Numbers Won't Make You Happy
This week in happiness
I hope you are doing well this week.
You step on the scale and one of two things happens, assuming it is on. You see a number you like, or you see a number you don't like. In that moment, you have given that number control over your happiness. But this will always be a hollow pursuit.
Weight should be treated for what it is, a measure that can help keep you healthy, weighing yourself every morning may be necessary for a time, but once you are at a healthier point, it accomplishes nothing other than either disappointing you or giving you hollow happiness. I say hollow happiness because I would rather be happy about the things that really matter to me: friends, family, and pursuing my passions instead of giving the keys to my happiness to a number.
The nature of numbers is that there will always be something smaller or bigger to compare them to. The cliché is a cliché because it is true, comparison is the thief of joy.
Here is something Robert Kennedy and Marx could agree on. The Amount of Money you have does not equate to happiness.
The gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country, it measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.
-Robert Kennedy
The less you eat, drink and buy books; the less you go to the theatre, the dance hall, the public house; the less you think, love, theorise, sing, paint, fence, etc., the more you save – the greater becomes your treasure which neither moths nor rust will devour – your capital. The less you are, the less you express your own life, the more you have
-Marx
We humans misunderstand what makes us happy, we have a bias towards the measurable, the easy to understand. Anything that has a number attached to it misleads us. Even something like the number of friends you have doesn't tell you how close you are, or how much fun you have together, or even if you really like each other.
To back up this idea of focusing on the measurable two of the 5 most common deathbed regrets are 1. I worked too hard and missed out on life. And 2. I didn't spend enough time with the people I love.
Happiness really is wanting what you have in every moment, no more and no less.
Better Vibes Exercise:
Take some time off, spend time with the people you love.
https://jamesclear.com/book-summaries/stumbling-on-happiness
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/manuscripts/needs.htm