Memory and Happiness

It’s been a while since I talked about Dr. Dan Gilbert’s research and the often confusing role our imagination plays in our happiness. But my son’s been reading through one of his book’s which I have so often quoted, so let’s talk about it.

If you’ve been following me for any length of time, you’ve probably heard me refer to Dr. Gilbert’s wonderful book, Stumbling on Happiness. The quote you’ve probably heard me reference the most is that “expectations are a happiness killer.” For those of you who may be knew, what this essentially means is that when we take ownership of a future expectation that we don’t really have control over, it places us into chronic stress until that expectation is resolved. Then once it IS resolved, we usually form another expectation very quickly. Most people live their lives within this cycle, and never even realize that their real problem is the cycle itself, not the want around which the expectation is formed.

But today, I feel inspired to go a little deeper into Dr. Gilbert’s work. To start with, why do expectations kill happiness? Well, first we have to look at the tool we use to do the expecting: our imagination. In the past, I’ve often avoided the word “imagination” and substituted “image-maker,” because “imagination” often has childish associations. But really, we use this tool for absolutely everything. According to Antonio Damasio, a renowned neuroscientist, all human thought is imagistic. As you read these words, you are continually creating a stream of images in your mind in order to comprehend their meaning, and without those images, you would understand them as nothing more than pixels on your screen. You cannot do, say, or comprehend anything without using your imagination.

The only exception would be memories. Since memories are records of something that we have already experienced, we can recall past events as they happened without ever involving our imagination. Right?

Well, no. As magnificent as our brain’s capacity is, we cannot possibly store memories of our whole lives—or even just important events in our lives—in perfect detail. Instead, our brains take shortcuts. They store impression, key details, feelings, and conscious reflections. In many cases, a person will experience something and reach a reflective conclusion about the experience, and then their memory of the event will actually change to better suit their conclusion.

For example, suppose that I go out to dinner with my wife. On the drive over, we have a pleasant conversation. As I sit at our table, I feel a nice sense of decompression from the workweek, and I notice how beautiful Hope looks in her dress. The next table over is a bit too loud, and we laugh about it together. The waiter takes a long time to get to us, but we’re both enjoying lingering together. When we order our food, mine is delicious, but they get Hope’s order wrong and she feels disappointed by this. It puts us a little damper on things, but by the drive home, we’re absorbed once more in enjoying one another’s company.

Now, consider how I might look back on that night the next day. What is the first thing I will probably remember? Right: they got Hope’s order wrong. Someone made a mistake, and it caused a minor but disruptive incident in our evening. As I look back on the night, I will not remember it in total holistic detail. I will probably not bother to fully recall the taste of my own food, or the enjoyable twists and turns of idle conversation, or the connection between Hope and I. I may not even remember what she was wearing that pleased me so much at the time. But I remember that wrong order… and what else? The table next to us was loud. The waiter was slow to take our order. The experience of the night gets flattened into the space of a PowerPoint slide, and reinterpreted in terms of a (mostly negative) summary. If you look back on my original anecdote, you will notice that we were enjoying ourselves practically the whole time. So why don’t I remember it that way?

This is why mental habits like gratitude, narcissism, cynicism, or optimism matter so much. The way in which we interpret our memories also determines what we will retain of them. It reshapes how we see our past, how we experience our present, and how we are likely to meet our future. You may remember one of our recent blog posts on Dr. Nestler’s research, which mentioned how conscious reflection can allow us to adapt to our circumstances and improve our resilience to stress. Well, here we have an excellent picture of how that process works, because even though it is usually unconscious, we can reflect and interpret things consciously in order to arrive at something closer to the truth—and the truth, as they say, will set you free.

Have a blessed, wonderful day!

Dr. Alex Loyd