Step Off The Hedonic Treadmill
Step Off The Hedonic Treadmill
Why we can't stay happy
We are terrible at estimating how happy (or sad) something will make us…
We work towards goals, thinking this will finally be the thing that makes us happy… but it never sticks.
Or we suffer a setback, and we think we’ll never recover… but a few months later, we don’t think of it anymore.
In one study, they even compared lottery winners to paraplegics; they wanted to see who was happier…
They concluded that the lottery winners were no more happy than the paraplegics.
But how can that be possible? These were people who had won the lottery (a moment most of us would imagine as completely changing our lives) vs. people who had been in an accident that paralyzed them.
We can thank Hedonic Adaptation for this.
Hedonic adaptation is the psychological term for us having a general baseline we always return to.
An event can make us happy, or sad, but eventually we end up right back where we were.
And we’ve all felt it.
You know that feeling when you first hear a new song, and you just can’t get enough? You listen to it over and over.
But eventually, the same song that gave you so much joy and emotion becomes a song you skip on your playlist.
Or think about high school graduation, college, getting the degree you worked so hard for, or the job you always wanted.
We want these things so badly, but do they ever live up to the hype once we have them?
How long before we’re complaining about our new job just like we did about our old one?
How long before the degree you worked so hard for becomes something gathering dust in a frame?
We adapt to all things, good and bad, and return to our natural baseline.
So what does this mean for us?
It means waiting to be happy for any one event is foolish, because there’s a good chance we’ll feel how we do now.
But it’s not hopeless. There are ways to increase your baseline happiness.
Here’s a great video on that:
My best tips?
The Stoic practice of negative visualization, combined with a gratitude practice.
Negative visualization means imagining your life without the things you hold dear.
Imagine how you would feel if you lost your job, or your spouse, or your legs, or your sight.
When you imagine your life without the people or things we so easily take for granted, it makes you happy you still have them.
It sounds morbid to imagine your loved ones passing, but it’s an excellent reminder to appreciate them when we otherwise would take them for granted.
The second tip, gratitude practice I’ve written about before: On Gratitude
But the key takeaway is to set aside time each day to be thankful for the things in your life… and for me it’s often the simple things.
A nice warm shower.
A safe place to sleep at night.
A family that cares about you.
Your health.
When you see those things for the blessings they are, you’ll never run out of reasons to be happy.
So don’t chase the peaks, and fear the valleys, when it comes to happiness.
Enjoy something great when it happens, but don’t try to cling to that happiness, hoping it will never go… it will.
But if we work to increase our natural level of happiness (a better word might be contentment), then life in general will be better, regardless of whatever event we’re currently going through.
Thanks for reading,
– Josh