Moral Dilemmas That Will Break Your Brain

Imagine you're going blind. The world slowly becomes a blur. You can no longer see your family or your friends. You can't see the beauty of a mountain landscape or the ripples in the ocean. Then a YouTuber comes around offering to give you the gift of sight. This is exactly what happened in January of 2023 when Mr. Beast found a thousand people suffering from cataracts and then offered them a simple surgery to regain their eyesight. Surgery which takes 10 minutes cured them forever. Was Mr. Beast playing God and reversing the course of nature?

Science and technology have given people new limbs with prosthetic advancement. It's cured people of immeasurable pain, like Victoria Gray, a 37-year-old mother from Mississippi who was born with the blood disorder sickle cell disease and has endured lengthy hospital stays and debilitating fatigue. In 2019, the controversial gene editing technology CRISPR cured her of her pain and transformed her life. Well, was that playing God? Or how about this: in 2018, a doctor in China used CRISPR to genetically engineer two baby girls to be resistant to HIV. The context: since the beginning of its epidemic, between 65 million and 113 million people have been infected with HIV, and of those people, around 40 million have lost their lives. Yet when this doctor genetically engineered these baby girls to be resistant to this life-threatening disease, he was arrested, with many accusing him of trying to play God.

Our attempts to make scientific and technological advances often leave us confronting the harm they can do. Genetically modified food can make food more accessible, but it threatens economies and environments in places like the Congo. Lab-grown meat reduces the emissions of greenhouse gases, but puts farmers out of business. These are the unintended consequences of trying to play God.

There's a new craze around the idea of de-extinction, bringing extinct animals like the mammoth and the dodo bird back to life by genetically transforming one of their close relatives. Instead of trying to bring back animals from extinction, we should focus on preserving our wildlife and stop them from going extinct in the first place. Humans have always tried to overcome nature, whether it was ancient Chinese blowing ground-up smallpox scabs into people's noses like an early vaccine or building wooden prosthetic limbs that operated with pulleys and strings. We've persistently worked to make life easier and safer.

In the year 1800, global life expectancy was only 29 years old, and until the late 1800s, people thought that infectious diseases could be caught by breathing smelly air. So they would reduce their chances of getting sick by breathing through the bunches of flowers. Seriously. But the medical advancements that emerged in the 19th and 20th centuries made us drastically healthier. After a cholera outbreak in 1854, British Dr. Jon Snow drew a map and discovered that all of the victims lived near the same water pump. The government removed the pump and the cholera outbreak stopped. This was the beginning of germ theory, which helps us understand diseases like COVID and how they spread from one person to another.

Modern surgical techniques and simple handwashing protocols make hospitals safe for us all. While generally the outcomes of medical advances like these are positive, there can be unintended consequences that we aren't prepared for. Like an aging global population. 200 years ago, global life expectancy was only 29 years, and today it's 73. The reality of these advancements is that while some get to enjoy the fruits of innovation, others are left behind. Clean drinking water limits the spread of harmful bacteria and chemicals, yet around 26% of the world's population doesn't have access to safe drinking water. Worse, around 46% lack access to basic sanitation.

Even how long we get to live isn't equal. People in high-income countries like Japan are expected to live three decades longer than people in low-income nations like the Central African Republic. But life expectancy differences due to imbalances in income can exist even in the same city. In 2015, in Baltimore, a city in Maryland, USA, life expectancy in one wealthy neighborhood was 19 years higher than in poor communities just 3 miles away. What would our world become when some people become gods, living long, healthy lives, while others remain mere mortals, barely able to live long enough to see their grandchildren?

But that's not all. Over the years, birth rates have slowed due to advancements in contraception, family planning, and more gender equality in the workplace. Not only are our life expectancies increased, but without the infusion of babies, the population on average is getting older. And this means that the labor force, economic growth, and social support systems are under a lot more stress. And more people are at risk of age-related diseases like dementia, vision loss, and cardiovascular disease. A longer life doesn't always mean a healthier life. Thanks to medical advancements, people can live longer while still being chronically sick or disabled. In fact, with a drastic increase in life expectancy, disability rates have remained constant.

The question of why life persists even in the most difficult circumstances is one I can't answer. Philosophers for millennia have tried and failed, but the reality is if we want to keep enjoying the benefits of living longer, these things need to improve. We need to improve public health care and elder care. With an older population, there's more need for social support since more people are retired. And even though there's been leaps in gender equality and it's put more women in the workforce, as a population ages, women are often expected to leave work and become caregivers. Those strides for women's rights and independence could be reversed.

The United Nations wants countries to adopt policies to reduce the negative impacts of an aging population, like reforming pension systems, raising retirement age, eliminating barriers for older people in the workforce, and developing long-term care strategies for caregivers. Now, while none of us would ever argue that we should get rid of sterile surgical instruments or functioning sanitation systems, the people who develop them probably weren't thinking about how thin our healthcare and social systems would be stretched a century later. On the other hand, our current technological and scientific advances are so fast-paced that we don't have to wait 100 years to be hit in the face with their unintended consequences, like GMOs or genetically modified organisms.

For example, in their relatively short life, they've already caused so much controversy. In the simplest terms, GMOs are animals or plants whose DNA has been altered with the goal of improving the genetic makeup of the organism or getting rid of unwanted characteristics. Scientists mainly study genetically modified animals to learn more about health and disease. But a few of them, like GMO salmon, end up in our food supply, and whether or not we should be eating genetically modified animals can be a conversation for another day.

But that's not even the main controversy surrounding GMOs, and for that, we have to look at the global fruit and vegetable supply. The first genetically engineered plants produced for consumption showed up in the 1990s, but today, 90% of corn, soybeans, and sugar beets are genetically modified. But there's a good reason for this: farming GMOs produces higher yields, longer shelf life, and crops that are resistant to disease and pests. On top of all of this, they usually taste better. Also, because they're resistant to pests, farmers use less pesticides, which we can assume is better for the environment. So good for consumers, the farmer, and the environment. What could go wrong? A lot, actually.

Yes, eliminating pesticides is good, but GMOs cause controversy not only because they change a plant in a way that wouldn't happen naturally but also because they can impact the biodiversity of the area where the crop is grown. For example, bees rely on plants for survival, and if the natural properties of the plants they live near change, the bees are affected. Once the bees are affected, the whole natural pollination of the area gets thrown out of whack, and the landscape and the natural resources change forever.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo, the second largest country in Africa, has the most significant biodiversity in Africa and is governed by various laws to protect it. GMOs directly conflict with these laws because they potentially threaten the natural environment. The European Union has banned GMO products, not only because of environmental preservation purposes but also due to the lack of research on how they affect our health. However, many African countries are weighing GMOs' potential ability to curb hunger crises against their potential for unintended health consequences. In Zambia, many people believe that GMOs cause resistance to antibiotics and weaken the body's immunity to disease.

The truth is that GMOs just haven't been around long enough for us to know their true long-term effects. There's a chain reaction once an organism is genetically modified. How threatening that reaction is to the environment and our health has yet to be seen. We can see this kind of controversy sprouting up in other scientific advancements and what we put in our bodies. Lab-grown meat may have seemed like a sci-fi plot line until recently, but in June 2023, the U.S. Department of Agriculture granted the first-ever approval for cell-cultured chicken meat.

90% of the U.S. population eats meat regularly, but a growing number of people around the globe are concerned about the current meat industry, which accounts for about 15% of global carbon emissions. Big livestock operations are also breeding grounds for harmful bacteria; they generate tons of waste and the animals often live short lives under harsh conditions. But we still love our meat. Most of us, at least. Meat is rich in protein; it's part of traditions and holidays, and for many, it holds cultural significance. Not to mention, it tastes pretty good.

So maybe instead of cutting it off altogether, lab-grown meat can be a solution for conflicted carnivores out there. Lab-grown meat starts with a sample of stem cells from a fertilized chicken egg, the best of which are submerged in a vat of nutrient-rich broth with ingredients that help the cells grow and divide. And as they grow and divide, they adhere to one another and eventually produce enough proteins to harvest. This new meat is textured rather by heating or shearing it, and then it's pressed into a nugget or cutlet shape.

At this point, lab-grown chicken is still a novelty, only available at a handful of U.S. restaurants. And until the industry scales much larger, it's hard to argue and gauge its environmental benefits. What is certain is that cultured meat facilities will use far less water and land and emit fewer greenhouse gases. But as we create meat out of almost nothing and disrupt the natural state of things, what are the unintended consequences?

Italy can answer that one for us. The Italian parliament just banned lab-grown meat after being lobbied by several farming groups. The ban cited lab-grown meat as ruining the cherished relationship between food, land, and human labor, and this gives a sneak peek into some of the unintended consequences of cultured meat. Sure, it can help the environment and potentially animal welfare, but what about the farmers who rely on the meat industry to survive? What do they do? It begs the question: just because we can do something, does that mean that we should?

These rat species, the extinct one and the relative they were trying to engineer, split evolutionarily 2.6 million years ago and that's considered a close relative. Mammoths and Asian elephants split 6 million years ago, and we can't even compare the complexities of raising a lab-grown mammoth with a rat, so it's safe to say that we won't see mammoths wandering around anytime soon. But even if we could bring back these extinct animals, should we? Because for the cost of bringing back one species from extinction, we could save eight species currently still in existence. NASA has spent over $100 million a year on research to get to Mars, to say nothing of what private companies like SpaceX are spending.

People say that learning about Mars can answer questions about Earth's history and get kids interested in science, and sure, that is valid. But there's also a lot of pressing issues here on Earth that could use $100 million a year. We could instead focus our energy on preserving the world we've been given. At the end of the day, the grass is only greener where you water it.

Speaking of Mars, martians might still be a thing of science fiction, but genetically engineered humans have moved far beyond Frankenstein into our current reality. Gene editing is perhaps the ultimate frontier of the debate around playing God. The gene editing technology CRISPR allows doctors to make precise changes to someone's DNA, even before they're born. In 2020, the creators of CRISPR won the Nobel Prize because the science can help treat and cure diseases. Who wouldn't want that?

Currently, testing is being done on the safety of gene editing for conditions like blindness, blood disorders, blood cancers, diabetes, and HIV/AIDS. It can help people like the Mississippi woman with sickle cell disease from living a life of suffering. The benefits could be world-altering, but so could the drawbacks. Because like any delicate technology, there's a concern that rogue companies or rogue scientists might use genome editing for full-blown eugenics, engineering a type of person that one misguided or evil leader believes to be the right type of person.

The beauty of our world is that we're all different. Unfortunately, those differences are sometimes in the form of pain or sickness. Do we cure one type of difference and risk losing all the others? There are complex ethical trade-offs in advancements like gene editing. Should it only be done on living humans who can consent to alleviate a disease, or should we allow embryos to be edited to be resistant to those same diseases in the first place? Right now, it's not really a debate that most of us can have because the treatments that will be approved soon cost more than $2 million a person.

And that's the reality of new technologies: only some of us get to play God. If the Earth fails, we're not all going to new state-of-the-art colonies on Mars. If embryos can be resistant to cancer, not every embryo will get to be. We don't even have clean drinking water for everyone, or vaccines, or prosthetics, or any of the advancements that so many people take for granted. Mr. Beast showed in the video how easy it is to help thousands of people see again, which only makes it more painful knowing that so many still struggle to get that treatment.

Why do only some people get access to life-changing treatment while others are left to suffer? There aren't just the unintended consequences of playing God; there are the very real and known consequences for those who never even get the chance. If I steal from the rich and feed to the poor, is that good or bad? If I drive over the speed limit to get my sick child to the hospital, is that good or is that bad? What is good and what is bad? What is morality, and do you as a person have morals?

Morality is what society treats as right and acceptable. They're the standards of thoughts, behaviors, and actions that everyone in a group agrees to follow so that they can all live peacefully. When you define it like that, morality does sound like law. However, while the law is influenced by morals, they're not the same. Stealing is against the law, whether you're stealing from the rich or from the poor. Stealing is a crime. However, a lot of people would consider stealing a piece of bread to save a homeless person from dying of hunger moral.

Driving over the speed limit is a crime, but when it could help save the life of a child in the backseat of your car, it becomes the most noble of actions. Trespassing is a crime, but when there's a storm coming and you don't have anywhere to go, hiding under the shade of someone's porch will definitely not get you in society's black book. On the flip side, there are also some things that are considered immoral but are not criminal. Cheating on a test is a crime, but cheating on a partner is not. However, both of them would most likely be considered immoral.

Breaking a promise is one of the most immoral things you can do, but unless it was a written agreement about a business contract, you normally won't get into trouble with the law for it. Although law and morality are different, they're quite similar in many ways. Actually, both morality and law are built on the foundation of respect for all humans, as well as the autonomy of life, property, and beliefs. They're also both there to guide the behaviors of people living in a community so everyone can live together in the most peaceful ways possible.

Just that one is written and the other is usually unspoken. I made an entire video about unspoken rules in society, and most of them are simply our moral obligations as members of that society. More often than not, the law expresses the morality of that time and place. Just a few years ago, it was illegal to smoke weed almost anywhere in the United States. However, as morality shifted towards tolerance for people to enjoy it, so did the law. Now, whether they did that for moral reasons or simply because they can tax it at a pretty high rate is a different discussion entirely.

But anyways, as humans evolve and learn new things, our morals change. This is why morality isn't stagnant; it evolves with time as people share their experiences and beliefs about the world. Think about issues like premarital sex, same-sex relationships, abortion, marijuana use. These are all things that were considered immoral long ago, but today society is beginning to accept all of these as moral. We've learned to be tolerant of people, regardless of their personal beliefs or preferences. And while not everyone might agree to all of these things or practice it themselves, things seem to have flipped, and it's now considered immoral to criticize the people who choose to live these lifestyles.

Throughout human history, morality tended to have been tied to religious traditions. However, now more than ever, we're moving to a place where morality is no longer tied to religion whatsoever. It's more of what the social norm is and how you operate around that social norm. We now recognize the need for secular morality that transcends people's personal beliefs and is instead seeking the good of the general public. However, there was one argument against this type of morality, the idea of subjective morality.

You see, there have always been debates about whether morality is subjective or objective, usually in religious or philosophical spheres. People who believe that morality is objective often say that if morality becomes subjective, everyone can simply create their own morality and then we can never say that they're wrong about anything, because who are we to say that their own definition of morality isn't the right one? And while there is some truth to that, there are still, of course, many flaws in that argument. If morality is objective, there needs to be substantial similarities in what every culture considers correct and acceptable, as well as actions that are also considered taboo universally; but it is almost impossible to find a moral issue that every culture in the world agrees on.

Even murder. Think about Nazi Germany and how it was thought of as moral to kill in that culture. Think about cultures that practice cannibalism or still make human sacrifices to their deity to this day. If even the most barbaric of actions aren't considered barbaric in every culture, how can we possibly say that morality is objective? Another problem with the argument of objective morality is that for morality to be objective, it has to be defined by an outside entity. In other words, a God or at least something that is hard-coded into all of us as humans. But in that case, most religions do not agree on the rules that have been given by their God. In fact, even within religions, not everyone agrees to or follows the same set of rules. So how do we then determine which group of people are right about what is wrong?

When people think of objective morality, what they're actually talking about is cosmopolitan morality. Because the world is now so connected, we're more open to new and diverse experiences, experiences that are helping us shape a new definition of morality, one that we can all agree on. But as we've seen in the past, getting everyone to agree on something is relatively impossible. This type of morality only exists on the Internet's biggest cosmopolitan metropolis. But when you step outside and look into the real world, into the billions of people that are not connected to the Internet, you'll be met with a vast difference in what is considered right and what is considered wrong.

Deli, named after the ancient Greek oracle, is a simple artificial intelligence system that has been designed to make moral and ethical judgments. The Allen Institute built Deli to answer one question: can machines learn morality? On the surface, it might seem like a simple question with a straightforward answer, but research done on Deli says otherwise. Deli was once accessed by a group of human judges, and they determined that her ethical judgments were around 92% correct. Correct, being decisions that humans are likely to make in the same scenario. When Deli was released into the wild via the internet, a lot more people agreed with what these human judgments thought of Deli. Yes, she wasn't perfect, but even humans aren't perfect moral beings.

As we gain new experiences and begin to understand the life and struggles of others, we learn more and become wiser in our judgments. But you see, there are two main problems with Deli and other AI systems like her. First, because Deli was created by humans, she can quickly become as flawed and prejudiced as the people who created her. The creators of Deli were ones who chose the ethical scenarios that would be used in the system. They also chose the people who would judge these scenarios. This means that, at least in part, Deli is a product of the morality of her creators, so until we can find a way to eradicate the prejudices that currently exist in our world, whatever AI we create will continue to express those thoughts. But this time, we won't have anyone to hold accountable.

Secondly, you see, morality is not just critical analysis. Morality is intertwined with emotion. Attachments between friends, partners, parents, and children. These are the foundations on which morality stands. Take away the emotions, and all you're left with is critical analysis and decision-making based on cost and reward, and this is simply not morality. This is why, when Deli was asked, is it right to leave one's body to science, she responded with "yes." On paper, the benefits outweigh the costs. But it is only when we look at it through a lens of both emotions and logical reasoning that we realize that human life is far greater than any benefit, especially when there are other exploitable options.

More and more, we're seeing lawyers defend their cases using MRI scans and the neurology side of morality. Because let's say a certain person was making life decisions while at the same time having a massive brain tumor affecting their thought processes. If the person was not capable of making a moral decision due to medical conditions beyond their knowledge, can we even blame them for their actions? Morality is a function of the brain. If the area of the brain just behind the forehead, inches away from the eyes, gets damaged, a person's moral judgment can completely change. Their moral judgment, especially in life or death situations, becomes warped. They're willing to take a life as long as it's done to save another. In a study, people with this type of injury were willing to strangle a baby as long as it would save someone else's life. It's vile and unthinkable to you, because you feel compassion, guilt, and embarrassment. But when the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, which is responsible for creating these emotions, is damaged, so is your moral compass.

Without the emotional system being in place, we're just like Deli, left only with the ability to make utilitarian cost-benefit analyses. So as long as we're saving one life, taking another seems completely fair. Only when you look at it through the eyes of compassion, through the lens of morality, do you realize it's a moral and barbaric. So if morality can be affected by our biological makeup, what is morality, biological or cultural? In truth, it's both. Biologically, what distinguishes us from other animals is our ability to make moral judgments, and this ability is down to three things: we can anticipate the consequences of our actions, we can make value judgments, and we can choose between alternative courses of action. These three things work together to give us the ability to make moral decisions.

However, while the ability to make moral decisions is biological, moral codes of conduct are strictly cultural, built out of the need to cohabit successfully. That's why every culture has its own morality. It's a complex thing, just like every human is on a different journey of life. We are all guided on that journey by different moral compasses. This is why morality is a difficult subject to talk about, because no matter what you say, there will always be some people that disagree with you. What some people consider moral, others consider immoral. What some people consider justice, others think of as revenge. But getting everyone to agree on a set of guidelines to follow should not be the only end goal of talking about morality, because while we might not get all the answers we want or a clear path we should all follow, discussions on morality, how it's formed, and how it affects us can give us a look into the lives of others and give us insight on how we should live our own.

It helps us learn how others think, why they act the way they do, and why some people fight forcefully against certain ideas and beliefs and hold on dearly to some others. Talking about morality, in a sense, makes us all more moral because it teaches us why we are the way we are and how we can improve upon that. Morality is not measured in absolute truths, but fractions of different pieces from different places that make up the whole pie we have come to know as humanity. Since everyone seems to think being rich is the end-all be-all goal for happiness, I'm here to help you out. Let's figure out what it is about being rich that is so attractive and see if we can create a road map to getting you there.

You're not going to wake up Elon. You're not going to wake up Warren Buffett. The next richest person in the world won't get there by making a social media platform. Aren't Mark Zuckerberg? The reason these men got to where they are today is because they took a path that no one else ventured down. They made really stupid decisions that led to better decisions that led to them being at the pinnacle of society, like creating a hot-or-not for girls at their college or just dropping out of college.

I wish everyone in the world for financial, physical, and mental health, but just know that only one of these can you be rich in while still feeling completely miserable. I hope that everyone reaches their goals of being rich just so you can finally see that you missed all the important things along the way. Anyway, here's how to get rich. If you're so smart, why aren't you happy? Why can't you make yourself happy? Is it the money?

Like really, how much would it take for you to be truly happy? Enough to pay rent? Enough to go on your vacations? And live life on your own terms? Money won't make you completely happy, but it'll take away many, many things that can make you unhappy for many. Alright, yeah, this is probably going to help you out. But for the rest, it won't, and you'll be even more confused than you were before. You'll fall deeper into a hole that is getting deeper faster than you can climb.

What happens when you solve all the problems that money caused and are still left over with unsolved issues? Then what? Then you hyper-focus on these problems, trying to find the roots of them, and you still don't know where it stemmed from. All the money you earned and all the riches you feel so entitled to aren't helping, and you're lost. What do you do then?

Your therapist doesn't help you. The pills don't help. The money doesn't help. Then what? For so many people, people that I'm surrounded by, some very talented people who are some of the smartest people I've ever met, they struggle with the very thing that embodies who they are, that knows of its own existence— their own brain. You're absolutely nothing without two things: physical well-being and mental well-being. These will beat you down to your hands and knees until you have nothing left.

There's a lot that people want, and it seems like these two are always the last on the list. These two go hand in hand. Money is just a supplement to both. I think that that struggle stems from a lack of purpose, and I'm not talking about everyone that's like “find your purpose.” Okay, obviously, if it was that easy, this wouldn't be an issue. It's not a long-term thing; it's a day-to-day issue. What's the purpose of getting out of bed? What's my purpose today? Day in and day out, it's the same thing over and over and over again.

A mundane, static life will slowly drive you into insanity. Becoming rich has its downsides, many of which you won't find until you venture down that path. Having to put the entire business, company, even the world on your back can take a toll on you physically, mentally, and fiscally. I don't know what you like. I don't know what you're good at. I don't know what you think the world needs or how you're going to improve it. But the one thing that I can tell you for certain is that you're going to need to make it big is mental clarity.

Slipping into mediocrity and sort of blending in with the rest of the world is terrifying. Failure is scary, and I've never wanted to avoid something so much in my entire life. That's where money comes in. It's a status symbol. You have money; you have everything else, right? It shows you're doing something and you're not a complete failure, so you have to be doing good, right? At least that's what it looks like from the outside, and maybe that's what everyone's chasing.

You know, maybe it really is the glamour. The 61 jet skis I just bought, these few bottles I just opened. Alright, I get it—it's fun, it's cool. But after that, you still feel unsatisfied. It'll change from day to day. Maybe you're unsatisfied with your relationships or friendships or business partners, or maybe you're unsatisfied with the fact that your interior decorator painted the walls cream instead of white. Okay, it could be anything. You're still going to be unsatisfied.

You're going to be unsatisfied with something. The people who can make it far, who will make the amount of money that will elevate them to the rich status, will almost always be unsatisfied with where they're at. It's a very lonely feeling because no one else will truly get your exact situation except for you. It's the most alone you'll ever feel. It's also very comforting knowing that no one else will understand how to get you out of the spot, so it's all on you. At least I find comfort in that.

There are certain character traits of successful people that are a double-edged sword. Not knowing when to quit, persistence, sociopathy, manipulation. You ride a very thin line between an amazing person and an absolute freak, and that's the risk you take. Your entire life is a risk. Everything you do, someone is watching. Everything you say, someone is listening. You mess up, you're the first person to be blamed. The biggest gamble of all is attaching your name to something or someone. Whether or not you come out on top depends on how far you're willing to go.

Becoming rich and successful isn't just a mental battle; it's a mental war. How much can you stomach? How far are you willing to go? How much can you take before it's all too much? Can you put yourself in the right spot at the right time with the right people in the right scenario? It's just a lot to handle. You dive in, not knowing whether or not you're going to come out on top, and it's that fear that drives you into insanity trying to make everything work.

This is why you need to be mentally strong, and that comes with so, so many underlying and linked conditions that are impossible to generalize for the public. Staying mentally tough is a single-player game. There's cheat codes and buffs and potions that will help alleviate some of your issues, but not all of them. You have to hope that you can figure out if it's a game that you can actually win.

I think that's one of the bad things about me. I turn everything into a game. My life is a game of chess. I'm setting things up for weeks, months, years in advance, taking gambles on everything, and kind of just hoping it works out. I've always loved the idea that you could figure things out, succeed, and come out on top in the end. Smart people are good at figuring out the truth, but this can hurt you and will get you into problems. Curious people won't quit until they get an answer that satisfies them. You have a point to prove, and you'll do anything to prove it to yourself.

But you don't recognize how harmful it can be until you get there, until you look back and see how much it took for you to get to where you're at now. Anyone who is rich or successful has at least once questioned their entire existence—why they're doing what they're doing. What's the point of it all? And then they wake up the next day and keep doing what they're doing until something changes.

If it sounds like insanity, it is. You know, many people in the 1% have been publicly ridiculed and shamed for just doing what they think is right. Now, to be fair, most of the hate comes from ignorant and overall just ill-informed people who are just attacking others ad hominem; but regardless, it's still there. It's always about getting rich, rich, rich. What's the quickest way up? How can I get there?

It takes a lot more than what it looks like on the outside. It takes an entire lifetime to blow up overnight. Make sure you read that again. Sure, there are some one-off instances where people just got dumb luck. It happens. But don't get jealous of that. You don't want that to begin with. You kind of have to think backwards if you want to grow beyond measure.

Start big. By that, I mean start working for a large company and work your way downwards. You will have the experience of working with giants, but now have the authority and potential to create something new, something different, something that you felt was missing. Try to find things that are mainly available to the rich and distribute it downwards. It works pretty well. Cars were seen as things for rich people until everyone had one.

Wealth is what you want— the money you make while you sleep. It gives you freedom. Money is just how we transfer wealth. Money isn't going to solve all of your problems; money is going to solve your money problems. Chasing money means you're chasing status, and that's why there's a negative connotation to being rich. Prioritizing status means you're trying to climb a ladder, climb the ranks to the top. And yeah, it seems appealing, but the only way your status goes up is to put someone else's down.

Making enemies is ultimately going to make everything harder. The only status you should care about is your own as an individual. You want to be seen in a good light, but you shouldn't have to beg for it. If people want to respect you, they will. If they don't, their opinions are irrelevant to you. True status should be a positive-sum game, nothing else. If you constantly have to brag about your status, you're a low-status person.

I hate to break it to you, everyone has a moral code. You didn't read it in a book, you didn't learn it in school. You live it. You experience it. Having true status or reputation makes everything else you do so much simpler. You don't have to worry about getting backstabbed. You don't have to worry about looking for work. People will come to you to work with you because you're you. You see, if you get good enough at one thing or a handful of things, you're going to be one of the top people, if not the only person that others will come to when they need help.

They won't have another choice. You are the choice. Your genuine curiosity will form a better career than following whatever is going to make you six figures this year. At the end of the day, though, what even is a career? Is it for money? Is it for your happiness? Is it to give you purpose? What you'll find is that the longer you spend alone, the more time you have with your own thoughts and emotions will lead you to finding the things you really want to do.

Less external influences, more internal thinking. But I'm not saying you need to completely isolate yourself. I'd actually recommend against it. Observing others, spending time with them, finding out what they want, and cross-referencing it with the things you want is one of the best decisions you'll ever make. The world is shifting; it follows trends. Use that to your advantage. Staying local to your environment, to your industry, seeing the things that everyone else dismisses, it's a mindset.

For some reason, it's burned into almost everyone's mind that you need to figure out what you're doing by a certain age, and this is just idiotic. There's millions of jobs in the world, yet we're apparently supposed to pick a career based on studying 10 to 15 subjects by the age of 21. Trying to figure out specifically what you want right away is setting you up for failure. Instead, this might help: find something you enjoy. You don't have to be amazing at it, but just find something that the thought of doesn't make you want to bash your head into a wall, no matter what it is.

If you can put it in front of them, someone else will have an interest in it. You'll find that the nicher the idea, the skill, how much easier things will become. If you can sell it, you're golden. Now, I'm not talking about Billy Mays; I'm not talking ShamWow. But sell it by making it your own thing. Everyone else will follow. It's a lot easier to hop on a trend than it is to create that trend. This is why you'll win. You see, they don't have the steel framework that you built from nothing.

Sure, they might make a building quicker than you, but in the end, you're the one with the skyscraper. I'm not trying to be that guy that's like money isn't everything. I get it. Everyone likes to seem woke and pretend they don't care about money at all. But really, you know you do. You might not care about the money itself, but you care about the things that it brings you. Wealthy people attract more wealth; it's a compounding effect.

If there's one thing you take away from this video, remember compounding interest. I'm not going to sit here and preach it to you like your high school economics teacher did, but hear me out. Not just money, but relationships, trust, wealth, your skills—they all benefit from compound interest. Start early, start now, and long-term you will do well. I promise.

I swear, success isn't as daunting as it seems. It's an internal battle. The only problem is no one wants to start the war to begin with. So please do something today and don't thank me until you're done. If you're watching this right now, chances are you've spent many years of your life feeling misunderstood. Maybe you coped by spending hours online or listening to pop punk alone in your bedroom. You might have wished to run away or for a simple answer that would sort out all the mixed-up feelings in your head.

A young person's life isn't always easy. Many teens suffer from severe anxiety, depression, and suicidal ideation compounded by school stress, relationship drama, and family pressures. Mental illness during youth is intense. Thousands of young people die by suicide every year, but many more teens don't suffer from mental illness. Sure, managing school, interpersonal relationships, and growing responsibilities is challenging, but learning to deal with these struggles and becoming resilient is a part of life.

So why is it that when you scroll on TikTok or Twitter, teens seem so, well, just sad? It's not just the teens; people of all ages repost memes making fun of depression or TikToks of what they ate while suffering from an eating disorder. There are highly aestheticized accounts of suffering, whether earnest or ironic. Some of them make us laugh, while others inspire us to sort of want these things. What's going on here?

No one ever sees physical illness and thinks, "I want that for myself." So why is it different with mental illness? The reality is that your perception of mental health warps how you view your own. And if it's culturally acceptable to joke about or aestheticize mental illness, it might become an alluring, sexy, or desirable condition to have. Do you ever fantasize about being mentally ill despite having no formal diagnosis? It might seem dark to admit it to yourself, but the truth is that you could be romanticizing mental illness without even knowing it.

Let me be clear: the reality is mental illness ruins lives. It's messy and complicated. It strains families, makes it challenging to work, and is way more than a meme or TikTok can portray. So why is it alluring? Learning to flirt with the aesthetics of mental illness? I was particularly drawn to Tumblr posts in my youth because they depicted an idealized version of some dire circumstance. They let me see the pain in the world through rose-colored lenses.

And it's not just social media; it's in film and television as well. Stories that depict mentally ill characters help us reimagine and work through our mental health struggles. Films like "Girl, Interrupted," "Silver Linings Playbook," and "Fight Club" show stories of what it's like living with mental illness and how it affects relationships with family and friends. To someone going through similar struggles, it might be relatable to see parts of your story represented on screen. For others, stories about mental health might offer you a new perspective, start a productive conversation, or open a channel for empathy.

The problem, though, is that aesthetics will always be at the forefront of how we connect to art. Angelina Jolie and Jennifer Lawrence are stunning Hollywood actresses. Tyler Durden of "Fight Club" represents a male ideal that some might strive for. This is how the media makes us romanticize mental illness—by making it more attractive and desirable than it really is. When you glorify mental illness, you convince yourself to believe a situation is better than it is in reality.

Think about the lives of some of the world's most famous artists. Marilyn Monroe is a beautiful movie star and one of the greatest actresses of all time. Her struggles with eating disorders, pill addiction, and depression are a part of her tragically glamorous story. Culturally, her mental illnesses are linked to her iconic status in public memory. Her beauty and her pain are intertwined. As a result, all the parts of her life are romanticized, even the less romantic elements.

And what about Kurt Cobain, the lead singer of the '90s grunge band Nirvana? His music gave voice to a generation as he made art about what it was like living with depression and addiction. His death by suicide in 1994 solidified his icon status in the music world. His death is part of his legacy as an artist, and how he died provides a lens through which we can look at the art he made while he was alive. We see his genius as inseparable from his mental illness.

Vincent van Gogh follows a similar pattern. He spent most of his life painting in obscurity, out of the public eye. Only after his death did the public learn about his mental illness and start associating that with his creativity. Whether it's drunken nights in Paris or the infamous cutting of his ear, the public's understanding of masterpieces such as "Starry Night" and "Sunflowers" is tied to Van Gogh's mental health struggles. It endears people to his story and transforms him into a tragic genius of sorts.

The intersection of mental illness and art is a prime example of romanticization. We look up and admire artists who create work we love. We assume their mental illnesses offer them clairvoyance and the unique ability to create magnificent art. That's why so many young artists believe they must suffer to be like the greats, who subconsciously wish mental illnesses upon themselves in hopes that it would help them create better art.

Today, it's no longer just artists creating masterpieces that paint a pretty picture of mental illness; it's everyone who has a camera and an internet connection. There's this phenomenon called "thinspo," where people suffering from eating disorders post pictures of their starved bodies online along with diets to inspire others to achieve a similar look. In the same vein, people post aestheticized pictures of self-mutilation in an attempt to encourage others to do the same.

All you have to do is scroll through any social media platform to find countless seemingly harmless memes about wanting to die to recognize that deteriorating mental health is a popular topic of conversation among people. Before the Internet, these feelings had no outlet to be aired publicly. They only happened alone or among small groups of friends, if at all. Now, not only do they have an outlet, but they have the distribution to reach millions of people in an instant.

And it begs the question: is the online discourse surrounding mental health productive, or is it distorting the reality of those who struggle daily? The truth is that the romanticization of mental illness is not black or white. It can be destructive, yes, but it also has its benefits. It seems contradictory to reframe suffering and mental anguish as desirable.

It sounds more logical to want a happy life free of anything that could get in the way of the ultimate contentment. Why would you like to invite suffering? Isn't that something you would want to cast away? It makes total sense on paper, but the reality is that suffering is a part of life, whether we want it or not, and spinning it into something noble, exciting, or cool can genuinely help people get through these issues.

This is what romanticization helps with: you convince yourself that you're mysterious, edgy, or aloof instead of socially anxious or depressed. Instead of feeling like an outcast, you become a rebel, championing the fight against the status quo. When you take your pain and turn it into an identity that gives you social credibility, romanticization allows your situation to feel acceptable, loved, or even coveted by mainstream society. You regain a sense of total control and power when you feel powerless.

When you romanticize, the narrative of your life is in your own hands, and you can reframe your suffering however you please. In a moderate and controlled environment, I don't see a massive problem with some light romanticization of mental illness. Even when life feels the worst, there can still be funny, enjoyable, and beautiful moments. And finding joy in those moments amid your struggle or trying to see the situation through a different perspective can help you get through it.

There's been a positive push towards destigmatizing mental illness in recent years. As a culture, we're trying to eradicate the shame historically associated with mental illness, and people are more willing to honestly discuss their struggles and receive treatment when necessary. While this is a positive step forward, the conversation about mental health has become too ordinary. In some ways, it's essential to have open and honest conversations about mental illness, but if, by definition, romanticism misrepresents mental illness, how is honesty possible?

Can true healing happen in a society with some romantic outlook on mental illness? The worst thing about romanticization is when it's done by people who are not mentally ill but wish to be. Those who take on the aesthetic of mental illness without understanding the real pain it actually causes people. Some people make a particular condition the cornerstone of their content and turn symptoms into fun little quirks that their young fans might start to mimic without knowing how damaging it can be in the long run.

Content posted by teenagers in their bedrooms now serves a similar function to the representation on TV and in movies. Only now, viewers can access it on their phone while in bed waiting for the bus or during downtime in class. And the problem is that consuming too much mental health-oriented content can lead to self-diagnosing or identifying with the mental illness that you don't clinically have. It's a form of mimic desire, which our desires mimic from the people or culture around us.

People might feel an average amount of sadness and think they're depressed. Mood swings are explained by bipolar disorder. Neatness and particularity turn into OCD, and difficulty focusing on a specific test becomes an ADHD diagnosis. The genuinely undesirable symptoms are often left out of these fantasies. With severe depression comes suicidal ideation. Bipolar disorder makes it challenging to have a steady job or healthy relationships. Some people with OCD find it hard to leave the house and struggle with crippling anxiety.

The reality of ADHD isn't fun or cute; it often leaves people feeling overwhelmed and overstimulated by even the smallest daily tasks. Think about the countless hours spent in therapy, the prescription drugs, and sometimes hospitalizations some people endure to manage their mental illness. When we romanticize mental illness, we undermine the seriousness of certain mental conditions. The public has become very familiar with mental health vocabulary and symptoms, which on the one hand helps with early diagnosis and encourages people to seek help, but on the other hand, this familiarity has given everyone a false sense of authority about the topic.

People start to diagnose not just themselves but their followers, and labeling and categorizing human behavior might explain why you act the way you do. And that's not satisfying. It takes away the mystery behind your quirks or life struggles. But when it's not done under the supervision of a healthcare provider, it can lead to serious issues. We've learned not to Google our symptoms when we have physical health issues because it just says you have cancer. So why do we do the same when we have mental health issues?

Look at the online discourse and see how blurred the line between mental health and mental illness is. Like physical health, mental health is something everyone must maintain, but just because you struggle with your mental health doesn't mean you're mentally ill. Conflating the two minimizes the suffering someone with a diagnosed mental illness has to go through daily. Romanticizing mental illness is a misrepresentation of the whole story.

It's best to maintain a neutral stance when engaging with that topic. Try being the key word here, because the truth is mental illness will always be complicated and messy. It changes human behavior, and productive conversations do not compartmentalize neatly. Which is why, to an extent, romanticization might be inevitable. It's human nature to spend a situation to be more desirable or attractive and, knowing this, how do we reset our mindset when influenced to maintain some neutral stance when discussing mental health?

Well, first you must give yourself a reality check on what mental illness means and how it affects people. It's not always just manically cleaning the house; it's ugly, gritty, and gets in the way of relationships. It's not cute, quirky, or fun; it genuinely destroys lives. Remind yourself that it's unethical to appropriate the aesthetics of mental illness for this reason: wearing the mask without understanding the pain hidden beneath it.

Recognize that most aspects of people's mental health journey remains private, behind closed doors. You don't know people's struggles, so it's crucial to delve into the nuances and complexities of dealing with mental illnesses and steer clear of an overly romantic outlook. Then and only then can you flirt with romanticism occasionally, instead of using it as a lens through which to interpret mental illness as a whole.

The abstract world of philosophy is interesting, from stoicism to nihilism to absurdism. There are many different schools of thought trying to teach us how to think, act, and tell right from wrong. But have you ever felt that philosophy is sometimes a bit too elaborate, too structural? Since written records began, philosophers have produced mountains of text, but how much of it really connects with us? Some of it does, definitely. "I think, therefore I am" is one of the most beautiful realizations you can have.

It is so concise, yet so beautifully self-evident. On the other hand, how many of us are spending our days thinking about the form of a table or its corresponding tableness? Like Plato. How many of us use Zeno's argument against motion in our daily lives? The Greek philosopher Zeno was teaching in a school in Athens how motion doesn't exist. His argument was that if motion exists, that would mean the universe has a beginning and an end. And if that's the case, motion had to have been created out of nothing, since before the beginning of the universe, there was nothing. But that can't be, since something can't be created out of nothing.

It sounds intelligent and maybe even wise, but upon close inspection, you quickly realize it can't possibly make sense. Because of course, motion exists. You and I have our life experiences to show for that. Humanity's argument may be philosophically interesting and even intellectually stimulating, but a bit silly, if I'm being honest. One of the people who sat in that class in Athens listening to Zeno agrees; like you and me, he felt that arguments like this were so complicated that they missed the rather obvious realities of our lives.

So what did he do to prove that motion existed? He got up and walked out. His name was Diogenes the Cynic, the craziest philosopher of all time. Diogenes was born in the Greek colony of Sinope, which is present-day Turkey, and this was only a glimpse of his eccentricities. He lived from 400 BCE to 323 BCE. Most philosophers of his time were sages, respected by the public and held to a high standard of conduct. Diogenes, on the other hand, would do things that just weren't impolite, but just downright strange and insulting, even by history's standards.

He lived in a giant stoneware wine container, and on most days, would beg for food. He would urinate and defecate in public and spit wherever he pleased. Sometimes, even at people. Because of his behavior, one day a man called him a dog and even threw bones at him as an insult. Diogenes, not one to ever feel insulted, simply walked up to the bones and peed on them. The man who had just called him a dog couldn't believe what just happened. Diogenes wittingly questioned, "Why call me a dog but be surprised when I acted like one?"

Diogenes not only relieved himself in public; he pleased himself sexually wherever and whenever he wanted to, since he believed that what isn't shameful in private shouldn't be shameful in public. Who are we kidding, really, he must have thought? Diogenes believed that philosophers were making life much harder than it needed to be by creating unnecessary rules and regulations that aim to block man's true nature, and people blindly following these rules made it all the worse.

He recognized that these people had no self-mastery and would do as they were told no matter how pointless the task was. Once, he was speaking and noticed that nobody was paying attention to him, so he began making strange noises, which immediately drew people's attention. Diogenes lamented that nonsense draws attention far quicker than wisdom. And if that isn't the state of social media today, I don't know what is.

Like every philosopher, some of what Diogenes preached was controversial. Things like sexual promiscuity and cannibalism cast some doubt about the quality of his philosophy. But it's difficult to draw too many conclusions given how much of his life is still unknown. What we do know is that his way of life was unique. What it begs the question is: What inspired him to be so cynical about life? Why was he called Diogenes the Cynic anyway? It started off from an innocent observation. One day, Diogenes noticed that while the rest of the world was partying and finding ways to celebrate their wealth, rats were having a feast on the crumbs that fell from his plate.

One account notes that by watching a mouse scurrying about, not anxious for a place to sleep, not afraid of the dark, nor pining away for any of the so-called pleasures, he discovered a way to cope with his surroundings. He realized that humans don't need all that much to be happy, and he also noticed that most people had a never-ending pursuit of wealth, which at the end of the day, didn't lead to any substantial happiness.

So he set out on a journey to ridicule the public and to show them just how out of touch their lives had become. Even philosophers, people who were supposed to be the wisest among the masses, had become attached to their fame and material possessions. This is what ultimately led to his criticism of the philosophers of his time and his cynical view of life. Cynicism is the idea that most human beings are fueled by self-interest rather than a deep inclination to be good. It's a concern that most of us can relate to: the fear that most of our relationships are transactional, that the people we call friends and lovers are only with us because of something they can get from us and not because they truly like us.

Did Diogenes believe that all humans were fueled by only self-interest? Well, yes and no. Interestingly, he believed that people are inherently good, but that societal norms and an inability to accept our instincts has led us to our current state of misery. But even though he had a tendency to make fun of societal norms, he wasn't advocating for chaos or disorder. He didn't want to break customs purely for the sake of breaking them; he broke them to prove a point and often at the expense of someone else's prestige.

You might think that Diogenes simply hated life and that this was his way of letting other people know just how miserable he was, but it's not even true, because he was quite fond of life. When asked if life was evil, Diogenes replied, "Not life itself, but living an evil life." He appreciated the simple things in life and was grateful for whatever came his way. Without the boastful show of wealth or extravagant parties of the social elite, he enjoyed the warmth of the sunlight on his skin, the sight of nature, the companionship of a dog. In fact, he claimed to be a king among men, which is ironic to say the least, considering he was basically homeless.

But he didn't make that claim because of the wealth he possessed; he did so because he felt no need to possess such wealth in the first place. He also mocked the remarkable lack of humanity that he experienced in Athens. This led to another stunt of his, where he went to a marketplace in the daytime with a lantern and stopped to say, "I've been looking for a man," because according to him, there was no one human enough in Athens.

Though calling him a dog was meant to be very much an insult, Diogenes, in his own way, interpreted it as a compliment, because a dog lives an unaffected and honest life. A dog eats anything that you give to it, sleeps wherever, and lives free of anxiety—exactly the life Diogenes wanted to live. An underrated part of his philosophy is his idea of self-sufficiency and autonomy. Diogenes doesn't want you to simply recognize that the world is cynical; he wants you to be aware of that fact and eventually be free from it.

It's one thing to lament how transactional today's world is, but it's another thing to act upon it, or at the very least, be prepared for it. Diogenes is said to have stood in front of statues and begged for food. When asked about it, he said he did so to get used to being rejected. Yet another thing we can learn from: whether it's a job that we applied for, missed out on, a school we think we should have gotten into but didn't, or a relationship we always wanted. We've all experienced rejection.

Diogenes doesn't want us to shy away from rejection, but rather accept it as part of life. This is in line with what a lot of us believe today—that one's happiness is his or her sole responsibility, and relying on someone else or something else for it would be a serious mistake. Diogenes went out of his way to manufacture a discomfort by doing things like rolling in the sand on hot summer days to make himself more resilient to life's misery. Well, this example might sound like a little too much, it's essentially the same as people who take cold showers in freezing temperatures when they could have just stayed in bed where it's warm.

Why do this? Why expose yourself to this kind of discomfort? You do it to condition yourself against the misery of the rest of the day. After you experience that level of discomfort, whatever nature sends your way, whether it's the company of a dog or the warmth of sunlight, it'll be the most beautiful and pleasant gift you could imagine. Diogenes seems crazy at first glance, but deep down, his beliefs resonate with us more than we might have thought. Most people have never read elaborate philosophical texts, and maybe it's best that all Diogenes' writings have been lost. All we have left are his examples and his actions to go by.

How he felt alienated by shows of wealth, how he experienced rejection, and how he dealt with insults. Diogenes' teachings and actions were aimed at critiquing conventional values and norms. He also highlighted our growing distance from nature, something that has left society puzzled and depressed. He used humor, paradox, and shocking behavior to provoke thought and challenge our assumptions about what truly matters in life, and his approach was influential in the development of later philosophical schools, particularly the Stoics.

Even in the worst of circumstances, even when Diogenes was held captive and enslaved, he didn't lose himself in despair. Not once did he consider himself less than the people who were buying or selling him. In his own eyes, even slave owners needed masters. Slaves were starved and poorly fed, and while this affected the other enslaved people, Diogenes merely reflected on how odd it was that instead of trying to make him look healthy by feeding him well, his masters were starving him and reducing his value on the market. Regardless, there was no happier man when Diogenes did get to eat a good meal.

Anyone else in this position would have lost all self-esteem, but not Diogenes. When asked about what he was good for by someone who wanted to purchase him, Diogenes simply replied, "Ruling over men." The philosophy of cynicism is closely related to nihilism, or the belief in nothing. Watch this video next to understand the difference.

You wake up in the morning and you go to work. You spend eight hours typing away at your desk on a job you once loved but now kind of just tolerate. Once it's 5:00 PM, you go home, make dinner, and watch TV, only to do it all over again the next day. You play sports or catch up with friends at a local bar on the weekend, and life's good. But you still feel like something is missing. You were excited when you got the job you loved, finding new recipes to cook every evening and catching up with friends on the weekend, which used to be your favorite pastime.

But over time, these things that used to excite you have become stale, mundane, and boring. You think to yourself, if I can just get a big enough raise to buy a new car and go on this extravagant vacation, then I'll be happy. Now imagine you get that well-deserved promotion and a healthy raise, and suddenly you're going on those vacations you want, strutting around, driving a nicer car, and receiving more status and respect in the workplace. Your quality of life has been significantly upgraded, and finally, you feel like you're fulfilling your potential. Fancy restaurants, rubbing elbows with influential people, your life feels new and almost foreign compared to where you came from.

Yet in a year or so, your once brand new Porsche just becomes your daily driver. All the imported sushi starts to taste the same, and while you still frequent white sandy beaches and pristine ski slopes, these places have lost their allure. You've completely changed your life, but you're still in the same position you were before you got the promotion. Those things that used to excite you have become stale, mundane, and boring.

This is hedonic adaptation, the reason why you'll never be happy. Hedonic adaptation is the tendency to return to a base level of happiness, even when undergoing profound periods of positive or negative change. Life is like a treadmill; things are always moving. Children are born, loved ones die, you buy a house, you lose a job. Yet despite all these changes, you stay in relatively the same place, never moving significantly forward or backward.

I think we've all heard the phrase "more money, more problems," and to an extent, this is true. Think about the casualness with which the uber-rich fly private and outsource their domestic labor to a fleet of assistants and personal support workers. While these might seem like luxuries to you and me, they quickly become the norm to someone whose daily life revolves in this sphere. According to hedonic adaptation theory, we adjust to the changes that happen to us quite quickly, incorporating them seamlessly into our everyday life.

And it doesn't matter whether you're rich, poor, healthy, or sick. For the most part, everyone has a relatively stable emotional state. It seems logical to assume that those with more resources are those who lead more adventurous, thrilling lives, should be happier. Likewise, those who are disadvantaged in life should be unhappy. But that's not the case, at least not according to the psychologists David Brickman and Donald Campbell, who popularized the theory of hedonic adaptation.

These researchers studied a group of lottery winners and asked them to assess their happiness levels. They did a similar survey for people who were recently seriously injured. The lottery winners claimed to have a spike of happiness when they initially won, and not surprisingly, the injured people reported a dip in happiness when they were first hurt.

What was surprising, though, is that both groups had comparable baseline happiness levels over time. These findings suggest that dramatic life changes, good or bad, don't significantly improve or diminish your overall happiness level. Life's new reality forces you to establish a routine, and your happiness level adjusts accordingly.

Now, that's not to say that these peaks and valleys don't affect you. Your baseline of happiness can shift upward or down, suggesting that your happiness is somewhat in your control. The more your life improves, the higher your baseline becomes, and big positive life changes like marriage or having children can make your day-to-day brighter. Advancing in your career, committing to volunteer work, or getting a pet can have a similar effect.

The inverse is true for negative experiences; developing a chronic illness, experiencing the death of a loved one, or a divorce can change your life forever, and sometimes for the worse. You can see a distinct separation of your life and a significant difference between before and after the event. Trauma and grief color your once-happy life in shades of gray. Though you're not as happy as you once were, things do even out over time.

You've adapted to your new circumstances and can make it through your day without wallowing in despair. Even though your overall happiness has diminished, hedonic adaptation teaches us that your baseline happiness will never match those extreme highs and lows. Instead, it might increase or decrease incrementally, just barely.

The shifting of your baseline of happiness suggests that, to some degree, your happiness is within your control. While much of your happiness is determined by circumstance, you can make choices that affect your baseline. It requires some self-honesty and evaluation. You must pay close attention to what in life spikes your happiness. Is it when you spend time with family, or when you travel?

The more complicated part is confronting and changing negative patterns that could prevent you from having a higher baseline level of happiness. Maybe you have a toxic friendship, or you're burnt out at work. Everyone's situation is unique, and I know it's not as simple as snapping your fingers and fixing your life.

But you do have some power to raise your happiness levels. You can end bad relationships and work towards changing careers. When stuck on the hedonic treadmill, it can feel like nothing will change, that you're doomed to be running in place forever. And in some ways, that is true. But when you make decisions with your baseline level of happiness in mind, your time on the hedonic treadmill is not such a slog.

Also, just because you're generally happy doesn't mean your life won't feel boring. It's not like people with high baselines of happiness always jump out of bed every morning rejoicing in the thrill of being alive. In fact, the higher your baseline, the more difficult it is to experience those immense periods of happiness.

Peaks of joy aren't so steep when you live a relatively privileged and fulfilled life. An income raise might mean little to you if you're already making lots of money. If you travel a lot, seeing a new city might not seem that exciting. You could be stuck in a cycle in which you're numb to all external stimuli.

It's not a bad problem to have as it's a symptom of a good life, but still, it's surprisingly easy to become bored and unhappy with a perfectly satisfactory life. Melancholy might persist, which leads to persistent pleasure-seeking. And unfortunately, our culture facilitates the constant pursuit of ultimate happiness.

Advertising, social media, and video games flood our brains with dopamine, gluing us to the screens, and our attention is devoted to our devices. Our happiness levels are distorted. While scrolling, we experience a constant peak of synthetic happiness, but when the shopping spree or the Netflix binge is over, we crash back down onto our hedonic treadmill, and our everyday lives start to feel lackluster.

Pleasure-seeking isn't a negative impulse. We can't have an enjoyable life without pleasure. It motivates us, boosts our mood, and allows us to enjoy our lives. But often, the joy readily available to us is like candy, overly sweet and lacking substance. Experiencing substantial pleasure is about exercising control.

You might have a favorite snack or TV show. Dedicating a time and place to indulge makes those sweet things you like about life even more pleasurable. If you had your favorite snack every day, you might come to take it for granted. It becomes part of your routine and incorporates into your baseline happiness level.

This is why rituals and traditions are so important. They're special pockets of time allotted to enjoying and celebrating life. When you feel like you're in a rut, thinking back to how you felt when you had that significant life change is a great way to be more appreciative of your current norm.

Practicing gratitude is another great way to dampen the effects of hedonic adaptation. And it might seem cliché and cringe to some, mainly because gratitude is wedged in with the sometimes problematic categories of self-care and self-help. There's a whole video about the complexities of toxic positivity and self-help, which you can check out after this.

But I think the trick to doing it well is expressing gratitude in a way that works for you. Maybe that's meditation or journaling; it could be cooking yourself a nice meal or watching a sunrise. It can happen in a small moment while on your commute or waiting for the kettle to boil, where you pause and just reflect on how lucky you are to have the life you have.

You can also do a little thought experiment with yourself every once in a while to check in: where were you five years ago? Six months ago? Compare your past self to your current self. How has your life changed for the better? Has anything happened that has made life more challenging by its nature?

Hedonic adaptation blinds us from reflecting on change. We adapt and move on without significantly noticing how we grow and shift throughout life. But when you put yourself past and present in comparison, you can see the patterns. You can feel proud of where you came from and see what you could do better about your current situation.

Comparing your past and present is a really great way to step off of the hedonic treadmill for a moment and assess your life for what it really is. You'll quickly see that regular days lead to profound change over time, and a stagnant, emotionally stable life can still be one in which you flourish. Coming to terms with this allows you to accept your life, despite its mundaneness.

The very normalcy of your life is what makes it livable. Think about how exhausted you would be if you were constantly experiencing the peaks and valleys of human emotion. It's a kind of blessing that nothing happens most days. Hedonic adaptation helps us confront and accept the fleeting nature of life.

Appreciating our adaptability is essential in reassuring us, even when life feels tumultuous. While you might not always feel your absolute happiness, you can build a life where you enjoy living day in and day out. Our lives weren't meant to feel like roller coasters; the traumas of highs and lows are unsustainable.

Maybe life was meant to feel like a slow-moving train, peacefully chugging along in a loop. At this pace, it's easy to appreciate the scenery around you— and where you are in life, even if you're not moving anywhere significant. Hedonic adaptation gives us this gift. Amid melancholy or boredom, it can be challenging to see it as such. But in those quiet moments, indulging in life's mundanity is important.

Find beauty in stagnancy and consistency so that when a peak of happiness comes, you can enjoy it to the fullest extent. Hedonic adaptation teaches us to embrace boredom. But today's society seems to overindulge in overstimulation. Watch this video to find out why that's dangerous.

Sleep is good; death is better. Yet surely never to have been born is best. These lines close a 17th-century poem by German writer Heinrich Heine. The piece is titled "Death, and his brother Sleep" compares these two states, suggesting that we experience a bit of death each time we fall asleep. While sleeping, we glimpse the void and briefly know what it would feel like to no longer exist.

Some might find it unsettling to conceive of sleep as a practice for death, but when your head hits the pillow every night, where do you go exactly? This proximity to our final resting state might be alarming for some. While others might find solace in this brief escape.

Think of a time when you've been horrendously embarrassed or undergone immense stress or grief. When your head hits the pillow, you are free from whatever is bothering you, even if just for a few hours. You get that sense that when you close your eyes, you collapse inward, shrinking so far into yourself that you vanish entirely.

Death, of course, is final, and so it's impossible to know what it would feel like. Yet you can be sure that your problems and your worries won't follow you into the afterlife, if there is any. Under the sweet release of death, you would be free. The thing with death, though, is that a footprint of your life would still be left behind. Loved ones would mourn your loss, embarrassing moments that people would still remember.

But there's a third option that's not temporal, like sleep, and doesn't leave hurt behind like death. If you're watching the video right now, chances are you've flirted with this third option. You've had the desire to not exist. What exactly is this feeling? How does it differ from death? What can it teach us about life?

The desire to not exist is stronger than death. To not exist is to have every trace of yourself and every mark you've left on the world erased. No one would have ever known you. All your achievements and accomplishments vanish, along with their failures. To die would be to still leave behind some memory of who you were; to not exist swipes away everything you are and ever were.

While the implication is intense, the desire is often fleeting, sometimes knee-jerk. It overcomes you in an instant, maybe at a time when life isn't going your way. Perhaps you're going through a breakup, or you've lost a loved one. Or it could be that you've just had one of those days where life piles everything on top of you and you feel like you're being crushed. You see a list of problems before you, and the fantasy of slowly drifting away is more appealing than facing your issues head-on.

Though it's not often discussed, I would bet that most people have wished to not exist at some point. Could this desire serve a purpose in our lives? And why, at times, can it feel so overwhelming? The word "desire" itself describes an intense wish for something one doesn't have. It transcends a mere want and is affiliated with something usually unobtainable.

Think about the desire for fame or fortune, to be well-liked or beautiful. Desires often surpass our daily wants and needs, like food or water. To desire something is, in some ways, to be seduced by it. You see it right before you, yet it's just out of your grasp. The desire to not exist is frustrating because, unlike fame or fortune, that still exists within some realm of possibility, it's impossible to have never lived.

The person watching this video exists. You have existed. Nothing, not even death, can change that. So the desire to not exist can never be fulfilled. It doesn't spring from any coherent logical belief. This desire is often not discussed because of its proximity to suicide and suicidal ideation, but it's very different.

It lacks the concrete outcomes and implications of suicidal ideation. The desire to not exist can never come true, while death by suicide is, unfortunately, obtainable. Although it can never happen, this feeling can still be overwhelming. If you think about it too deeply and too often, it can quickly lead to a terrible mental health state.

If you experience this desire in a way that's becoming overwhelming, you should seek professional help. For most people, though, this feeling of never having been offers a way to cope with the heavy burden of life. It provides temporary relief from whatever you're going through, and helps to decenter you from your experience. By imagining a world without you, you understand how insignificant many of life's problems are.

If the odds shifted by even a minute fraction, you wouldn't be here today, and none of this would matter. So why should it bother you so much? If you find comfort when you imagine your non-existence, I would encourage you to look further