Wonderfulness IS Lasting

I recently started an online Yale University course, “The Science of Well-being”, taught by Dr. Laurie Santos, cognitive scientist and Professor of Psychology at Yale University. (Incidentally, this is Yale’s most popular course on campus – quite the distinction.) One of the many reading assignments in this absorbing seminar, Stumbling on Happiness, by Harvard psychologist, Daniel Gilbert, forms the basis for today’s blog.

Specifically, Dr. Gilbert asserts that “Among life's cruelest truths is this one: Wonderful things are especially wonderful the first time they happen but their wonderfulness wanes with repetition.” He further states “Just compare the first and last time your child said "Mama" or your partner said "I love you" and you'll know exactly what I mean. When we have an experience -- hearing a particular sonata, making love with a particular person, or watching the sunset from a particular window of a particular room on successive occasions, we quickly begin to adapt to it, and the experience yields less pleasure each time.” The author refers to this as habituation or from an economics perspective, declining marginal utility.

Far be it from me to disagree with a Harvard psychologist, but in this case, I must dissent somewhat from such a ubiquitous claim. While generally speaking I accept the broad application of the statement I veer far from it when I specifically think of my own wellness and well-being journey.

As I have chronicled many times in past musings, my journey began as the result of a catastrophic personal setback. My initial footstep was a mindfulness course. I found the first module wonderfully captivating and my wonderment flourished with each subsequent learning installment. To this day, my daily meditation session(s) fill me with the same sense of wonderful gratification.

Likewise, I emerged from my initial grounding practice filled with a sensation of wonderfulness typically realized via a life-altering experience. That was over a year ago and I felt just as wonderful yesterday when I grounded prior to a potentially contentious engagement. My initial exposure to breathing techniques was wonderfully enlightening. My continued pursuit to expand my knowledge base in this critical area fills me with an equally wonderful sense of accomplishment.

The same can be said of my desire to expand my knowledge about well-being. I am wonderfully motivated to learn as much as I can and knowing that stokes my “wonderfulness meter” like a body-builder crushes the high striker at a county fair. This, my – hopefully - constant reader, is a wonderful admission.

Like Dorothy’s travels thru Oz, where each step along the yellow brick road was filled with a wondrous adventure, so too, can be said of my sojourn. My beginning was wonderful and my pledge to myself is to make each subsequent placement of one of my shoes – Nike Air Force One and not a ruby slipper – after the other maintain the same degree of wonderfulness I have experienced thus far.

I wish you all a wonderful day.

- George