I recently read a article on dentistry and death. They did a study and checked brain chemistry tests. It was quite interesting. The study concluded that it was more positive to be thinking about death. And actuallly quite stressful and negative when thinking about the dentist. I thought that was an interesting result.

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s classic book, Flow, the Psychology of Optimal Experience talks about the experiments with beepers, checking to see what people are doing when they’re the happiest. It’s when they’re actively involved in something, of course. I figured that out for myself when we were living in Europe. I planned our weekend and holiday trips as well as our two-month trip coming back the long way. It was clear to me then that doing the planning was more challenging and fun than sightseeing.

rummuser and Diane,
When my daughter was little it was a bit different. I enjoyed hanging out with her and learning about child psychology, knowing that it was the most important work of my life. I did balance it with other projects that didn’t take all of my time and attention but that used some of my other talents.

“Imagine a long, terrible dental procedure. You are
rigid in the chair, hands clenched, soaked with
sweat–and then the dentist leans over and
says, ‘We’re done
now. You can go home. But if you want, I’d be happy to
top you off with a few minutes of mild pain.’

“There is a good argument for saying ‘Yes. Please
do.’

“The psychologist and recent Nobel laureate Daniel
Kahneman conducted a series of studies on the
memory of painful events, such as colonoscopies. He
discovered that when we think back on these events,
we are influenced by the intensity of the endings, and
so we have a more positive memory of an experience
that ends with mild pain than of one that ends with
extreme pain, even if the mild pain is added to the
same amount of extreme pain. At the moment the
dentist makes you his offer, you would, of course,
want to say no–but later on, you would be better off if
you had said yes, because your overall memory of the
event wouldn’t be as unpleasant.

“Such contradictions arise all the time. If you ask
people which makes them happier, work or vacation,
they will remind you that they work for money and
spend the money on vacations. But if you give them a
beeper that goes off at random times, and ask them to
record their activity and mood each time they hear a
beep, you’ll likely find that they are happier at work.
Work is often engaging and social; vacations are often
boring and stressful. Similarly, if you ask people about
their greatest happiness in life, more than a third
mention their children or grandchildren, but when they
use a diary to record their happiness, it turns out that
taking care of the kids is a downer–parenting ranks
just a bit higher than housework, and falls below sex,
socializing with friends, watching TV, praying, eating,
and cooking.”

Paul Bloom, “First Person Plural,”

rummusers last blog post..Realities Of The Past.

Jackie,
Let me know how Possibility Lists work for you. I love them.