Well fed, safe, and reproduced, maybe some social life and respect and status, all our genetic drives are satisfied.
Maslow would disagree. And empirically, people who are not satisfied with just being “well fed, safe, and reproduced” always exist—they are not the majority, but they are very very important.
One way to deal with your problem would be to sacrifice safety. Ditch Europe, move to some place with a higher risks and higher rewards, for example.
My impression is that many East Europeans who found themselves in Germany (and Austria, I would expect) grabbed at the welfare blanket too quickly and found themselves in grey mediocrity. Other East Europeans who ended up in places where you have to fight to live well, turned out much better (possibly at the price of some of them crashing and burning).
Yes, there is a minority of people who have an adventurous spirit. Or entrepeneurial. But let’s keep Maslow out of it—that was purely speculation, entirely unevidenced.
I think loyalty is a concept I cannot really explain in a way that is easly understood on LW. Let’s just say that I already have guilt pangs living merely a few hours driving outside the borders of my home country, and especially stronger guilt pangs when we visit family and come back. I feel I belong to a land and people even a few hours driving living outside it makes me feel traitor-ish. This is not so much tribalism but the idea that if you belong to a group of people, and they generally suffer or don’t have it well, it sounds like a fax from fate telling you you are supposed to help them and not run away from their problems. This is 75% irrational but still has an effect on me, also because of social pressure. Besides my chaotic emotions, denying grandparents the right to see their grandkinds every month by moving half a planet away would be more or less objectively cruel. My mother at 60 absolutely nothing going in her life beside that. Just being alone, cleaning the house, watching TV and waiting for our next visit. Seriously, I think people who leave their old parents to twiddle their thumbs all year in boredom and just visit them once a year because they decided living 10K km away is better are not being ethical.
Do I have to? Is this necessary for happiness? And how do people learn to want things? I mean. Your parents raise you like this: you must study or you will be a low status street cleaner. You must dress up nice or your classmates will laugh at you. So it is focused on what you must do in order to avoid negative outcomes. At what point do people normally learn to want also positive outcomes, not just avoiding negative ones? Or my parents are unusual in this regard? I think they themselves did not really want things, just securing a comfortable middle-class existence and raising me was kind of hard enough for them.
I think this is the point I want to make rather strongly. While there are exceptions to everything, people with no pressure (internal or external) on them to do things will generally go soft, flabby, passive, dull, and dumb. And often will start to medicate themselves (alcohol is typical) to keep themselves floating in grey nothingness without anything happening to them.
That’s why retiring (or becoming a housewife) can be dangerous.
Fighting for something you really want will both improve you and make your feel alive.
Or my parents are unusual in this regard?
I think they’re typical, but I also think you don’t want to be typical.
I think you are very right. I also think I totally have no idea how to do it and it seems hard.
Everybody I know fights for things I already have.
Let me think it over and discuss it later. Or if you have some basic ideas, go on. Perhaps, meta-values. Is it possible to have goals if neither your happiness or not that of other people motivates you much, or are these necessary etc.
That’s why retiring (or becoming a housewife) can be dangerous.
This feels weird, because it suggests people who still work are not in a high danger of it. I think it is not the case, only for special kinds of works but just doing office stuff to pay bills i.e. most people does not qualify in this. In other words, once a career reaches a point where diminishing marginal utilities become clear, the next improvement is hard and brings little change, and it becomes routine, I think it happens.
And yes, I see how it is a typical West Euro issue. The whole society is set up for floating in riskless, unchallenging dullness. People usually fix it with hobbies. The average Austrian is an alpine skier at heart and accountant work, not the other way around.
Maslow would disagree. And empirically, people who are not satisfied with just being “well fed, safe, and reproduced” always exist—they are not the majority, but they are very very important.
One way to deal with your problem would be to sacrifice safety. Ditch Europe, move to some place with a higher risks and higher rewards, for example.
My impression is that many East Europeans who found themselves in Germany (and Austria, I would expect) grabbed at the welfare blanket too quickly and found themselves in grey mediocrity. Other East Europeans who ended up in places where you have to fight to live well, turned out much better (possibly at the price of some of them crashing and burning).
Yes, there is a minority of people who have an adventurous spirit. Or entrepeneurial. But let’s keep Maslow out of it—that was purely speculation, entirely unevidenced.
I think loyalty is a concept I cannot really explain in a way that is easly understood on LW. Let’s just say that I already have guilt pangs living merely a few hours driving outside the borders of my home country, and especially stronger guilt pangs when we visit family and come back. I feel I belong to a land and people even a few hours driving living outside it makes me feel traitor-ish. This is not so much tribalism but the idea that if you belong to a group of people, and they generally suffer or don’t have it well, it sounds like a fax from fate telling you you are supposed to help them and not run away from their problems. This is 75% irrational but still has an effect on me, also because of social pressure. Besides my chaotic emotions, denying grandparents the right to see their grandkinds every month by moving half a planet away would be more or less objectively cruel. My mother at 60 absolutely nothing going in her life beside that. Just being alone, cleaning the house, watching TV and waiting for our next visit. Seriously, I think people who leave their old parents to twiddle their thumbs all year in boredom and just visit them once a year because they decided living 10K km away is better are not being ethical.
Hungary is one of those places with higher risks and higher rewards X-/
You sound like you’re entirely lacking in purpose. What do you want?
Do I have to? Is this necessary for happiness? And how do people learn to want things? I mean. Your parents raise you like this: you must study or you will be a low status street cleaner. You must dress up nice or your classmates will laugh at you. So it is focused on what you must do in order to avoid negative outcomes. At what point do people normally learn to want also positive outcomes, not just avoiding negative ones? Or my parents are unusual in this regard? I think they themselves did not really want things, just securing a comfortable middle-class existence and raising me was kind of hard enough for them.
Yes.
I think this is the point I want to make rather strongly. While there are exceptions to everything, people with no pressure (internal or external) on them to do things will generally go soft, flabby, passive, dull, and dumb. And often will start to medicate themselves (alcohol is typical) to keep themselves floating in grey nothingness without anything happening to them.
That’s why retiring (or becoming a housewife) can be dangerous.
Fighting for something you really want will both improve you and make your feel alive.
I think they’re typical, but I also think you don’t want to be typical.
Um, being a housewife can be a lot of work.
The point is not the amount of work, the point is pressure and challenge. But, of course, see also “there are exceptions to everything”.
Well, I suppose that depends on whether the housewife has children.
I think you are very right. I also think I totally have no idea how to do it and it seems hard.
Everybody I know fights for things I already have.
Let me think it over and discuss it later. Or if you have some basic ideas, go on. Perhaps, meta-values. Is it possible to have goals if neither your happiness or not that of other people motivates you much, or are these necessary etc.
This feels weird, because it suggests people who still work are not in a high danger of it. I think it is not the case, only for special kinds of works but just doing office stuff to pay bills i.e. most people does not qualify in this. In other words, once a career reaches a point where diminishing marginal utilities become clear, the next improvement is hard and brings little change, and it becomes routine, I think it happens.
And yes, I see how it is a typical West Euro issue. The whole society is set up for floating in riskless, unchallenging dullness. People usually fix it with hobbies. The average Austrian is an alpine skier at heart and accountant work, not the other way around.