Happiness In A Relative World

With all of the bad things happening in our country right now (the stock market crashing, the banks and mortgage companies failing, jobs being lost, you know what I mean) I was thinking how many people out there are effected negatively by this? As a people, are we generally less happy when our economy is doing badly? n My first guess would be “duh”, yeah! But when you look closer at the numbers, I can’t believe an overwhelming number of people are really that badly hurt right now by these financial catastrophes. If you work for a bank, are laid off from your job, or just lost your home to foreclosure, of course I don’t mean you. I feel very badly that so many people are going through these things. Nevertheless, statistically that is only a small number of people. If about 2 million houses went into foreclosure last year (which is a record I believe) that still only represents less than 2 percent of the total U.S. households. That is a whole lot of people affected mind you, but not anywhere near the majority of households in the country. Once again, the people that are feeling the pinch of this downtu
are surely going through hard times, and I sympathize greatly.

What about the rest of us that are relatively unscathed by the housing crisis? Sure, our 401K’s have tanked. But in talking to many people the past month or so, I hear many say how depressing this stuff is. Gas prices are at record levels, groceries prices are skyrocketing, and most people aren’t getting much of a pay increase either due to business conce
s. You read in the news every day about the desperation, how it is affecting our lifestyle, we have to make massive changes to cope with economic “meltdown”. Granted things are pretty bad right now, but if you have a roof over your head, your family has food every day, and you have the security of knowing a single phone call can bring the police or fire department to your door, how badly do we really have it? I’m just saying try to keep things in some perspective, that’s all.

Ok, switch gears for a second. Pretend you live in a small island nation somewhere in the Pacific where there is barely enough food to eat, houses are made of tree branches with thatched roofs, and the only clothes you have are the ones your mother made for you. No stores like Walmart, or any grocery stores, no corner gas station, no car in fact since you walk everywhere. Living a simple life like this, would you imagine you would be happy? If not, then why not? Just think about it a minute. I make the case that people with this lifestyle are 10 times happier than the average U.S. citizen. For one thing, in their experience nobody in the entire village ever had television, or a cell phone, or any other of the “modern conveniences” that we take for granted, right? So their expectations of what tomorrow will bring are vastly different from ours here in America. Their whole perspective on life is so different, that their happiness must literally be measured on a different scale than ours! Their scale of happiness contains things like having their favorite fish for dinner, going for a leisurely swim in the ocean, working up a sweat while felling trees to help a neighbor build a new hut. Not only that, I would imagine their concept of community is completely different from ours as well. In a small village, you know everybody! You could have several hundred close friends, all helping each other and living for the benefit of the community rather than scratching to get their share as individuals.

Are their choices limited? Of course, but that doesn’t limit their happiness. As human beings, we’re as happy as we decide to be for the most part. But everyone has a different scale of happiness depending on the circumstances provided for them at birth. Can their situation be changed? Sure, if someone from this small island nation moves to a large city, their whole happiness scale would change due to the expansion of their experiences and newfound host of options. Would it be a change for the better? I’m guessing not, but that would depend on how they reacted to this massive influx of sights, sounds, and just plain information overload. If that person takes the newfound changes in stride and looks at it as a positive experience, eventually they may learn to be just as happy.

That is precisely my point – happiness has nothing to do with how much money you have, or how big your house is, or what car you drive. It has to do with how you feel about your circumstances in life, which is totally dependent on your personal perspective. So next time some small inconvenience causes you to go ballistic, or you feel exasperated due to some five-cent rise in gas, stop yourself and think about how insignificant most day to day details like this are. Don’t set a goal to be happy in the future, do your best to be happy now. It may take some practice, but believe me it’s well worth it. Strive to set goals and make your life better, but never forget to be happy now.