Mare Somniorum

Early on in “Stumbling on Happiness” the author makes it clear that the book isn’t a self-help book.  At best, the book can be described as self-confusion or self-understanding (to some extent).  Gilbert cites research, both his own and that of others, throughout the work to share how we do, indeed, stumble on happiness.

What makes us happy?  How do we become happy?  What happens in our heads to give us that sensation we long for so much?  Over the course of human history the question of happiness has been raised, by philosophers, religious leaders, politicians and the layman, every single day.  It’s a driving force for much of humanity, one way or another.  But just how well do we understand it?

Gilbert takes us on a tour of our mental processes and how we fail, miserably, to understand what choices will make us happy.  A prime example of this is the art class experiment, which gives students the choice of two classes, identical in every way, except that one class will let you choose between two items of your work to keep for yourself — with an option to change your mind for a brief period of time, the other class has the teacher assign you an item.  People, almost without a fault, would prefer to have the choice of items.  However, when people are asked afterwards (no matter the time frame from the class itself), those who had the choice made for them are much happier with the item they possess then those who chose for themselves.

What’s even worse though is that even after being shown this study, when new students were offered the same classes, a vast majority chose the one where they had the option to choose the item for themselves.   Even after being made aware of our faulty expectations, we still demand to make them, and we are, yet again, disappointed relative to our counterparts.

There are many such revelations in Gilberts work.  Another tidbit is how our brains rationalize our choices and expectations,  and our memory then fudges things to make them “as we wanted them to be” over how they really were — even over how we experienced the events at the time.   Our brains simply lie to us, and the lack of introspection onto the self makes it almost impossible to notice what’s going on.

Gilbert is also a fantastic writer, and the audio book is read by Gilbert himself, making it a treat to listen to if that’s your preference.  Apart from hard science and acclaimed research, there is massive fun to be had in seeing how he tricks your mind just as you’re reading or listening to the book itself.   If you’ve ever wondered what goes on in your noggin’, “Stumbling on Happiness” is a must.

As a light introduction, Daniel Gilbert has hosted two TED talks, if you haven’t watched them yet, now is a good time.