Why does life seem harder for me than everybody else?

Moody Mountaineers! Graham here.

In a burst of new year’s optimism, I just bought a book designed to help me optimise my brain. In How to have a good day, economist Caroline Webb unpacks a few ways that contemporary neuroscience, psychology, and economics can help us feel more productive (and less overwhelmed) in the workplace.

There’s some good stuff in there, but the book also got me thinking about this whole 'better brain' genre.

Sometimes reading these shiny new insights into how our brains work gets you all inspired to try new stuff. But sometimes it just leaves you even more depressed, and thinking 'that would never work for me.'

This issue, we look at one particular staple of this TED-esque, life-hacking set: how your thinking shapes your reality. And we ask, how might this idea make us feel *better* about ourselves, instead of just more aware of our own shortcomings?

Stop me if you've heard this one. Our thoughts shape our reality.

Early in the book, Webb outlines her big idea - and it’s one you’ve probably heard before. Our mood shapes the way we perceive the world.

Webb gives a bunch of examples, including: if you’re in a good mood, a hill will look relatively easy to climb. If you’re in a bad mood, it will look more steep.

Similarly, if you’re in a good mood, you’re more likely to judge people kindly. If you’re in a bad mood, you’re more likely to think they suck.

As Webb puts it, “it really is possible to get up on the wrong side of the bed”.

And it’s not just mood that shapes how we perceive reality. Anything that’s on our mind can change which things our selective attention notices as important. 

If you’re hungry, you’ll see food everywhere. If you just quit smoking, you’ll see people smoking (even if they’re actually just chewing on a pen).

What if you’ve been getting up on the wrong side of the bed for-- I don’t know-- ever?

Or what if you’ve not been getting out of bed at all lately? Chances are, when you look at a hill you’re going to think, ‘that’s a really steep hill’.

And what if you’re *also* in a pickle jar (worrying about something more than you think you should)? Chances are, your perception of reality will also be shaped by that worry. This can be a double whammy.

Let’s say that your pickle jar is some variation on, ‘I’m not good enough, I shouldn’t find life this hard’. Now let’s go back to that hill, which was already looking pretty steep. Any guesses what the little nagging voice says as you watch your friends and colleagues seem to skip up the very same hill no problem while you’re puffing away?.

(We are not going to put words in her mouth, but let’s just say Mean Beyoncé, the mean yet dazzlingly charismatic voice inside us all, would not disappoint.)

It's a vicious cycle!

You feel crappy, so all the hills look steeper.

All the hills look steeper, so life is pretty hard.

Life is hard, so you feel crappy.

(Well that was an uplifting poem. What do we do now then huh?)

The answer may not be a TED talk

The usual advice at this point can make the problem worse. There are a hundred TED talks with advice on how to change how you perceive your reality. But their usefulness can be limited, for exactly the reasons outlined above.

If I watch a TED talk when I’m in a good mood, I’ll see it as useful advice for living. If I watch it when I’m in a bad mood, I may see it as yet another example of how my crappy situation is all my fault.

You already think the mountain looks steep. Then you berate yourself for thinking the mountain looks steep.

The Kind Reality Check

Ok, so maybe you *can’t* easily put yourself in a different mood, but you *can* notice a potential bias in how you’re seeing things. In actual fact, we usually notice that bias all the time, we just tend to notice it in a way that makes us feel even worse.

You see how steep the hill looks, you notice that other people don’t seem to think it’s so steep, and you feel like shit for being so steepness-sensitive.

Instead, can we notice in a kinder way? ‘That hill looks really steep. I wonder if it looks that way because of how I’m feeling?’

And then the crucial step, what we will call The Kind Reality Check.

The Kind Reality Check is not, ‘lighten up, that hill isn’t actually steep at all you weeny’.

The Kind Reality Check is this:

This hill looks steep. Maybe on another day it will look less steep. And yet, today it still looks really damn steep.

Maybe on another day it will *feel* less steep, and yet, today it still *feels* really damn steep.

Maybe on another day it will *be* less steep. But today, it is really damn steep.

If i climb it today, I will still have climbed a really damn steep hill. Even if I’m the only one around me who climbed *that* hill, even if everyone else had the degree of difficulty dialed right down, I’ve done something that took a whole lot of effort.

And if I don’t climb the hill today, that makes sense too. Because it’s a really damn steep hill, and maybe I’ll climb it another day, when it’s easier.

If feelings shape our reality, then when life feels hard, it *is* hard

This is the central kindness of the Kind Reality Check. Yes, our perception of reality is changeable. Yes that hill can be a mountain one day and a molehill the next.

But instead of using this as yet another stick to hit ourselves with (‘just climb already, it’s only steep in your mind’) we can take a kinder view.

Look at this way: if our feelings shape our reality, then when life feels hard, it *is* hard. That’s true whether you’re pushing yourself to climb anyway, or taking a hard-earned break in bed for a few days, weeks, or months.

And equally true: the hill won’t always be this steep, life won’t always be this hard. But of course when life is hard you probably won’t believe that. (See: vicious cycle.) So on the days you are attempting the climb, maybe pack an extra feelings-nutrition bar (or maybe just some tender self-pats) for braving the mountain even when it feels like the climb will never end.

That my friends, is some hardcore feelings-bouldering. For which you can justifiably be as smug as Teddy here (my Gran's dog) after he successfully convinced Honor that patting him was definitely her idea.