Why are we ashamed of our youthful passions, but stubbornly believe that our today’s addictions will remain with us for life? It’s our distorted perception of time that’s to blame, says psychologist Daniel Gilbert*.
“At every stage of life, we make decisions that affect who we become in the future. But, looking back, we are not always happy with what we once chose. As adults, we are ashamed of tattoos, for which in our youth we were ready to pay a lot of money; we divorce with the same haste with which we once sought marriage; we work for wear and tear, losing what we later try to make up for in adulthood.
As a psychologist, I have long been occupied with the question: why do we so often regret past decisions and actions? I think one of the reasons is a fundamental distortion in our perception of time. The frequency of changes that occur to us decreases with the course of life. Our children change every minute, but our parents keep the same habits and tastes for years. At what point in our life path is the point after which the rate of change decreases? Age of majority? Average age? Old age?
Most of us would answer like this: right now. We are sure that we have already become the people we wanted (or expected) to become, and will remain so for the rest of our lives. I called this phenomenon the illusion of the “end of history”.
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How does this illusion affect the assessment of our current decisions that we will give them in the future? My colleagues and I interviewed several thousand people aged 18 to 68, asking some to imagine how their values and lifestyle would change over the next 10 years, and others to assess the changes that have occurred over the past 10 years*. What results did we get? Most of the respondents strongly overestimated the stability of their habits and attachments.. Those to whom we offered to fantasize about their future were sure that they would have the same friends that they have now, they would go on vacation to the same places and listen to the same music. But those who recalled their past noted significant changes in their tastes and habits.
But here’s the curious thing: when we asked the participants how much they would pay for a ticket to a concert of a band they once loved, they named the amount of 80 dollars. And the ticket for the performance of their current favorites, if it took place in 10 years, they have already estimated at $ 129. This means that we perceive our current choice as more valuable, while past addictions depreciate.. The age of our desires. I think it has to do with our sense of the present as a moment of completion. For most of us, the present is a magical time in which our personality finally finds its integrity. Against its background, the past is seen only as a series of uncertain steps to this point. But the truth is that each of us is in constant development, although we do not realize it. Our current “I” is as fleeting, changeable and unstable as all the previous ones. The only thing that is constant in our lives is change itself. We should remember this.”
* J. Quoidbach, D. T. Gilbert, T. D. Wilson «The End of History Illusion», Science, 2013, vol. 339 (6115).
Daniel Gilbert is a social psychologist, professor at Harvard University, and author of Stumbling on Happiness (Peter, 2008). A recording of the lecture is available at ted.com.