""You are transient. The one constant in our life is change..."
(Dan Gilbert)
are often wrong" This is a "premise he supports with intriguing research".
Whilst writing this I was listening to "Pain" by Jimmy Eat World (oh shush. I know...) and there's a lyric that always rings true to me "I never thought I'd walk away from you.
I did. But it's a false sense of accomplishment. Every time I quit".
What is it that makes people happy? Well, Dan here has done a lot of research on happiness and in this video he looks at our expectations.
expect is that our expectations don't change. Actually, we change hugely beyond
our own expectations from decade to decade. In this, our expectations of
happiness and satisfaction change - consequently, the things that we want, and the things that make us happy change. We change from day to day, we're not static in ourselves. The only constant we have IS change.
My favourite
quote from this is "when is the point that we become the person we want to be?
NOW. Now is that time".
So why do people not make the changes they have been meaning to? They're waiting
to be: better, richer, slimmer, faster, prettier, older, braver....but
essentially, surely we are all of those things whenever we want to be them?
[mushy stuff inc] If I think back over the past few years I can recognise who I have changed from - that girl who can be quoted as saying "I don't like to exercise because it makes
me sweat" to someone who can also be quoted as saying "Ooooh, I'm positively
amphibious....that was a good workout" (don't I just have the nicest way with
words... :p).
How much have you changed in the past few years? And what kinds of
changes do you WANT to make? Because as Dan here suggests - you don't have to
wait until you're at a certain point to make a decision to change. You're that
person RIGHT NOW. In the words of Nike - "just do it".
Talks courtesy of www.TED.com