The Hedonic Treadmill
When was the last time you gave yourself permission to feel good about your life with all its imperfections? We are constantly fantasizing about the next promotion , the next raise , the next car , the dream vacation and probably the next everything and how happy we will be once we get there. This is where the Hedonic Treadmill comes into play. The Hedonic Treadmill is the observed tendency of humans to quickly return to a relatively stable level of happiness despite major positive or negative events and life changes. For example, you’re waiting on that big promotion and thinking of how happy you will be once you get it. Yes, of course you’re going to be happy, but after some time you just get used to it and return to your baseline level of happiness and again find yourself dreaming up other to-be scenarios in the future that would make you so happy.
This raises the question , if we are content with where we are at in this moment does that change the way we look at desires? It’s human nature to want something and then want more of it but what if we give ourselves permission to be happy just where we are? Now I’m not saying you should stop having goals , dreams and ambitions, but the act of questioning what place is the desire coming from changes everything. For example, if you’re dreaming of a vacation as a means to get away from the routine life , won’t you feel worse once you’re back hoping you could just stay there forever? On the other hand if you love what you do and a vacation is just a break to explore , you will come back refreshed and your level of productivity might just improve. Instead of chasing outcomes that keep us temporarily satisfied wouldn’t being immersed in the journey towards the outcome bring us lasting fulfillment ?
Assuming people who are born wealthy don’t really have an emotional connection to the things they own simply because it’s quite normal for them. But people who come from nothing and dream of owning a Lamborghini have an emotional connection to the car when they get it. We often feel the outcome is everything and it will change our lives forever , but we fail to look at and enjoy the person we are becoming who has all those things. If that seems very far off , the least we could do is acknowledge the role of The Hedonic Treadmill and the effects it has on our decision making and question what place is the desire truly coming from, whether its coming from trying to escape our current reality or coming from a place where the outcome would just complement the process.
