Think About Your Death and Live Better

We banish death from our thoughts. But this leads us to make choices in life that actually curtail our happiness. People who express more regrets tend to be those who postponed profound activities that yield meaning, such as practicing religion, appreciating beauty, or spending more time with loved ones.

This is probably because they realized too late that they had implicitly assumed life would always go on and on, so there’s always time to do these meaning-filled things. When we avoid thoughts of death, we unconsciously assume that tomorrow will look a lot like today, so we can do tomorrow what we could do today. But when we focus on death, that increases the stakes at play in the present, and clarifies what we should do with our time. 

Arthur C. Brooks writing in the Atlantic

The Green Lumber Fallacy

A fellow made in fortune in green lumber without knowing what appears to be essential details about the product he traded—he wasn’t aware that green lumber stood for freshly cut wood, not lumber that was painted green.  

Meanwhile, by contrast, the person who related the story went bankrupt while knowing every intimate detail about the green lumber, which includes the physical, economic, and other aspects of the commodity.

The fallacy is that what one may need to know in the real world does not necessarily match what one can perceive through intellect: it doesn’t mean that details are not relevant, only that those we tend to believe are important constitute a distraction away from more central attributes to the price mechanism.  

Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Our strong intuitions about happiness are wrong

Our minds lie to us. We have strong intuitions about the things that will make us happy, and we use those intuitions to go after that stuff, whether it’s more money or changing circumstances or buying the new iPhone. But a lot of those intuitions, the science shows are not exactly right — or are deeply misguided. That’s why we get it wrong. I know this stuff, but my instincts are totally wrong. After a busy day, I want to sit and watch crappy Netflix TV shows, even though I know the data suggests that if I worked out or called a friend I’d be happier. But to do that I have to fight my intuition. We need help with that, and you don’t get it naturally, especially in the modern day. 

We’re fighting cultural forces that are telling us, “You’re not happy enough; happiness could just be around the corner.” Part of it’s all the information out there about happiness, which can be hard to sift through, but a lot of it is a deeper thing in our culture that seems to be leading us astray.

Yale cognitive scientist Laurie Santos, quoted in the New York Times

Watch a Flower

Some years ago, a few close friends were (at the home of a friend who had survived cancer that should have killed him decades ago), eating and drinking out in his garden. It was dusk, and he asked us to gather around a plant with small, closed flowers. “Watch a flower,” he instructed. We did so, for about 10 minutes, in silence. All at once, the flowers popped open, which we learned that they did every evening. We gasped in amazement. It was a moment of intense satisfaction.

But here’s the thing I still can’t get over: Unlike most of the junk on my old bucket list, that satisfaction endured. That memory still brings me joy—more so than many of my life’s earthly “accomplishments”—not because it was the culmination of a large goal, but because it was an unexpected gift, a tiny miracle.

Arthur C. Brooks, From Strength to Strength

Wear Sunscreen

A Chicago Tribune columnist wrote a piece in the late 1990s that has become known as Wear Sunscreen. She imagined what advice she might give to students at a commencement. It starts like this: “Ladies and gentlemen of the class of ’97: Wear sunscreen.”

The commonsense advice that followed included tidbits like, “Don’t be reckless with other people’s hearts” and “Don’t put up with people who are reckless with yours.” The message was intensified when it was set to music, renamed Everybody’s Free (To WearSunscreen) and released on an album by an Australian film director. One of Brazil’s biggest advertising agencies added video.  

Are you a self-objectifier?

Are you a self-objectifier in your job or career? Ask yourself a few questions, and answer them honestly.

• Is your job the biggest part of your identity? Is it the way you introduce yourself, or even understand yourself?

• Do you find yourself sacrificing love relationships for work? Have you forgone romance, friendship, or starting a family because of your career?

• Do you have trouble imagining being happy if you were to lose your job or career? Does the idea of losing it feel a little like death to you?

If you answered affirmatively to any or all of these, recognize that you will never be satisfied as long as you objectify yourself. Your career or job should be an extension of you, not vice versa.

Arthur C. Brooks writing in The Atlantic

So Much Straw

It is said that on 6 December 1273, while he was celebrating mass, a great change came over Thomas Aquinas. At the age of 49, his Summa Theologica ("Summary of Theology" – nearly 1300 pages) unfinished, he stopped writing. To his faithful secretary and companion Reginald of Pipersno, he said, ‘Reginald, I can do no more; such things have been revealed to me that all that I have written seems to me as so much straw. Now, I await the end of my life of my works.’ Aquinas died three months later.

All our talk about God is halting, partial, hopelessly inadequate. This does not mean we should not hold firm beliefs about God or do the best job we can as philosophers and theologians. It simply means that no matter how much skill or effort we bring to the job, God always remains in part a mystery. The gap between God and our ideas about God was, we believe, salvifically narrowed by God’s revelatory initiative, but not closed.

Like Aquinas, all Christians can see that human talk about God ultimately comes to an end. It’s best efforts are like straw.

Stephen T. Davis, Logic and the Nature of God