Happiness Myth #2 – Nothing Changes a Person’s Happiness Level Much.

As I’ve studied happiness over the past few years, I’ve learned many things that surprised me. Each day for two weeks, I’m going to debunk one “happiness myth” that I believed before I started my happiness project. Yesterday I wrote about Myth #1: Happy People Are Annoying and Stupid.

Happiness Myth #2: People have a happiness set-point, and no matter what happens to them, before long, they snap back to their usual happiness level.

Wrong.

From time to time, someone says to me something like, “Trying to make yourself happier is futile. People have a genetic set-point that doesn’t change. I heard about a study of people who became paralyzed, and after a few months, they were back to their old selves!”

It’s true that there’s a powerful genetic link to happiness – usually it’s estimated to be about forty to fifty percent. Some people are born more Tigger-ish, and others are born more Eeyore-ish. And it’s also true that people are amazingly adaptive, both to good and bad fortune. Human resilience is extraordinary.

However, adaptation has its limits.

About those people who become paralyzed – in a major study looking at the happiness levels of people with disabilities, it turned out that these folks took a big hit when they were injured, and they didn’t all snap back to where they were before. Some, yes, did recover their previous level of happiness, some recovered somewhat, and some didn’t recover much at all.

Major life events can have strong, lasting effects on people’s happiness. For example, although people adapt quickly to marriage, it takes much longer for widows adapt to widowhood. Losing a job, getting divorced – these kinds of events make a significant lasting impact on happiness.

Adaptation varies considerably among people. Some get over changes quickly, while others take much longer to adapt, if they ever do.

This is the way I’ve come to think about this question: people are born with a natural range of temperament, but circumstances, actions, and thoughts can push people up to the top of their range, or down to the bottom of their range.

That’s the effect my happiness project has had on me. When I’m in neutral – say, I’m staring out the window of a bus – I’m the same familiar Gretchen. My happiness project hasn’t changed my inborn temperament. (I score 3.92 on a 1-5 scale, by the way; take the Authentic Happiness Inventory Questionnaire if you want to test yourself.) The difference is that, because of my happiness project, my daily experience of my life is happier. I have more fun, and less guilt. I have more challenge, more novelty, more satisfaction; less anger, less boredom, less remorse. That’s how I’ve made myself happier, without changing myself.

If you want to read more about this fascinating debate, check out the chapter “Nature and Nurture: Is There a Happiness Set Point, and Can You Change It?” in Ed Diener and Robert Biswas-Diener’s Happiness and Richard E. Lucas’s “Personality and Subjective Well-Being” in The Science of Subjective Well-Being.

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Interested in starting your own happiness project? If you’d like to take a look at my personal Resolutions Chart, for inspiration, just email me at grubin, then the “at” sign, then gretchenrubin dot com. (Sorry about writing it in that roundabout way; I’m trying to thwart spammers.) Just write “Resolutions Chart” in the subject line.

Comments

[Fred Bloggs]

This matches my experience. I've been desperate, and accused of not knowing how to be happy, and I've been happy. Life changed.

It also turns out one big thing doesn't change things that much for that long - you lose a limb, you feel desperate for year or two, you learn how to live without it. You lose a limb and lose friends who can't cope with the fact, your life gets way harder.

[Christopher]

Very cool and thanks for the questionnaire!

[Yes, But Still...]

I like your assessment, and if I understand it correctly, your goal is to live at the top of your happiness "range".

Me too.

[Alex Lickerman @ Happiness in this World]

I've found the level of happiness I enjoy seems to fluctuate from moment-to-moment depending on how resistant I am to the vagaries of external forces pressing on my life-condition. When good things happen I tend to feel good for a while and when bad things happen I tend to feel bad for a while. But I've become convinced that if we work to increase our capacity to experience happiness, like exercising a muscle it will grow stronger, and the set point around which our happiness fluctuates will inevitably rise. But it really does seem to require diligent, consistent effort and the pursuit of a path that actually works. It also seems to me there are far more bad ways to pursue happiness than good ways.

[Vi]

I agree with you whole heartedly. As someone who has suffered through depression, it amazes me everyday how happy I am now. I hardly remember the dark days of many years past now.

If you are going through a tough time or think that you were just born to be a depressed person, I want to tell you that your happiness level can change. It most definitely can. And when it does, you won't recognize the old you. Trust me, there is hope.

[judy]

I've been surprised, actually, at the effectiveness of my happiness project. Though I think I lean toward happy anyway, the little things that I pay attention to now make a difference. I'm more conscious of my life now... more IN it. I'm glad you debunked this myth, Gretchen. I'd hate to think happiness is predetermined.

[R. M. Koske]

I first heard the set-point theory while I was depressed and didn't realize it. (Yes, it's possible.)

At first, the idea made me even more unhappy. This is as good as it gets? Argh. But I thought about what I knew (I didn't read the study, only mentions on the and in books) and decided that just because you couldn't depend on winning the lottery to make you really happy, that didn't mean you couldn't gradually nudge the happiness level up. I decided to do everything I could think of to make myself a little happier every day, and it helped a lot. Getting diagnosed and treated for my depression helped even more, but I did see results from my change in self-care.

I think of it as an average - you return to average after most major events, so you want that average to be as favorable as you can get it.

[May]

I am enjoying these myth posts. I wonder if you've posted about happiness strategies you've tried that didn't work? That might seem 'too negative', but these days every commercial or self-help guru or medication or religion or philosophy promises us happiness -- the world is ostensibly suffering from an overabundance of happiness tips. So hearing about strategies that you've found useless would be genuinely helpful.

[Alexis Gabriele]

I was suprised to find my score on the 1-5 scale was only average, and yet I think of myself as happier than most. I'll have to do some introspection...

[Allison Byrd]

Okay, if no one else will ask, I will! What's with the photo of "Big Foot" doing attached to this article. Does he have (or not) a genetic happiness set-point?

Off to do the happiness quiz. Thanks for another great article!

Allison

[Catherine Cantieri, Sorted]

I just want to say that I am digging the Bigfoot. The Bigfoot is adding to my happiness!

[Laura L. Rice]

Thanks for the happiness inventory quiz. By the way, this work everyone is doing, by working on their happiness, determining ways to be happier, this is essentially what a therapist may refer to as cognitive-behavioral therapy. I am a mental health professional and hold strongly to the cog-behav theories, it is possible to make changes and become happier, very possible! Thank you so much for sharing this article.

[Rachel]

A clinical social worker once told me that feelings only last fifteen minutes-- after that, one needs to re-fuel their emotion to give it power over one. (This goes along with your next entry, about venting too much.) Obviously when one is grieving a recent death, etc., feelings will re-emerge during those fifteen-minute periods and continue on for a good long while. However, it is helpful to know that when one is in a funk, it oftentimes only takes a positive attitude to get out of it.

[Allison Byrd]

Duh! Okay, sorry I didn't get the connection between the Big Foot MYTH and the theme of this series of posts! The myth is the thing. Very appropo. Thanks for the smile.

[Katie]

Until I read this post, I also believed all the studies that said we have a happiness set-point. Actually, just this week I was considering what that meant for me. This post and comments make so much more sense. I now believe that we have an average point that we return to, but that average point can increase or decrease. I'm going to continue to work on increasing it! Consciousness is a huge help in that area for me.

[Michael]

A great book on this topic is Seligman's "What You Can Change and What You Can't"
http://www.amazon.com/What-You-Change-Cant-Self-Improvement/dp/1400078407

[Hilda]

I heard about this theory a few years ago when I was doing alot of reading on the subject of happiness myself. I think it orginated from Martin Seligman? Anyway, I agree with you. My experience is that people can move beyond their "set-range", but it takes commitment and conscious awareness around your thoughts and deeds. I have found meditation to be the single most effective technique for increasing happiness levels.

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