make your own happiness even if you are alone, miserable, and depressed!

[musicman777]

Hey everyone,

I guess the emotions board was the best place to post this, but I kind of feel it's relevant to a lot of places on this board. I just talked about this in another thread. I watch this "TED talks" program on Netflix. It's got leading scientist/experts where they make these short 15-20 minute videos talking about everything from psychology to astronomy. Anyway I watched this one recently that was really enlightening, I think this is good whether you are someone desperately trying to find someone or you are someone already in a relationship, you can watch it free here just click play:

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This guy Dan Gilbert talked about something called "synthetic happiness". He said that all humans are basically capable of producing their own feel-good, happy chemicals in our brain. And many of us choose to believe that if we make up our own happiness ("synthetic happiness") that isn't as good as natural happiness, eg. falling in love with someone, getting money, getting a job, etc. He gave a few examples. One of which was the guy that was the drummer for The Beatles before Ringo joined. He said that he was "happy he wasn't part of the Beatles". Somehow without becoming a famous and rich rock n roll icon, he still managed to be happy. Also another person was an old man that spent decades of his life in prison for a crime he didn't commit, and when he was finally released on DNA evidence he said something along the lines that its a divine/enlightening experience.

 

It's a pretty thought-provoking phenomenon this guy talks about. A lot of us run ourselves down into the ground for not finding someone to love or not being able to. but here is this old man that spent decades of his life in prison and he was able to find ways to make himself happy through just his brain. I think too many of us become consumed with romantic feelings, at least on this board, that we are not worth it or we can't be happy with someone else. That is not the case with what this guy talks about.

Just good food for thought and an interesting watch, it's only 20 minutes. I think we are humans have more control over our brain and thought-processes than we realize. I'm not saying you should ever give up on finding someone or anything. But I do say that you don't have to be miserable all the time just because you don't have a boyfriend/girlfriend whatever it is!

[Capricorn3]

I agree. Also, I think happiness comes from within. If you can't be happy within yourself, and always look to others to make you happy, you will never be happy (imo).

[HappySeeker]

I wish that it were easy to just create your own happiness. Many days I tell myself to pull it together and be thankful for what I have, but that simply isn't enough. I guess if you do not suffer from depression this would be excellent. I will watch the video though, maybe it can help me somewhat.

[Batya33]

I'm a fan of starting small. For about the past 5 years I make myself think of 3 positive things that happened that day (or 3 things I am grateful for) right before bedtime. It's so much easier to think negatively, let negative thoughts take over so this is my small way of combating that temptation.

[Lucia Amman]

I have his book Stumbling on Happiness. He doesnt say much new to me in his tedtalk but it is a nice reminder I loved reading it. And his book amongst other's did truly helped me to come out of my depression. The book obviously has more body than just this 20 minute talk. I would definitely recommend reading it to someone who suffers from depression or doesnt. Like I said though, I read other books as well and this book wasnt the most outstanding one to me. But that might be too because I first read other books that helped me instantly (The How of Happeniss for example).

 

Somewhat in line with this synthetic happiness phenomena is a philosophical book I read that was titled For a Truly Successful Life. It was in dutch only but it was about if you really should win that race or not. Will you become happier if you buy that fridge or not? Do you need to be married and get kids or not? Of course the answer to all these questions was: no, no one must do this. Just because society wants us to do those things or just because we as a human species have been doing it for decades or centuries doesnt mean it will give us that true fulfilment in life. What a truly successful (and therefore happy, he was speaking more on the term of being fulfilled in life) is is just living it. You dont need to aim for highest - in some cases that will rob you of experiences in different area's and even let you never experience something else entirely. At the end of your life what will you be happy with? A mediocre life can be just as fulfilling as a grant exceptionally lived life.

By the way this was also touched in Dan Buettner book The Blue Zones about people living in the blue zones area that life up till their 100th birthday in relatively very good health. Some of these people have lived a very hard life but were still very happy to be alive. But they often don't know any better so I'm not sure how much that is the same with synthetic happiness.