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“I know that there’s a huge difference between pleasure and satisfaction. You can get pleasure from drinking a couple of beers. Satisfaction requires much more personal investment. When great violinists are asked to describe the most important factor in improving as violinists, they always agree it’s practice. But they also say practice is the least enjoyable activity they do. Enduring happiness often requires delaying gratification. I can’t say that I felt “happy” during the hours I was struggling to write The Way We’re Working Isn’t Working. What I did feel at the end of each day was deep satisfaction at being able to hang in there, and an enormous sense of accomplishment and joy about the finished product.” “But, he proposed, substantive conversation seemed to hold the key to happiness for two main reasons: both because human beings are driven to find and create meaning in their lives, and because we are social animals who want and need to connect with other people.”
“… our longings and our worries are both to some degree overblown because we have within us the capacity to manufacture the very commodity we are constantly chasing when we choose experience.” (via KM) |
