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by Erlich_Bachman
2350 days ago
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> is it right for people to live in ignorance if it makes them happy, it it's not their choice? I wouldn't pretend to answer if it is "right" (what does it even mean), but a lot of people already do live in ignorance. Maybe not in the straight way of ignorance of not being able to recollect some information, but certainly in terms of assigning certain labels and judgements to it. So many people watch a TV with someone having a great time and think/feel to themselves things like "they stole the money somehow to get there", "they had rich parents", "they are not happy anyway", "life is unfair, they got their riches through unfairness", "money is the root of all evil", "money brings unhappiness", "it's not their real life, just some fake instagram story" etc. |
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Advertisement, like Instagram or facebook is tailored to give us the impressions the Joneses are doing much better for themselves. Some of this is true, some is designed to tap into this emotion.
I actually woke up 30 min ago iterating over all the things I didn't get in life that most other people had in abundance. It's not the first time I pondered that. After the excuses you mention above I always come back to a thought I had when I was I think 6 years old:
Other peoples lives, their expectations and their opinions are not really all that interesting or important. They could be if they put minimal effort into creating or evolving them. In stead they just copy this stuff from the next guy without review - then dedicate their lives to living up to them.
I consider myself extremely privileged to escape from that formula. I've never written it down before but happiness now starts with having oxygen to breath, then comes having water to drink, food and a place to sleep share the 3rd spot, 4th is having the mind set to think about something, 5th is a sense of safety and the privilege to implement the thoughts, 6th is to be able to share the thoughts and brainstorm, 7th is to have good people in my life, 8th is to be able to pay my bills, 9th a decent set of garments etc
Having what other people are having is still on the list some place but to have 1-4 makes for a fantastic life. 5 includes health and fitness. The rest is really just nonsense by comparison.
What I'm trying to say is that satisfaction is overrated. You get only so much of it, trying to optimize for it just diminishes it.
> the survey question “How satisfied are you with your life?”
Not satisfied? Well good! Time to accomplish something!