Would you rather win a silver medal or a bronze?

Studies have been done on the relative happiness of medal winners. Unsurprisingly, gold medal winners are typically the most happy with their achievement - as it doesn’t get any better than that. 

In second place are the bronze medalists.

This is initially counter-intuitive. You would think they should be the least satisfied with their result. 

The difference is explained by their frames of reference. The bronze medalists are happy they made it to the podium. If they finished one place less, there would be no medal around their neck.

Whereas the silver medalists are less satisfied because if they had finished one place higher, they would’ve been wearing glorious gold, not second place silver.

This is a lovely reminder of the power of framing and also our tendency to compare up, not down. We typically spend too much time focused on how far we have to go to scale our mountain, without pausing to look how far we come. But when we do, the view is usually pretty good. 

We then remind ourselves to look back more often, but then get summit fever and forget. To compound this, once we get to that summit we find it is a false one and there is a higher peak to climb - which will turn into another false summit!

If you’re able to get into the habit of comparing down rather than up, it’s easier to find gratitude, and reflect on the fact that you are not doing too bad.

I start with the facts that I have electricity and running water. Everything else is up from there!

This all comes from the simple act of reframing. 

So, take a moment to turn and look back, you quite possibly will enjoy the view and feel a little better for doing it.