The 85% Rule for Happiness

My "85% Rule" of Happiness:

1. Take anything in your life (house, job, relationship etc.)

2. Imagine how it would be if it was 100% perfect (so perfect that you would not change anything).

3. If the one you currently have feels around 85% of what it could be, you're done. Just be happy.

The remaining 15% is always a lie.

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I found that this rule works well as a gauge to calibrate expectations. I suspect that, maybe as a side effect of consumerism and advertisement, or maybe just because apes are very good at comparing themselves to peers, humans are very good at imagining how things could be better. My house is too old, my car makes rattling noises on the highway, my partner is a bit too grumpy, my cat is too chubby etc.

I learned that all these intrusive thoughts are completely irrelevant to the ultimate goals of joy, peace and fulfilment. If anything, these kind of complaints point totally in the wrong direction. Life is actually amazing, and as soon as you cover “the basics”, every incremental addition has diminishing returns in terms of joy and requires exponentially more time and effort.

So, if you find yourself a bit unsatisfied with something in life, think about the 85% rule, and you’ll gradually retrain yourself into loving what you have and just be happy about it. Enjoy the basics.

Take for example my house: it’s not too small and has a garden, but it’s not really in a prime location and honestly it’s pretty badly built and the design is old. But it feels like home, and I’d reckon it feels like it’s 85% of what a perfect home would be. So now I know that I’m done. I should be really happy about my home. To find a better home I’d probably have to spend months/years looking for a replacement, it would be way more expensive, and it’s very unlikely I will actually find something that has all the good sides of my current home + solutions to all my imaginary complaints.

So, cover the basics, ignore the rest. Then learn to just sit and be happy.