The Importance of Do Do

Last week I wrote about the reverse K, about striking out with the bat on your shoulder. That is to say, I wrote about the pathetic nature of inaction. And it got me to thinking about Dan Gilbert.

Who is Dan Gilbert? Very simply, he's the real deal. You may, or may not, have heard of Mr. Gilbert. He's a professor of psychology at Harvard University. Even if you haven't heard of Dan, chances are you have seen him. The Prudential company recently used Gilbert in their television ads.

Have you seen the TV commercial that asks people how old is the oldest person they have ever known? The commercial was shot in Austin, Texas and they asked people to help them construct a graph. They gave people a blue dot and asked them to stick it on a wall to visually illustrate how far people are living past the official age of retirement.

The host of the advertisement is a bald guy with glasses and a goatee. That guy is Dan Gilbert. Several years ago Dan wrote a fantastic book titled Stumbling on Happiness. If you haven't already read it, I can't recommend the book highly enough. Over time, I'm sure I will talk about various items from the book. One of the things Gilbert talks about is how humans have something he calls a, “Psychological immune system.”

I won't get into it too much, right now, other than to quote Gilbert who says the psychological immune system, “Defends the mind against unhappiness in much the same way that the physical immune system defends the body against illness.” Think of the story of a young man who crashes his motorcycle and becomes a paraplegic. When asked, the young man will tell you he is much happier today than he was when he could walk. Kind of odd, right?

How could that be? Well, the psychological immune system kicked in, that's how. You see, prior to the accident this young man was simply stumbling through life without much direction or sense of purpose. Today he coaches newly paralyzed people to help them adjust to life in a wheelchair. Instead of dwelling on the loss of the his legs, he is now focused on the good he can do for the world. With the help of his psychological immune system, this man's life now has meaning, purpose, and joy.

I say all that to simply set the stage. What I really want to talk about is regret. And what I have to say ties directly in to last week's post. If you haven't read it already, here's a link: Opening Day

Back in 1995 two Cornell psychologists wrote a great paper titled The Experience of Regret. What we know, pretty much beyond all doubt, is that people regret the things they don't do much more than the things they do do.

Please allow me to quote from Stumbling on Happiness, “Consider this scenario. You own shares in Company A. During the past year you considered switching to stock in Company B but decided against it. You now find that you would have been better off by $1,200 if you had switched to the stock of Company B. You also owned shares in Company C. During the past year you switched to stock in Company D. You now find out that you'd have been better off by $1,200 if you kept your stock in Company C. Which error causes you more regret? Studies show that about nine out of ten people expect to feel more regret when they foolishly switch stocks than when they foolishly fail to switch stocks, because most people think they will regret foolish actions more than foolish inactions. But studies also show that nine out of ten people are wrong. Indeed, in the long run, people of every age and in every walk of life seem to regret not having done things much more than they regret things they did, which is why the most popular regrets include not going to college, not grasping profitable business opportunities, and not spending enough time with family and friends.

“But why do people regret inactions more than actions? One reason is that the psychological immune system has a more difficult time manufacturing positive and credible views of inactions than of actions. When our action causes us to accept a marriage proposal from someone who later becomes an axe murderer, we can console ourselves by thinking of all the things we learned from the experience (“Collecting hatchets is not a healthy hobby”). But when our inaction causes us to reject a marriage proposal from someone who later becomes a movie star, who can't console ourselves by thinking of all the things we learned from the experience because … well, there wasn't one. The irony is all too clear: Because we do not realize that our psychological immune system can rationalize an excess of courage more easily than an excess of cowardice, we hedge our bets when we should blunder forward.”

To paraphrase Mr. Gilbert we are better off with an excess of courage than we are with an excess of cowardice. As the professor recommends, "We should blunder forward." This is such a critically important idea to internalize and master. Because I'm a big fan of baseball, I like to visualize the symbol that is the backwards K. But maybe you'd prefer to think about Gilbert's much more humorous example of failing to pull the trigger on a future movie star. Or maybe you have your own example. However you choose to think about it, it's extremely wise to remember that in life we regret the things we don't do much more than the things we do do.