As 2024 approaches, people will reflect on their lives and wonder what they can do in 2025 to live more satisfying lives. In doing so, you will discover the following mystery. Why do you have great things in your life, like a satisfying job, a loving family, and a cozy home, but these things seem to have only a limited impact on your daily happiness? ?
At the same time, there may be things around us that aren’t so nice – rifts in relationships, online rudeness, inefficiency at work – and we often seem to become accustomed to these maladies, so we’re less likely to try to change them. .
In other words, we stop noticing things that have always been there. Here’s how to change this:
habituation awareness
Habituation is a fundamental feature of our brain. That is, the tendency to become less and less responsive to persistent and frequent events.
Imagine walking into a coffee shop. At first, the aroma of freshly brewed coffee is noticeable, but after about 20 minutes, you can no longer smell it. Olfactory neurons stop responding and become habituated. And just like you get used to the smell of coffee, you can also get used to more complex aspects of life.
The challenge, then, is to restore sensitivity to the great things in life so we can feel joy, and to the terrible things we don’t realize we could potentially change if we tried. So what should we do? disMake it a habit?
break something good
The answer lies in this great quote from economist Tibor Scitovsky: “Pleasure comes from the imperfect and intermittent satisfaction of desire.”
Think of your favorite song. Would you enjoy it more if you listened to it continuously from beginning to end, or if you took a short break? 99% of people say “no” to rest. but, research It shows that people like songs better when they take a break to listen to them. why? If you keep listening to a song, the initial pleasure you feel will diminish over time. But breaks cause bad habits, so whenever the song comes on again, your joy level rises again.
To prevent habituation and maximize enjoyment, you need to consume the good things in life a little at a time. Whether it’s a Netflix show, chocolate cake, or a new romance, savor it rather than binge it.
Swallow the bad stuff whole.
On the other hand, if you need to complete unpleasant tasks, such as household chores or administrative tasks, do them all in one sitting. research People show less pain if they have to listen to an unpleasant noise (like a hoover) continuously than if they take a break. If you experience noise consistently, the “pain” you initially experience will decrease over time. However, rest causes spoilage, so the pain level increases again each time the noise is heard again.
experiments in daily life
What about those aspects of your life that you think may be causing you stress and anxiety but are always there and you don’t really know how much they affect you because you don’t try to change them? They loom in the background like the constant noise of the AC. You don’t realize how negatively noise affects you until someone turns it off and you suddenly feel much better.
Consider social media. Is it having a negative impact on you? As one studyResearchers paid half of the participants $100 each to quit social media platforms for a month, while the other half continued their lives as usual. By the end of the experiment, the “quit” group was happier and less stressed. The most important thing is that they are surprised. They didn’t realize how negatively the platform affected them.
Try experiments in your daily life in 2025. For a while, remove some elements from your daily routine one by one and add other new elements. By measuring and evaluating their impact on your life, you can maintain the features that drive happiness and purpose and eliminate those that don’t.
