Converting Action into Bliss
OUR 'IF-THEN' ACTION PREDICAMENT We perform action to achieve a specific outcome. If we achieve that outcome, we are happy; if we don’t achieve the outcome, we are disappointed. Over a long period of many such cycles, our happiness becomes contingent upon the outcome. We believe that we will be happy only if the outcome takes place -- the ‘If-then’ Model of happiness. ‘If’ my children listen to me, ‘then’ I will be happy; ‘if’ I can attain that promotion ‘then’ I will be happy; ‘if’ I lose the last 10 lbs., ‘then’ I will be happy. Many of us live with this, ‘if-then’ kind of operating model in our heads. A good experience can make us temporarily happy, but it reduces to a normal personal baseline of happiness as time passes. In 1971, two psychologists, Brickman and Campbell, coined the term ‘hedonic treadmill’, to explain this experience, the gist of which is that people tend to return to their baseline level of happiness, regardless of the positive or negative experience