Want to be happy? Lower your expectations

By Gary Hayden, Mind Your Body, The Straits Times, 30 Oct 2014

I am a big fan of the British television show, Bargain Hunt, in which competing teams try to make profits buying and selling antiques.

Yesterday, while introducing a husband-and-wife team, the show's host said: "You've been married for 35 years. So tell me, what do you think is the secret of a happy marriage?"

The couple considered the question for a moment. Then the woman replied: "Low expectations!"

It was a cheeky answer: one that poked a little good-natured fun at her husband.

But anyone who has been married for a long time will know that there is a lot of truth in it.

All good relationships require, if not exactly low expectations, then at least realistic ones.

KEY TO HAPPINESS

A recent study conducted by researchers at University College in the United Kingdom suggests that low expectations may be the key, not only to happy marriages but also to happy lives.

The study consisted of two parts.

In the first part, 26 people were required to make decisions that led to financial gains or losses while a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) brain scanner monitored their mood.

In the second part, more than 18,000 people self-reported their levels of happiness while playing a game called The Great Brain Experiment in which their decisions led to them winning or losing points.

The researchers found that the subjects' happiness levels did not depend on the total amount of money or points they gained or lost but, rather, upon how those gains or losses matched up to their expectations.

Summarising the results of the study, lead researcher Robb Rutledge said: "Happiness depends not on how well things are going but whether things are going better or worse than expected.

"Lower expectations make it more likely that an outcome will exceed those expectations and have a positive impact on happiness."

BALANCING REALITY

Of course, this was just one study, which focused specifically on how expectations of small gains and losses affect moment-by-moment feelings of happiness.

But the broad principle - that keeping expectations low has a positive impact on happiness - seems to be generally true.

Economists Rakesh Sarin and Manel Baucells spent 10 years collecting and analysing data from all over the world in order to identify the principles that govern happiness.

In their 2011 book, Engineering Happiness, they summarised their findings and presented what they considered to be the "fundamental equation" of happiness, which is happiness equals reality minus expectations.

We all have various sets of expectations for our lives.

When the reality of our lives exceeds those expectations, we feel good.

When the reality of our lives falls short of those expectations, we feel bad.

For example, if we have always aspired to live in a comfortable little two-bedroom apartment, then we will feel overjoyed if we get to live in a comfortable three-bedroom home.

But if we have set our sights upon a luxury penthouse, then living in an ordinary three-bedroom apartment will leave us feeling unhappy.

The more we expect - from our apartment, salary, car, spouse or whatever else - the more likely we are to be disappointed.

MORE AND MORE

The trouble is, our expectations are constantly shifting.

The more we have, the more we want.

The more our friends or colleagues have, the more we want.

And the more we want, the more we require to make us happy.

This explains why, as Sarin and Baucells discovered in their research, American millionaires living in luxury houses are barely happier than the Masai warriors in Kenya who live in huts.

The Japanese poet Gensei once wrote: "The point in life is to know what's enough."

It seems that he was right.

Though, of course, learning what's enough is, itself, no easy matter.

You can take part in The Great Brain Experiment yourself by downloading the free app for your smartphone or tablet.

Gary Hayden is a philosophy and science writer.