There is an entire industry dedicated to making you feel inadequate and unhappy: advertising. We are bombarded with messages telling us we are not good enough as we are, but certain products and services can make it so.
Don't worry though, it will all be better once you sit down with your Bay Area Mercedes Benz dealer to talk about financing options on the fantastic new S series featuring blah blah blah.
What you said has been repeated so many times everyone just accepts it as true. But if you look at the new age hippies, they're playing the same game, but having a better car is replaced by having a nicer 30 yr old van, or nicer dreadlocks, or being more spiritual, etc. People will always want to be better than other people; having that S class you mentioned is just one of the methods of achieving that. Advertising is just one of many sources which feed you ideas on how to demonstrate your higher value over fellow human beings.
Right. To put a finer point on it, the insidious part is that advertising teaches us not what to want, but how to want. It doesn't say "a Mercedes makes you worth something", it says "only the things you buy can [make you valuable|entertain you|satisfy you|make life worth living]", which ingrains certain behaviors.
It's like the Dark Side version of the "...teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea" quote.
Edit: and it really goes even deeper than that, teaching us that being constantly entertained or totally satisfied is the state of being everyone else is in (so why aren't you?) --> only buying things can get you there --> here, buy this.
Until it becomes socially acceptable to bring a tax return and 401k statement on a first date, nice clothes and a nice car are going to remain the only way to demonstrate success to a stranger.
You chose a funny example because car commercials are as much speaking to recent car buyers as they are to car shoppers. Half of what they're intended to do is reduce "buyer's remorse," to make owners feel good and want to buy the same make again.
It discusses studies on how materialistic desires relate to one's emotional well-being (all correlative, as I recall), and then goes from there into a thoughtful analysis of how materialism alters a person's priorities in a variety not-so-healthy ways. I found it to be a pretty good reality check.
We don't live in a vacuum. Our lives are still dictated by things we need, such as food, shelter, fulfilling relationships, and meaningful activities. Some people fine actual enjoyment in cars, so they do genuinely become happy when they purchase that new S Series. The bigger issue is that media tries to say that they know what we want better than ourselves, so we should listen to the car dealer/parent/professor/etc.
When I find that I am falling into the trap of emotional highs from buying crap I don't need, I just remind myself that I grew up with only the essentials and I don’t need more toys. If we (my siblings and I) wanted anything, we made due with homemade cardboard props (for the USS Enterprise (NCC-1701)), sticks for swords, or paper men for armies.
It sounds embarrassingly crude, but it has served as an internal equalizer when I feel like desiring or whining. I have tried to demonstrate to my kids that contentment (happiness) is really best obtained and empowering when you realize you don’t need to buy it, you can just make or generate it yourself.
Point well received. I think there's some kind of correlative regarding even bringing such an attitude into one's home...as in, the Echo. Yes it serves many purposes but I think it's germane to point out the origin and, ahem, probably preferred use in a consumer context.
"As time went by, the settlers from Europe noticed something: No Indians were defecting to join colonial society, but many whites were defecting to live in the Native American one."
The passage shocked me, as it is extremely surprising, and speaks to the core of our societal growth over the past few hundreds of years not leading to maximum happiness. The passage is from this David Brooks column (which I think is definitely worth the three minutes to read): http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/09/opinion/the-great-affluenc...
The core thought is that people trade up for comfort (including privacy), but that they lose out on the overall bonds with other people that are what really makes us happy.
One extremely clear choice: Do you work from home (more comfy) or an office (more social)?
The work from home choice seems extremely relevant to me. Is it actually bad for happiness in the long term to do something that's so much more comfortable (no commuting, no dressing up, feeling of being at home, etc)?
When I think about the best times in my own life, they were the times when I had a close group of people I lived and hung out with (college, summer camp, etc). I assume it's the same for many others reading this. So why do we not live more like that into our adult years?
I work from home. If I were single or if the kids had moved out of the house and my SO worked, your comment would probably be true for me (better to be in the office). But, I've had a chance to see my young children grow up in a way that couldn't have happened had I been in the office, all while doing significant meaningful work. Certainly that's more social with a closer group of people (family). So, it probably depends on circumstances.
I love working from home. But it's because in the Summer I can choose to split my day in two, spend a sunny afternoon riding my bike around the city with my girlfriend, grab a beer with a friend, and finish my work in the evening; or I can go out to the country, visit my friends' office and work from there... or whatever.
Sitting at the office from 10 to 6, breathing in sterile AC, watching the world pass me by through the window was the depressing bit.
> The core thought is that people trade up for comfort (including privacy), but that they lose out on the overall bonds with other people that are what really makes us happy.
The fundamental importance of high quality bonds with other people is something I wish was emphasised more.
The following TED talk describes a pretty interesting research experiment done over a long time frame which essentially comes to this conclusion:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8KkKuTCFvzI
I agree with you about working in an office. Regarding the passage though, I think it can be explained by things other than one society is happier. Like, there is such a thing as romanticized notions of another culture that are not accurate. Or a tribal identity that makes it very difficult to leave regardless of happiness.
Around the turn of the century cough I became aware of the concept of "affluenza" (a portmanteau of affluence and influenza), watched a PBS show on the topic, and read the book "Your Money or Your Life," which changed my life. Before that time I was a materialistic kid, gathering as much stuff as I could.
The TL;DR to these is that once you get enough anything more produces rapidly diminishing returns in the happiness department:
The movie Fight Club also came out around this time with a similar message and was the "knockout punch" to my consumerism, haha. Not long after this I'd sold most of what I owned, quit my job, and took a trip around the world. Have been much happier ever since, with new expectations and goals.
Another thing I learned on that trip, I did not miss TV one minute while I was gone, and found a lot of the garbage (consumerism, superstition, Britney news, and petty politics) in my mind had cleared.
The main purpose of TV news and advertising is to drive fear and desire, which I now liken to a cancer, but one that can be beat.
Yes, we have netflix and itunes because there are some great shows, right? But commercials and mainstream news sources---fuck no---life is much better without them.
Come on! We live in a world which is specifically designed to make us unhappy. I mean most of us don't even have the option to be less materialistic; most jobs that pay enough that you could spend less time at work don't give you the option of doing so. So the only freedom left to people is the freedom to choose how their money is spent. Human relations are constantly being squeezed out and replaced with business deals. And I keep seeing these articles blaming the victims. Folks, this is not some unintended side effect of capitalism- this is the way the system is supposed to work. You're not supposed to be happy.
Same here. Meditations is fantastic, though for a more complete look into Stoicism, I can't recommend A Guide to the Good Life (The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy) by William B Irvine enough!
What is it about "modern" life that makes us less inclined to Stoicism, though? This smells of noble savagery--I'm doubtful anyone who refers to ritual body mutilation as preferable to playing Everquest has been mutilated.
Jason Silva put it quite nicely in one of his videos [1]:
> The very same quality that make us these majestic creatures that soar above the heavens and transcend their boundaries has made us perpetually dissatisfied, neurotic beings living in urban centers drowning in consumption in an over-capitalist bloated system that can no longer satiate us always wanting something else until we're overwhelmed and overweight and immobilized by how spoiled we've become and yet we enjoy very little of it.
We are moving away from the satisfaction in the action to glamorizing all the other parts such as the result, or even worse the ability to avoid the action altogether. Our values are more aligned with pride and the communal recognition of success rather than the individual notion that you put your full effort and must live with the consequences.
On a separate note, we are seeing a gradual disappearance of the middle class resulting in desperate attempts to rise in status whether superficially or explicitly. In either case, we are losing some self-worth and putting our happiness in the hands of society and rules we don't control.
I once saw a bumper sticker that said "You will die. I will die a marine." I'm guessing the modern version of being drug out to the desert for "ritual body mutilation" had given that person a sense of pride and happiness at his service. Certainly something to be feel better about than hours spent on Everquest.
In the Enlightenment era, Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a famous advocate of Spartan values over the "Athenian" cultured urbanism that is essentially the foundation of modern Western life.
This may very much be the source of the happiness the author is lamenting about, though.
Status is always there, and it never went away, and I'd posit that it is is something capable of making a person feel miserable even if everything else in their life is great.
If your happiness is strongly tied to status, that is problematic, since status is almost necessarily zero-sum. For it to be significant that one is a Marine, Marines must be rare, and the comparison point would need to be some non-Marine. And, in the past, communities were smaller, you weren't comparing yourself to billions of people. If status is zero-sum or near-zero-sum, and when you can no longer stand out just by contributing to your community as the guy who makes tables or something, because there are quite a few people making better tables than you, so what happens to your status?
"Imagine a society that subjects people to conditions that make them terribly unhappy, then gives them the drugs to take away their unhappiness. Science fiction? It is already happening to some extent in our own society. It is well known that the rate of clinical depression had been greatly increasing in recent decades. We believe that this is due to disruption of the power process...The entertainment industry serves as an important psychological tool of the system, possibly even when it is dishing out large amounts of sex and violence. Entertainment provides modern man with an essential means of escape. While absorbed in television, videos, etc., he can forget stress, anxiety, frustration, dissatisfaction"
5 points to whoever can guess what this quote is from
In recent years I've gotten into the Greek philosophy of Stoicism and find it a great mental tool even in our modern times. I'm partial to the book A Guide to the Good Life by William Irvine.
It's easy to be happy. Read a book about life in a WWI trench, read a book about a former slave, read a book about the plague. Go visit an old folks home. Read about parents who lost their kids in a tragic accident. Just remembering those things make me realize that I should be happy with what I have.
Serving others tends to help out with my own happiness here. :)
Since we're on the subject, other things that help: reading scriptures, meditation, relationships (others, family), etc.
I haven't read the book, but is the article arguing that rampant individualism leads to unhappiness, or the lack of detachment and focus on "communities"? It seems to mention both.
Do we have any decent evidence of raising unhappiness?
Say looking at proxies like suicide rates does not suggest any particularly strong trend in either direction?
This article doesn't do the work. It does not provide good arguments, nor does it provide evidence. It simply repeats some fairly popular platitudes and jabs in hopes that it will make people agree and go buy the book. But nothing is really being properly explored in the article and I would not give it any credit.
The book is another matter but that will need to be analyzed separately.
[+] [-] karma_vaccum123|9 years ago|reply
Don't worry though, it will all be better once you sit down with your Bay Area Mercedes Benz dealer to talk about financing options on the fantastic new S series featuring blah blah blah.
[+] [-] nimbix|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Domenic_S|9 years ago|reply
It's like the Dark Side version of the "...teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea" quote.
Edit: and it really goes even deeper than that, teaching us that being constantly entertained or totally satisfied is the state of being everyone else is in (so why aren't you?) --> only buying things can get you there --> here, buy this.
[+] [-] aianus|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hammock|9 years ago|reply
Source: I do this for a living
[+] [-] bunderbunder|9 years ago|reply
https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/high-price-materialism Tim Kasser, The High Price of Materialism
It discusses studies on how materialistic desires relate to one's emotional well-being (all correlative, as I recall), and then goes from there into a thoughtful analysis of how materialism alters a person's priorities in a variety not-so-healthy ways. I found it to be a pretty good reality check.
[+] [-] technobabble|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] retro64|9 years ago|reply
It sounds embarrassingly crude, but it has served as an internal equalizer when I feel like desiring or whining. I have tried to demonstrate to my kids that contentment (happiness) is really best obtained and empowering when you realize you don’t need to buy it, you can just make or generate it yourself.
[+] [-] 6stringmerc|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] DominikR|9 years ago|reply
> The problem is that detachment – solitude, quietly taking responsibility for your own actions – is inimical to modern life ...
Top comment here:
> It is the fault of advertising!!
I'd say that is the polar opposite of taking responsibility for your own actions.
[+] [-] wolfpwner|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|9 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] tuna-piano|9 years ago|reply
The passage shocked me, as it is extremely surprising, and speaks to the core of our societal growth over the past few hundreds of years not leading to maximum happiness. The passage is from this David Brooks column (which I think is definitely worth the three minutes to read): http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/09/opinion/the-great-affluenc...
The core thought is that people trade up for comfort (including privacy), but that they lose out on the overall bonds with other people that are what really makes us happy.
One extremely clear choice: Do you work from home (more comfy) or an office (more social)?
The work from home choice seems extremely relevant to me. Is it actually bad for happiness in the long term to do something that's so much more comfortable (no commuting, no dressing up, feeling of being at home, etc)?
When I think about the best times in my own life, they were the times when I had a close group of people I lived and hung out with (college, summer camp, etc). I assume it's the same for many others reading this. So why do we not live more like that into our adult years?
[+] [-] yankeehue|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] noam87|9 years ago|reply
Sitting at the office from 10 to 6, breathing in sterile AC, watching the world pass me by through the window was the depressing bit.
[+] [-] gajjanag|9 years ago|reply
The fundamental importance of high quality bonds with other people is something I wish was emphasised more. The following TED talk describes a pretty interesting research experiment done over a long time frame which essentially comes to this conclusion: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8KkKuTCFvzI
[+] [-] ovulator|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 3minus1|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] arcadeparade|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mixmastamyk|9 years ago|reply
The TL;DR to these is that once you get enough anything more produces rapidly diminishing returns in the happiness department:
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affluenza
- http://www.pbs.org/kcts/affluenza/show/joe.html
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs
The movie Fight Club also came out around this time with a similar message and was the "knockout punch" to my consumerism, haha. Not long after this I'd sold most of what I owned, quit my job, and took a trip around the world. Have been much happier ever since, with new expectations and goals.
Another thing I learned on that trip, I did not miss TV one minute while I was gone, and found a lot of the garbage (consumerism, superstition, Britney news, and petty politics) in my mind had cleared. The main purpose of TV news and advertising is to drive fear and desire, which I now liken to a cancer, but one that can be beat.
Yes, we have netflix and itunes because there are some great shows, right? But commercials and mainstream news sources---fuck no---life is much better without them.
[+] [-] fallingfrog|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ErikAugust|9 years ago|reply
This article hints at both - and they were my biggest eye-openers on the question of how* to live.
[+] [-] reifnir|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bbctol|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] throwanem|9 years ago|reply
"You might be surprised," he said, and was himself surprised when people took it as a joke.
[+] [-] bm1362|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|9 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] sakopov|9 years ago|reply
> The very same quality that make us these majestic creatures that soar above the heavens and transcend their boundaries has made us perpetually dissatisfied, neurotic beings living in urban centers drowning in consumption in an over-capitalist bloated system that can no longer satiate us always wanting something else until we're overwhelmed and overweight and immobilized by how spoiled we've become and yet we enjoy very little of it.
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzAFCU4RCnM
[+] [-] orky56|9 years ago|reply
On a separate note, we are seeing a gradual disappearance of the middle class resulting in desperate attempts to rise in status whether superficially or explicitly. In either case, we are losing some self-worth and putting our happiness in the hands of society and rules we don't control.
[+] [-] merpnderp|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pavlov|9 years ago|reply
An associated phenomenon is Laconophilia, the admiration of Spartan values: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laconophilia
In the Enlightenment era, Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a famous advocate of Spartan values over the "Athenian" cultured urbanism that is essentially the foundation of modern Western life.
[+] [-] mesozoic|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bm1362|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] projektir|9 years ago|reply
Status is always there, and it never went away, and I'd posit that it is is something capable of making a person feel miserable even if everything else in their life is great.
If your happiness is strongly tied to status, that is problematic, since status is almost necessarily zero-sum. For it to be significant that one is a Marine, Marines must be rare, and the comparison point would need to be some non-Marine. And, in the past, communities were smaller, you weren't comparing yourself to billions of people. If status is zero-sum or near-zero-sum, and when you can no longer stand out just by contributing to your community as the guy who makes tables or something, because there are quite a few people making better tables than you, so what happens to your status?
[+] [-] grillvogel|9 years ago|reply
5 points to whoever can guess what this quote is from
[+] [-] ewhanley|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] evo_9|9 years ago|reply
Summary: http://becomingeden.com/summary-of-a-guide-to-the-good-life/
[+] [-] fsiefken|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] WhitneyLand|9 years ago|reply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedonic_treadmill
[+] [-] squozzer|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Clubber|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] r00fus|9 years ago|reply
Guess what? It didn't make me feel better. I just felt sad.
Listening to music or reading less depressing books lifted my gloom. YMMV.
[+] [-] projektir|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rogerdpack|9 years ago|reply
And those typically don't cost much money LOL
[+] [-] mizzao|9 years ago|reply
For those who haven't seen it, this article also argues the former: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/20/opinion/the-fragmented-soc...
[+] [-] auganov|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] xyzzy4|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|9 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] projektir|9 years ago|reply
The book is another matter but that will need to be analyzed separately.
[+] [-] la6470|9 years ago|reply
[deleted]