Q. Is there any research on the different selves and how happy they are? The two networks approach of the Default Mode Network and the Tasking Network (See blogposts "What is the Default Mode Network?" and "nondual awakening and autism...the battle of the "blah, blah" and "tasking" networks") is great, but which one is happier?
G. The "go to guy" on happiness research is Daniel Kahneman, the 2002 Nobel Prize winner in Economics. Some of his work compares the happiness of the two states of selfing: the experiencing self ("now, now, now") and the remembering self (what i call "blah, blah, blah"). Kahneman is famous for his work on the psychology of judgment and decision making, behavioral economics and what is called "hedonic psychology", or "happiness economics".
Broad "happiness-related measures" have gained popularity since the mid-20th century; most notable is the development and popularization of "gross national happiness" (GNH) in 1972 by the leader of Bhutan.
GNH came from an off-hand remark, and was developed for Bhutan by two Canadian researchers into a sophisticated survey. This is now a major element in policy initiatives of the Bhutanese government. (There have been some "unhappinesses" in Bhutan recently so the GNH may be lower than the publicity releases.)
A good summary of Daniel Kahneman's work on happiness is in a TED video "Daniel Kahneman: The riddle of experience vs memory.". Much of the research in that talk comes from Kahneman's paper "Experienced Utility and Objective Happiness: A Moment-Based Approach" in Choices, Values and Frames. (2000).
Kahneman's current best-seller, "Thinking, Fast and Slow", has gotten major awards. He summarizes his decades of brilliant academic work as "people place too much confidence in human judgment".
Kahneman describes "cognitive traps"' in the happiness discussion:
1) "Happiness" is impossible to define - it is too complex and has been applied to too many things. A new, different term is required like "well-being".
2) There is confusion between experience and memory, which are fundamentally different - the difference between "being happy IN your life" (experience), and "being happy ABOUT or WITH your life" (memory).
He demonstrates this difference by an anecdote of someone who listened to a symphony for 20 minutes, totally immersed in its beauty. At the end, he heard an awful screech. The listener angrily said the sound "ruined the whole experience."
Kahneman points out that it hadn't; it had only ruined the memory of the experience. The listener had 20 minutes of beautiful music, but the memory was all he had kept and it was ruined.
The two different "selves", the experiencing self and the remembering self are fundamentally different.
The "experiencing self" lives in and knows only the present ("now, now, now" - tasking network). It responds when the doctor asks you "Does it hurt when I touch you here?".
The "remembering self" keeps score, creates, maintains and tells the story of your life (which is your "I"), and responds when the doctor asks "How have you been feeling lately?" What we keep from our experiences is our "story", our "I", haphazardly assembled from a tiny fraction of possible memories.
Kahneman contrasted different experiences of pain from his studies. Which of these profiles of pain, over time, suffered the most? Blue, or red?
Clearly, we would say "red"...there is much more and longer pain.
However, which thought they had suffered the most? The surprising answer is that "blue" had a worse memory of the pain than "red". Why? The way the brain works, the worst one is the one where the pain was at its peak at the very end, i.e., the most "recent" memory.
This is a clear conflict between two selves. From the standpoint of the "experiencing self", "red" had the worst time, but it wasn't remembered. However, what the "remembering self" stores are significant changes and most importantly, the endings; here the ending dominated.
The experiencing self lives life continuously w/moments of experience, one after another. What happens to these moments? As Kahneman points out, "They are lost forever. The psychological present, for the experiencing self, is about three seconds long. Most don't leave a trace and are completely ignored by the remembering self." ("my" situation.)
Kahneman also discusses vacations. For the experiencing self, a two week vacation is twice as good as a one week one; the ongoing joy of "now, now, now" experiencing lasts twice as long.
However, for the remembering self, a two week vacation is not much better than a one week one as you have not formed many new memories. Also, during the second week, the remembering self is recalling the now overdue commitments and projects at work, or home, that overshadow any joys.
Storing vacation memories has another downside. If we had a great vacation 4 years ago w/many memories, all other vacations will have to "measure up" to those memories (which aren't accurate - see blogpost "How neuroscience, psychological studies and our poor memories change the law"). As our next vacation has little chance of matching our (now distorted) memories of the great vacation, disappointment is virtually certain.
Just how much pleasure do we derive from those vacation memories? Kahneman recalled that he "remembered" his great vacation for about 25 minutes total over the intervening 4 years. Is that a good trade given what arises from those memories in future vacations? How we choose our next vacation, job, surgeon, partner, etc., reflects this disconnect between the experiencing and remembering selves.
How happily one lives their life (experiencing self) and how pleased/satisfied they are when they recall it (remembering self) are different answers. How satisfied someone is with their life doesn't tell you how happily they are living it.
Kahneman also talks about selecting where one lives, contrasting California w/Ohio, which brings in climate (and memory) as a big consideration.
Well, it turns out that climate is not very important to the experiencing self, so it isn't going to be any happier in California than it is in Ohio. (True, IME.) However, the remembering self will remember the cold winters in Ohio from time to time and will be convinced that it made the right decision. It is also important to remember that the brain, for evolutionary survival, developed to strongly overweight negative memories over positive ones.
A study of income was similar. If you don't have enough money to live in a safe place with adequate food, clothing and health care, then the lower the income, the unhappier you will be. However, if you have enough money to meet these needs, more money doesn't make any difference to the experiencing self. A Kahneman found, to his surprise, it is a "flat line" on happiness vs income above the basic "enough" level.
However for the remembering, "story" self, it is very different; the more money you have, the more satisfied you are. It's a relative, remembered, comparative story.
The interesting ending to the TED talk was about the implications of these findings, and the worldwide increasing emphasis on "happiness" and what it means for public policy. If more money doesn't give more experiential happiness, why doesn't that impact our public policy discussions?
Kahneman closed by saying "How to enhance happiness goes two very different ways depending on whether you think of the remembering self or the experiencing self. This is going to influence policy in years to come. In the United States efforts are being made to measure the experiential happiness of the population. This is going to be, within the next decade or two, part of national statistics.
BTW, there is a great youTube video clearly demonstrating the value of "blah, blah". (The discussion begins about 4:44 into Rush's induction into the R&R Hall of Fame).
 |
| Daniel Kahneman Princeton University |
Broad "happiness-related measures" have gained popularity since the mid-20th century; most notable is the development and popularization of "gross national happiness" (GNH) in 1972 by the leader of Bhutan.
GNH came from an off-hand remark, and was developed for Bhutan by two Canadian researchers into a sophisticated survey. This is now a major element in policy initiatives of the Bhutanese government. (There have been some "unhappinesses" in Bhutan recently so the GNH may be lower than the publicity releases.)
 |
| Bhutan's king Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuk |
A good summary of Daniel Kahneman's work on happiness is in a TED video "Daniel Kahneman: The riddle of experience vs memory.". Much of the research in that talk comes from Kahneman's paper "Experienced Utility and Objective Happiness: A Moment-Based Approach" in Choices, Values and Frames. (2000).
Kahneman's current best-seller, "Thinking, Fast and Slow", has gotten major awards. He summarizes his decades of brilliant academic work as "people place too much confidence in human judgment".
Kahneman describes "cognitive traps"' in the happiness discussion:
1) "Happiness" is impossible to define - it is too complex and has been applied to too many things. A new, different term is required like "well-being".
2) There is confusion between experience and memory, which are fundamentally different - the difference between "being happy IN your life" (experience), and "being happy ABOUT or WITH your life" (memory).
He demonstrates this difference by an anecdote of someone who listened to a symphony for 20 minutes, totally immersed in its beauty. At the end, he heard an awful screech. The listener angrily said the sound "ruined the whole experience."
Kahneman points out that it hadn't; it had only ruined the memory of the experience. The listener had 20 minutes of beautiful music, but the memory was all he had kept and it was ruined.
The two different "selves", the experiencing self and the remembering self are fundamentally different.
The "experiencing self" lives in and knows only the present ("now, now, now" - tasking network). It responds when the doctor asks you "Does it hurt when I touch you here?".
The "remembering self" keeps score, creates, maintains and tells the story of your life (which is your "I"), and responds when the doctor asks "How have you been feeling lately?" What we keep from our experiences is our "story", our "I", haphazardly assembled from a tiny fraction of possible memories.
Kahneman contrasted different experiences of pain from his studies. Which of these profiles of pain, over time, suffered the most? Blue, or red?Clearly, we would say "red"...there is much more and longer pain.
However, which thought they had suffered the most? The surprising answer is that "blue" had a worse memory of the pain than "red". Why? The way the brain works, the worst one is the one where the pain was at its peak at the very end, i.e., the most "recent" memory.
This is a clear conflict between two selves. From the standpoint of the "experiencing self", "red" had the worst time, but it wasn't remembered. However, what the "remembering self" stores are significant changes and most importantly, the endings; here the ending dominated.
The experiencing self lives life continuously w/moments of experience, one after another. What happens to these moments? As Kahneman points out, "They are lost forever. The psychological present, for the experiencing self, is about three seconds long. Most don't leave a trace and are completely ignored by the remembering self." ("my" situation.)
Kahneman also discusses vacations. For the experiencing self, a two week vacation is twice as good as a one week one; the ongoing joy of "now, now, now" experiencing lasts twice as long.
However, for the remembering self, a two week vacation is not much better than a one week one as you have not formed many new memories. Also, during the second week, the remembering self is recalling the now overdue commitments and projects at work, or home, that overshadow any joys.
Storing vacation memories has another downside. If we had a great vacation 4 years ago w/many memories, all other vacations will have to "measure up" to those memories (which aren't accurate - see blogpost "How neuroscience, psychological studies and our poor memories change the law"). As our next vacation has little chance of matching our (now distorted) memories of the great vacation, disappointment is virtually certain.
Just how much pleasure do we derive from those vacation memories? Kahneman recalled that he "remembered" his great vacation for about 25 minutes total over the intervening 4 years. Is that a good trade given what arises from those memories in future vacations? How we choose our next vacation, job, surgeon, partner, etc., reflects this disconnect between the experiencing and remembering selves.
How happily one lives their life (experiencing self) and how pleased/satisfied they are when they recall it (remembering self) are different answers. How satisfied someone is with their life doesn't tell you how happily they are living it.
Kahneman also talks about selecting where one lives, contrasting California w/Ohio, which brings in climate (and memory) as a big consideration. Well, it turns out that climate is not very important to the experiencing self, so it isn't going to be any happier in California than it is in Ohio. (True, IME.) However, the remembering self will remember the cold winters in Ohio from time to time and will be convinced that it made the right decision. It is also important to remember that the brain, for evolutionary survival, developed to strongly overweight negative memories over positive ones.
A study of income was similar. If you don't have enough money to live in a safe place with adequate food, clothing and health care, then the lower the income, the unhappier you will be. However, if you have enough money to meet these needs, more money doesn't make any difference to the experiencing self. A Kahneman found, to his surprise, it is a "flat line" on happiness vs income above the basic "enough" level.
However for the remembering, "story" self, it is very different; the more money you have, the more satisfied you are. It's a relative, remembered, comparative story.
The interesting ending to the TED talk was about the implications of these findings, and the worldwide increasing emphasis on "happiness" and what it means for public policy. If more money doesn't give more experiential happiness, why doesn't that impact our public policy discussions?
 |
| Experiencing self surrounded by remembering selves |
Kahneman closed by saying "How to enhance happiness goes two very different ways depending on whether you think of the remembering self or the experiencing self. This is going to influence policy in years to come. In the United States efforts are being made to measure the experiential happiness of the population. This is going to be, within the next decade or two, part of national statistics.
BTW, there is a great youTube video clearly demonstrating the value of "blah, blah". (The discussion begins about 4:44 into Rush's induction into the R&R Hall of Fame).
Why does my remembering self is so much unhappier than my experiencing self? At home, I am often thinking about work and feel terrible, sometimes I am even afraid of it or want to quit. Once I am at work, I feel good, sometimes even great. I am very immersed in what I am doing. How can I take some of the happiness of my experiencing self onto my remembering self?
ReplyDeleteHi Anonymous,
DeleteWhen you are at work "tasking", you are occupied, focused, engaged in something you apparently enjoy doing. The "blah, blah" mind/remembering self is pushed away by the "tasking, 'now, now, now'", experiencing self.
When you are home, the "tasking"/experiencing self isn't in operation and the "blah, blah"/remembering self is remembering, worrying and creating stories.
That is why Ramana Maharshi's "Direct Path" covered in another blogpost is so important for today's "real life". If you put some self-inquiry into your day, whenever you can recall it (see blogposts on Dialogues w/Dominic), and then spend some time at home doing a few yoga posture flows (see youTube video on this), and do some nondual awakening meditation (four youTube videos), you can change that.
Trust this is helpful.
stillness