Shiny, Happy People Holding Hands
Recently, I have been watching “Child of Our Time”, this epic documentary series that showcases over 20 millennium babies and their families over a period of 20 years to launch the age-old argument of nature versus nurture.
In one particular episode, the researchers were trying to find out more about how our memories work for us from the time we were born to adulthood. So they brought in some of the parents of the babies individually, without their babies, and showed them photos of themselves taken when they were kids. They were asked to describe the happenings around them while they were having those pictures taken. Then they were shown a photo of themselves with one of their parents in a hot-air balloon. What they didn’t know was that the pictures of themselves and their parents were superimposed into the hot-air balloon. In other words, the event never took place. Needless to say, all the individuals were shocked when they first saw the photo and claimed that they didn’t recall this incident at all. The interviewer then told each of them to try and recall this event every night for the next 2 weeks, just before they go to bed. 2 weeks later, they returned separately and were asked a series of questions before being shown the photo of the hot-air balloon again. Most of them still insisted that they couldn’t remember this supposedly eventful day despite their earnest efforts to think about it for the past 2 weeks. But interestingly, a few said they managed to remember little snippets of the event and even gave a rough account of the happenings of that day. One lady, who had a generally unhappy childhood, even described some negative commotion that took place that day while she was having her picture taken.
So the psychologists and researchers concluded from this test that the human brain is so powerful that it can trick us into believing in things we’ve never seen or experienced. This had definitely confirmed my belief in changing our mindsets in order to be happy. In other words, if we can trick our minds to believe in things we’ve never seen or experienced before, we can likewise, trick our minds into believing that we are happy.
Ludicrous? Maybe not. Some might go, “but that’s fake!” But just think about it: if I truly believe that I’m happy and exude happiness through my actions because I believe that I’m happy, who’s to claim that my happiness is fake? Wow…. let me quickly jot this down in my Palm so that I can be reminded of this and live by this statement!
Let’s take another example. Remember Joan of Arc? That virginal nut (rest her soul) who believed that she saw many miraculous signs from God which gave her such immense faith that she astoundingly led her army to many victories over England during the 1400s. Putting faith aside, the crux of it is that her brain had successfully tricked herself to believe that she’s destined to win those battles despite having a physically stronger enemy. Her tricked mind then went on to convince her troops that they really could win this, and their minds too were tricked to believe in this, which brought about their shocking victories. She lost the last battle she fought only because she believed God had warned her of her defeat. So do not underestimate the power of our minds.
This is not to say that you should trick yourself into believing that you’re happy when you’re being abused or taken advantage of. For instance, if you’re in a relationship where your partner showers you with all the attention and affection that you want, but picks up fights with you once every 3 days, which completely mentally exhausts you, you should have the intelligence to rationalise if the issue is in yourself or an external factor.
So the next time somebody doubts your state of happiness, be sympathetic. Cynics usually don’t understand what it truly means to be happy.
Here’s something to ponder about: when asked when she was a little girl, what she’d want to be when she grew up, Goldie Hawn (Hollywood actress) replied, “I wanna be happy”.
In one particular episode, the researchers were trying to find out more about how our memories work for us from the time we were born to adulthood. So they brought in some of the parents of the babies individually, without their babies, and showed them photos of themselves taken when they were kids. They were asked to describe the happenings around them while they were having those pictures taken. Then they were shown a photo of themselves with one of their parents in a hot-air balloon. What they didn’t know was that the pictures of themselves and their parents were superimposed into the hot-air balloon. In other words, the event never took place. Needless to say, all the individuals were shocked when they first saw the photo and claimed that they didn’t recall this incident at all. The interviewer then told each of them to try and recall this event every night for the next 2 weeks, just before they go to bed. 2 weeks later, they returned separately and were asked a series of questions before being shown the photo of the hot-air balloon again. Most of them still insisted that they couldn’t remember this supposedly eventful day despite their earnest efforts to think about it for the past 2 weeks. But interestingly, a few said they managed to remember little snippets of the event and even gave a rough account of the happenings of that day. One lady, who had a generally unhappy childhood, even described some negative commotion that took place that day while she was having her picture taken.
So the psychologists and researchers concluded from this test that the human brain is so powerful that it can trick us into believing in things we’ve never seen or experienced. This had definitely confirmed my belief in changing our mindsets in order to be happy. In other words, if we can trick our minds to believe in things we’ve never seen or experienced before, we can likewise, trick our minds into believing that we are happy.
Ludicrous? Maybe not. Some might go, “but that’s fake!” But just think about it: if I truly believe that I’m happy and exude happiness through my actions because I believe that I’m happy, who’s to claim that my happiness is fake? Wow…. let me quickly jot this down in my Palm so that I can be reminded of this and live by this statement!
Let’s take another example. Remember Joan of Arc? That virginal nut (rest her soul) who believed that she saw many miraculous signs from God which gave her such immense faith that she astoundingly led her army to many victories over England during the 1400s. Putting faith aside, the crux of it is that her brain had successfully tricked herself to believe that she’s destined to win those battles despite having a physically stronger enemy. Her tricked mind then went on to convince her troops that they really could win this, and their minds too were tricked to believe in this, which brought about their shocking victories. She lost the last battle she fought only because she believed God had warned her of her defeat. So do not underestimate the power of our minds.
This is not to say that you should trick yourself into believing that you’re happy when you’re being abused or taken advantage of. For instance, if you’re in a relationship where your partner showers you with all the attention and affection that you want, but picks up fights with you once every 3 days, which completely mentally exhausts you, you should have the intelligence to rationalise if the issue is in yourself or an external factor.
So the next time somebody doubts your state of happiness, be sympathetic. Cynics usually don’t understand what it truly means to be happy.
Here’s something to ponder about: when asked when she was a little girl, what she’d want to be when she grew up, Goldie Hawn (Hollywood actress) replied, “I wanna be happy”.
posted by Devilsoup at
9:01 AM
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