take for granted

L31mr0d

Why is that humans, so quickly, take everything for granted? I mean we seem to lose perspective on the reality of our existence and that of the countless others in this world around us?

I frequently find it odd how we don't have the ability to envision a billion of anything (picture 1 billion apples, go on try it) yet we treat everything about our existence in infinites. You only have to look at how we consume and waste or how we view our life and death to see this. People put their waste in the bin and then it gets picked up and taken away and we imagine it just no longer exists, but it does. All the waste you have ever created in your life is still on this planet somewhere, imagine if you could see, smell and touch it all right now. We seem to lose perspective on something if we lose the ability to interact with it directly via one of our 5 senses.

I mean, people will see a disaster on the TV, hear the screams for help and empathise and try to help, but shortly after the news stops covering it people will stop caring. The results of the problem haven't disappeared, we just can no longer interact with it via our 5 senses.

Why is it that humans can so easily take their existence and aspects of it for granted and find it so difficult to always have perspective?

Evilsbane

Look at it this way: how hard do you have to concentrate to walk? You do it effortlessly, without thinking, right? If you had to concentrate on everything you did, you wouldn't get a whole lot done. You wouldn't be able to walk and talk at the same time.

People take things for granted because no-one can devote their time and energy to every problem in the world: there aren't enough hours in the day to fully consider every facet of existence. Subconsciously, you know what is and isn't practical for you. You know that you can't just quit your job and travel to South-East Asia for a few weeks to help the victims of a tsunami. So when you see the disaster on TV, your subconscious mind makes a split-second decision: that this is one of those things that you will leave it to someone else who is closer to help those people and who is in a better position to do something without ruining their own lives (like a twenty-something who's already thinking of going to Thailand on a working holiday, who has no kids dependant on them and therefore has no financial responsibilites). Another day, when you walk down the street and witness a car accident, you may run over and pull a victim out of the burning wreckage. Even if you don't travel to help with that tsunami, if you go to work one day and see a person with a bucket collecting for aid for that tsunami, you'll think 'I can do that' and give €5. It's all about knowing how much you can give of yourself, because you only have so much to give and you have to take care of yourself, too (otherwise you'll help some people initially but you'll end up homeless and then someone will have to give you charity).

The best thing a person can do is work really hard, save up a lot of surplus money, and then they'll be in a position to give a lot. But you can't work TOO hard either because you have your physical and mental health to think of too.

L31mr0d

sorry if that sounded kinda preachy as it wasn't meant that way. I'm really more interested in the why though. I mean you don't have to actively spend more time to appreciate your situation in life. To appreciate you have running water, a relatively safe living environment, money in the bank... etc. But more often than not these are all taken for granted, as being constants.

I mean I'm acutely aware of how lucky my situation in life is. I always think, regardless, that it "could always be worse". But when I say this to people and try to get them to picture the lives of fellow human beings that are going through much worse circumstances the reply is usually "I know that, but that still doesn't change or help MY problem".

I mean what is it about the human mind that makes us not appreciate things while we have them and then not have the correct perspective when we lose them.

thatsa spicy

This is something that I often have trouble with getting my head around; how people in the first world can, on one level, be aware of the plight of their fellow human beings but on another level constantly assume that they will never, and could never, be in an equivalent position.

We look at 250,000 people being killed in a tsunami and see the pictures of the dead but still our brains arn't able to concieve of what a tragedy it is; is this directly a result of there not being a sufficient amount of the appropriate neurotransmitter in our brains, or something?

Also, people from rich countries complain about trivial things (myself included in this!) that wouldnt even register with those who have never got enough to eat.

That sometimes I'm literally unable to appreciate how good I and everyone in my country has it, when I feel like I should be able to feel grateful, frustrates me and seems so illogical.

Also, mods please dont lock this for being a semi-zombie thread!!

Tim Robbins

thatsa spicy wrote: »

This is something that I often have trouble with getting my head around; how people in the first world can, on one level, be aware of the plight of their fellow human beings but on another level constantly assume that they will never, and could never, be in an equivalent position.

We look at 250,000 people being killed in a tsunami and see the pictures of the dead but still our brains arn't able to concieve of what a tragedy it is; is this directly a result of there not being a sufficient amount of the appropriate neurotransmitter in our brains, or something?

Also, people from rich countries complain about trivial things (myself included in this!) that wouldnt even register with those who have never got enough to eat.

That sometimes I'm literally unable to appreciate how good I and everyone in my country has it, when I feel like I should be able to feel grateful, frustrates me and seems so illogical.

Also, mods please dont lock this for being a semi-zombie thread!!

But if you absorbed every single misery in it's full gravity you'd crack up. Try reading the Murphy or Ryan report.

Evolution explains the most of why we are the way we are. There is no evolution benefit to thinking about how lucky you are. You are not going to live any longer or breed anymore.