Most humans alive today are healthier, wealthier, and safer than any other generation in history. Sadly, this hasn’t translated to us being any less miserable. Here are 7 things which might be driving our sorry state, despite all we have achieved.
Wanting more. More isn’t always bad. More knowledge makes us less ignorant, and more wealth provides us with more potential. But the blind and single-minded pursuit of more for its own sake? That’s a recipe for perpetual dissatisfaction. There’s always more to have, do, and experience than you ever can in your life. Being addicted to more sets you up for disappointment.
Success. We like achieving what we set out to do. This isn’t a problem, until our pursuit becomes pathological. If failure is an inevitable part of life - and our greatest teacher - an addiction to success is crippling. Our measures of success are often abstract and relative, which lets us move our goalposts, and continue to perpetuate our addiction.
Feeling good. Feeling good is meant to be a signal that things are going well. But we’ve found ingenious ways to feel good even when things may not be so. We can use drugs to bypass pain and feel good. We can distract ourselves with screens, flooding our brains with dopamine to feel good whilst putting off our real lives. Wanting to feel good is not bad, but we have to ask ourselves whether we are chasing these feelings at the expense of living a rich and genuine life.
Comparison. Humans brains are relativistic machines. We’re not equipped with a simple barometer that tells us whether we are simply ok or not. Instead, we’re told whether we are ok relative to everyone else. And there will always be someone with more of something you think you lack.
Self pity. In small doses, self pity is therapeutic - it’s a mechanism to empathise with difficult situations in our lives. But taken too far, calling on our own self-pity to invite the empathy of others leads us to seek connection in an unhealthy way. Self pity also keeps us in our lane, rather than helping us take action to change.
Looking busy. Busyness is a sign of a full life, but not necessarily a fulfilling life. Glamourising hard work runs the risk of making everything feel hard, even when it doesn’t need to be. There’s no doubt we should contend with our limitations and push ourselves, but to do so in service of signalling busyness to others will lead us astray in our individual paths.
Our minds. Thanks to our egos, we default to taking our thoughts at face value. We believe the stories we cook up, without ever questioning them. How many times does your story limit you? How many times do your ruminations paralyze you? Have you ever considered, that you might in fact be addicted to the prison of your mind?
More success, to feel good in comparison to others, along with a sprinkle of self pity and always wanting to be busy is a recipe to ruminate in our minds, and live in perpetual scarcity.
I'm reading "The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck" now. The author explains that feeling bad occasionally is perfectly fine. It's this social media epidemic that says you must always be feeling happy and fulfilled. That's wrong. Happiness comes from solving problems. Negative emotions are actually good because you can't be happy if you don't know what being unhappy feels like.
A fantastic read, thank you for sharing!