We've all heard the truism "money can't buy happiness". Wise thinkers have given lists of reasons for this, like "stuff is temporary" or "mo' money mo' problems". But the actual reason is more fundamental. Happiness is not a state of being. It is a state of perception and expectation.
Economist G. L. S. Shackle gave this example: suppose you are a poor farmer and own a small plot of land. How happy are you? Now, suppose your neighbor comes to you and explains that he has found a deposit of gold that runs right up to your property border and undoubtedly crosses into your property. Now how happy are you? Do you feel wealthy upon learning this news?
"There is a sense in which a man who discovers a gold field on his farm is not objectively richer after the discovery than before. No visible change may have taken place on his land, but simply the knowledge has come to him that a gold-bearing reef has been traced on the neighboring farm up to the edge of his own territory, into which it certainly continues. What then has changed? In what does his new-found wealth consist? His expectations have changed, there now open before him action-courses which will realize great wealth. But the fact that this wealth is not yet realized does not keep him in a state and feeling of poverty."
Expectations are what drive our happiness. There are three parts of expectations which alter our psyche state. First is the expectation period in which we wait for the expected event. Second is the occurrence of the expected event. Third and finally is the subsequent evaluation of the event's meeting or failing to meet expectations. Somewhat surprising, it is the first of these which impacts us the greatest.
Constant expectations of future pleasure and joy put us in a state of happiness. Expectations of discomfort, displeasure, or dissatisfaction must conversely put us in a state of misery. This is the longest lasting period of the expectation process, and thus has the longest impact on our lives. It is the expectation of events which causes our brain to generate dopamine, thus generating a feeling of pleasure and joy from the mere expectation of some presumably positive outcome. Conversely, the brain releases endorphins during the experiencing of the pleasurable event, which offer a peaceful, satisfied feeling. As it turns out, dopamine has a much stronger influence on our brains and thus our state of mind. This means that expecting something nice has a much larger impact on our happiness than actually doing or having something nice.
Now to bring this full circle, happiness is not an actual state of being. You are not happy because your life is in a pleasant state. Happiness depends on your perception of your current and future status. You may choose to be happy simply by expecting positive outcomes for yourself. You may choose to be miserable by expecting bad outcomes in the future. Happiness is a choice, and it pays to be optimistic.
Thursday, July 25, 2013
Saturday, July 20, 2013
Black and White
I think it is human nature to try to see things as black and white, true and false. It gives sense and order to our perception of the world. It removes uncertainty and gives us purpose and direction. When the world is black and white, we can comprehend it.
But the world is not black and white. Not only is it full of shades of gray, but various colors and hues. There are very few absolute truths, and those we think we have may not be nearly as absolute as we believe. Believing in absolutes structures our mind, but also restricts it to a limited understanding of truth. We become unwelcoming to new truths, deeper meanings and hidden secrets. If we believe unquestionably in some absolute, that absolute restricts our knowledge to the limits of which that absolute can explain an no further.
I was listening in on a conversation between my uncles at my family reunion a couple of weeks ago as they debated and questioned each other on points of doctrine. As they struggled back and forth with intriguing questions, I realized that their failure to find an acceptable resolution to some of their queries may have been due to a failure to consider some other possibility. Admittedly, this possibility is largely rejected by the members of the church, but it is something I had discussed with an institute teacher a few year back, who had some very interesting insights and supporting evidence. I offered the idea to my uncles who, as I suspected, rejected it right out, noting that it was "doctrine" that my suggestion was false. I left it at that, as they continued on their discussion as they were.
The thoughts that came to my mind in response, however, I think are worthwhile to consider. "Doctrine" is a funny word, which has come to mean that which the church has officially said is true. But doctrine is not black and white. It is not true or false, right or wrong. Our understanding of doctrine comes to us line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little, there a little. We are not meant to be able to understand the doctrine fully. Before each new insight, we must first become spiritually prepared, and then seek after it.
This is the reason Christ gave for speaking in parables. "Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom, but to them it is not given" (Matt 13: 11). We can't be given everything in black and white because some of us, many of us are not ready for it and cannot comprehend it. New doctrines would shatter the understandings we have come to rely upon, and we would become worse off than had we never learned the truth. Thus we are better left to keep the understandings we have established and no more.
Take, for example, the Christian faith as a whole and its understanding of "eternal life". This is a simple doctrine for them, it is clear as day, and is indisputable. Eternal life means those who obtain it will live forever. That is, after all, what the words mean. But in modern revelation, Christ revealed that the phrase was a mystery, a secret that he had only revealed to his apostles of old (see D&C 19: 8). The mystery was in Christ's use of language, suggesting that "eternal" is one of His names, thus its scriptural use is in reference to Him. Thus "eternal life" is God's life.
Why did Christ do this? Why did He continue to use the words "eternal life" when He knew it would only lead his followers and listeners to believe something that was not fully true?
Now, should we suppose that this is the only mystery that God has kept from us? Certainly not, we know that many mysteries of the kingdom are not yet known to the world. So why do we insist that we understand the "doctrine" of the church and that there can be only one interpretation of it? Why do we scorn those who perceive truth a bit differently than we do, when we know that each of us must necessarily be at varying levels of doctrinal understanding and progress? Are we so sure that it is we who are the more correct?
I believe that many of our truths are hiding deeper messages, that the truths we understand are meant to give us only a superficial and incomplete (if not incorrect) understanding of the universe until we are ready to understand more. The spirit world, for example, is hardly a world divided into two, with a bridge built by Christ in between the two halves. These "doctrines" are not necessarily literal, but metaphorical and simply meant to give us some understanding until we are ready for more.
When we take doctrine as literal, as we often do, we put ourselves into a black and white world that is easy to understand and is straightforward and certain. But we may be missing so much of the beauty in the world that God has actually created.
But the world is not black and white. Not only is it full of shades of gray, but various colors and hues. There are very few absolute truths, and those we think we have may not be nearly as absolute as we believe. Believing in absolutes structures our mind, but also restricts it to a limited understanding of truth. We become unwelcoming to new truths, deeper meanings and hidden secrets. If we believe unquestionably in some absolute, that absolute restricts our knowledge to the limits of which that absolute can explain an no further.
I was listening in on a conversation between my uncles at my family reunion a couple of weeks ago as they debated and questioned each other on points of doctrine. As they struggled back and forth with intriguing questions, I realized that their failure to find an acceptable resolution to some of their queries may have been due to a failure to consider some other possibility. Admittedly, this possibility is largely rejected by the members of the church, but it is something I had discussed with an institute teacher a few year back, who had some very interesting insights and supporting evidence. I offered the idea to my uncles who, as I suspected, rejected it right out, noting that it was "doctrine" that my suggestion was false. I left it at that, as they continued on their discussion as they were.
The thoughts that came to my mind in response, however, I think are worthwhile to consider. "Doctrine" is a funny word, which has come to mean that which the church has officially said is true. But doctrine is not black and white. It is not true or false, right or wrong. Our understanding of doctrine comes to us line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little, there a little. We are not meant to be able to understand the doctrine fully. Before each new insight, we must first become spiritually prepared, and then seek after it.
This is the reason Christ gave for speaking in parables. "Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom, but to them it is not given" (Matt 13: 11). We can't be given everything in black and white because some of us, many of us are not ready for it and cannot comprehend it. New doctrines would shatter the understandings we have come to rely upon, and we would become worse off than had we never learned the truth. Thus we are better left to keep the understandings we have established and no more.
Take, for example, the Christian faith as a whole and its understanding of "eternal life". This is a simple doctrine for them, it is clear as day, and is indisputable. Eternal life means those who obtain it will live forever. That is, after all, what the words mean. But in modern revelation, Christ revealed that the phrase was a mystery, a secret that he had only revealed to his apostles of old (see D&C 19: 8). The mystery was in Christ's use of language, suggesting that "eternal" is one of His names, thus its scriptural use is in reference to Him. Thus "eternal life" is God's life.
Why did Christ do this? Why did He continue to use the words "eternal life" when He knew it would only lead his followers and listeners to believe something that was not fully true?
Now, should we suppose that this is the only mystery that God has kept from us? Certainly not, we know that many mysteries of the kingdom are not yet known to the world. So why do we insist that we understand the "doctrine" of the church and that there can be only one interpretation of it? Why do we scorn those who perceive truth a bit differently than we do, when we know that each of us must necessarily be at varying levels of doctrinal understanding and progress? Are we so sure that it is we who are the more correct?
I believe that many of our truths are hiding deeper messages, that the truths we understand are meant to give us only a superficial and incomplete (if not incorrect) understanding of the universe until we are ready to understand more. The spirit world, for example, is hardly a world divided into two, with a bridge built by Christ in between the two halves. These "doctrines" are not necessarily literal, but metaphorical and simply meant to give us some understanding until we are ready for more.
When we take doctrine as literal, as we often do, we put ourselves into a black and white world that is easy to understand and is straightforward and certain. But we may be missing so much of the beauty in the world that God has actually created.
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