Baltimore City Chamber of Commerce issued the following announcement on Sept. 3.
"Do what makes you happy" is right up there with "Be passionate" in terms of popular mantras. Maybe you've even said it yourself or posted it on your social channels with some type of ubiquitous cat poster. But can I talk to you for a minute on why you might want to take a step back from this one?
Are you happy or just trusting what doesn't suck?
The familiarity principle, also known as the mere exposure principle, basically says that, as we experience things over and over, we can start to prefer them. From the scientific perspective, this probably happens simply because it's more efficient for our brains to use well-worn neural pathways than to carve out entirely new ones.
So the problem is, when most people try to "do what makes them happy", they often end up leaning on what they already know or have learned. They can have a warped perception of how much joy they're really experiencing, simply because they haven't engaged in other activities that might be significantly more pleasurable and, subsequently, have no good comparative reference. They're not really finding new sources of joy or growing. They're just trusting what they know doesn't suck in an effort to avoid subconsciously anticipated stress.
Original source can be found here.
Source: Baltimore City Chamber of Commerce
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