Saturday, May 28, 2016

Happiness decoded

The following post is slightly technical and mathematical and may feel ridiculous to most. There is nothing in this post that you already don't know about. So it may probably be a waste of time. Hence proceed at your own risk!

Problem statement:
Why do we lose the spark as we age? Why don't we laugh as freely as a child? Why don't we feel as happy as we were 20 years back? 

The following is my analysis:

 

Symptoms and analysis:

Consider an empty glass to be your overall emotional capacity. There is a small hole at the bottom of the glass. Now based on whatever goes on in your life two types of things fill up the glass:
1. Happy memories: Consider these as liquid in nature (represented by water in the snap)
2. Sad/bad memories: Consider these as solid in nature (represented by dirt in the snap)

So we can derive the following equation:
Overall experience = good moments or memories(water) + bad moments or memories(dirt)

The third factor in the above equation is the size of the hole at the bottom of the glass. The bigger the hole, the better it is for the following reasons:
1. Low chances of dirt to accumulate in the glass.
2. Faster recycling of the water and dirt within the glass.

Lets call the size of the hole as time. So our equation now becomes:

Overall emotional balance = (good memories(water) + bad memories(dirt)) / size of the hole(time)

The emotional memory span of a child is lesser than an adult. Hence the recycling of good and bad memories within the glass is extremely quick. Ever seen a child who stopped talking to his/her best friend for life due to a quarrel? Ever seen a child being upset with his parents for a month on being scolded? Nope..
Second interesting point is the force with which the the happy/sad moments enter the glass. The force is much higher in a child. Due to this force, the bigger chunks of dirt (bad memories) don't accumulate in the glass. Consider the fluid coming into the glass like a waterfall. Ever seen a child dancing in the rain? Ever seen their reaction on getting a gift that they like?

Now that we understand this, lets see what happens as we grow up:

1. Every bad memory or experience starts getting bigger in size and starts getting deposited in the glass. The hole starts getting smaller and smaller. Slowly the dirt gets deposited in the glass without an outlet. That major heartbreak! The death of a loved one! That big financial loss! Oh.. how we love holding on to these memories!. Due to the clogging of the hole, the outlet is only a trickle for most of us. Hence these memories get stuck in the mind for longer. This has two side effects:
   a. It reduces the intensity of your emotions: Every time you get a happy moment, since the glass is already filled with dirt and water and the outlet is slow, the amount of water that the glass can accommodate is lesser. So the thrill or enjoyment that you feel is less. Remember, how you felt when you got your first job? Well, it didn't pay much, but it gave you immense happiness. Now compare that to how you felt when you last changed your job. How did it feel?
  b: It reduces the frequency of being happy: Since your glass is already clogged and you are holding tightly on to the contents withing the glass, you actually spend a lot of time thinking about them. This actually prevents you from spending time in creating new memories. You are very likely to say "no" to a lot of fun opportunities that come your way.

So what do we do? Is there a way out?

Probable Solution:

Since it is impossible for a grown up to shorten his/her emotional memory span, one can try the following:

1. Stay immature. Maturity kills happiness. 
2. Do at least one thing in a day that makes you happy. Dance, play a prank, eat that pizza!
3. Do things today! Do not keep things for tomorrow. Act on it at as early as possible. Take that vacation you have been thinking about since a year, visit that restaurant you have been eyeing for a while, make amends with a close friend with whom you fought with years back! Do it today!

And do all the above with such force that the hole gets unclogged.

If you find a better way, do let me know!

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