Interpreting Migration

What is more satisfying to humans - things in comparison or in absolute? Many believe that the relative achievements are much more important to us and generate more happiness. Multiple researchers have suggested this e.g. when students at a top b-school were asked what scenario would they prefer to be in - earning $200k while your batch mates make $100k or earning $300k while batch mates make $400k and an overwhelming majority chose the first scenario. This may be surprising to some but this is not the case of a single, selfish or jealous person but seems to be the general behavior of so called rational humans. Moreover, we can see so many examples of this phenomenon at play around us. Does clocking a 10.5 seconds for a 100 meter dash in a winning race of national athletics championship feel more exuberant or clocking 10.0 in Olympics and finish last?

If this is true, then why do people migrate from low earning societies to high earning ones. Leaving aside the case of forced migration due to war, famine or fear for life, here I am referring to voluntary, economic migration with sheer motive of better earning (and lifestyle?). E.g. migration from Bihar to Mumbai or Punjab, from Gujarat to US or Punjab to Canada and Australia. None of these places are at war or suffering from famine and none of these people are running away for their life.

A person living in top 10 percentile of income in their own 'home' is tempted to go to a society where he is most likely to be in the bottom 50%. A better lifestyle? May be. But more satisfaction or happiness? Apparently not. Then what drives such behavior, generation after generation? If getting pulled down in the social income hierarchy does really give unhappiness then why don't people move back to their happier pasts? If inertia is the reason, then why didn't the inertia stop them in the first place from migrating? Aren't we humans such a mysterious creature!

What to do with...

All of us at times think about what would be the best way to get the most out of the available resources xyz. In fact, at other times we make a subconscious decision on xyz based on our value system or past experience where we had made a thoughtful choice. 

Still doesn't sound familiar? Let's define xyz. XYZ is all the resources a person has got - Time, Energy and Money. Most of our actions use a combination of these - be it me writing this article or you reading this article. We obviously had numerous other options to utilize our resources - check facebook, have a walk, watch a movie, go shopping, go earning.. to name a few obvious ones. On what basis do we decide what action is the best for us? How to make the best use of time, energy and money - assuming we have a limited supply of it, although they can be exchanged for each other e.g. time and energy can be exchanged for money (i.e. the work we do for our living). Had these not been limited, we won't be making statements like I wish I had time for myself/ family/ gym etc. or I wish I had money to buy the latest iPhone/ Ferrari or I wish I had enough energy to go for a walk/ read a book after dinner or climb Mt. Everest.

The below picture tries to explain how we struggle for these three throughout our lives.

The question "what's the best utilization" can be divided into 3 parts - what's best for me in short term/ in medium term or in long term. More often than we realize, there exists a trade-off among these three. What sounds like a good choice in short term could be a disastrous one for long-term or vice-a-versa.

Let see what are the likely choices when we prioritize one of these 3 time frames-

1. Short-term happiness: When we spend (time, money and energy) on activities that give us instant happiness. The characteristic being that they have immediate effect but have little long term impact - apart from may be creating a few good memories. A few classic examples can be - watching a Salman Khan movie, binge eating, drinking alcohol, doing drugs, playing online games (candy-crush, counter-strike, anyone?), going on a world-trip/vacation, going out for a lavish dinner/party/concert or even social service or charity (while expecting nothing in return apart from the instant feel-good). None of these activities is expected to "benefit" you in future - the happiness dies the moment you are done with them. In fact, in long term you might even regret making those choices. 

2. Medium-term happiness: When we spend on things with an objective to get happiness over a period of time, though the rate of that happiness may diminish over time and the value of the item too will decrease with time. Examples would include - buying the latest gadgets (smartphone, laptop, gaming console), a new car, a wardrobe makeover. These things will give you happiness over a period of time while you use them (or show them off!) but won't last for long or the happiness resulting from them will go down to negligible - does the 55-inch TV you bought two year ago give you the same happiness it gave when you installed it?

3. Long-term happiness: These are the decisions made while contemplating a distant future, needless to say by compromising on short-term and medium-term happiness - Retirement funds, a house/land which is likely to appreciate in value, activities aimed at making ourselves healthier, fitter or wiser over time (gym, walks, yoga, dieting - if we leave apart the enjoyment part if any).

Type 1 may be labeled as Indulgence/ Enjoyment or Experience, type-2 as Consumption or Things and type-3 as Investment.

While you focus on one, you might lose on the other. In other words - you may want to enjoy today and suffer tomorrow or suffer today with a hope to enjoy tomorrow.

Not surprisingly, most of us don't want to miss on any of the three time frames and strive for a "balance". But is there an ideal mix of the three? Can someone (say, a spiritual guide) find it for us? I don't think so, and on top of that the "optimal mix" is highly dependent on what you "think" is important for "you". Go contemplate, find your optimal mix and make a little more conscious choices in everyday life to align them with your optimal mix. Good luck!

Don't forget to leave your own thoughts below.

3 decades of exploring and still wondering what is it that really matters!

Is something worth pursuing or worth ignoring? We frequently face this question in our lives. It largely depends upon what we value and how much. But why we value some things more than others? Are we right in doing so or we just 'feel' strongly about it?

The other way around, do all the things that we choose to do or pursue, really matter? Some decisions might seem trivial e.g. whether we choose to get up or snooze, whether we choose to follow traffic rule or jump the queue, whether we stand up or continue to take shit when people around us talking non-sense,  whether we celebrate random days as birthdays and festivals or consider them 'just another day'.

In order to know how something matters, one possible way can be to try the available alternatives. For a person like me who seldom celebrated birthdays, it's usually away from any attention or limelight and to ensure that, I used to hide my B'day from social media (fb, orkut and likes), omit the birth date field wherever permitted, and so on. This year I forgot to hide my b'day from fb and realized it only when fb frnds started posting on timeline. I was too late to remove it so I decided not to hide it and see what happens and 'how does it matter' :)

2 days later I have a few numbers: On FB a total of 124 friends (out of 840 in friend list) wished. 5 wished a day in advance, 106 on the exact day and 13 a day late.

I couldn't stop myself from doing simple analytics on these numbers and here are the findings (and inconclusive inferences).

- Though I have around 25% friends in friend list whom I never met (or don’t remember having met them), but among 124 who wished on my wall only 10% are such. So people whom you know outside 'virtual world' are more likely to post?

- I have 21% female friends on fb (as per wolfram alpha facebook analytics) , among wall posters only 15% were female. Does it mean male friends are more likely to post on (my) wall? Really? :(

I was about to pull more statistics (e.g. do married friends post more or singles, do friends in India post more or those abroad et al. But just then came a question "How does it matter?" and I had no choice but to surrender. Ultimately those wishes or posts have no impact on my relationship with those people or for that matter even on cheering up my mood.. Or in other words "it simply doesn't matter!"

So I won't try to analyze any further and thank each one of those 124 for honoring my wall as well as the rest 840-124=716 for promoting cleanliness ;)

Among all these stupid non-sense thoughts and analysis I will keep on wondering "what is it that really matters"