Comparison

What makes people feel happier? My answer is comparison. When people are comparing the present with the past and comparing themselves with others, if they find they are better, they are highly likely to be happier. If my belief is true, then people living in a imaginary ideal society where everyone is equal and the living standards are good and stable may not be happy because they do not feel they are better than the past or others, so this ideal society may not be ideal.

Comparison is an important motivation for the society to develop. When people are comparing themselves with the past or others, they are trying to make themselves better than others or their past; when everyone in the society is doing the same, the society is pushed to move forward. However, this does not make we should make the differences within the society wider. A too wide gap may make people feel hopeless; when they making comparisons, they find the gaps become wider and wider, they will certainly feel unhappy. Such unhappiness in the beginning may make people work harder, but if they find they are nowhere near to close this gap, the unhappiness will make them pessimistic and loss incentives to work hard.

However, it is difficult to fully manage people's comparison, because people can make comparison from too many angles and aspects. For example, they may live better than the past, but they compare their improving rate with the previous generations and find the rate is much slowers, so they still feel unhappy (or unsatisfied).

Comparison makes people jealous, but comparison may be the foundmental motivation for many of our activities.