I can give. I can cooperate with my fellow students more. By extension, cooperating means I'll get more out of it, too! So many times has cogitation led me to the conclusion that the right answer is a balanced one. I am starting to understand the most general and universal notion of "living life right." It's about balancing the give and the take. But to do that, we have to be equally aware of what we put in and what we take out.