Redefining the theory of happiness through neuroscience and dimensional theory

I want to be happy. Many people wish for that.

But for some reason, I can't be happy. I get used to what I should have, and then look for the next thing. This isn't a matter of personality. It's just that the very structure of the phenomenon of happiness is designed that way. This time, we're talking about how happiness is not a substance, but merely a rate of change.

The true nature of happiness is “brain secretions” and “rate of change.”

When people feel "happiness," three substances are active in their brains. Oxytocin - the love hormone. Secreted through relationships, companionship, family, trust, and compassion. Serotonin - the stability hormone. Regulated by sunbathing, meditation, nature, and deep breathing. Dopamine - the pleasure hormone. Released through rewards, achieving goals, anticipation, and addiction.

These three personal balances shape a person's sense of happiness. They change with age, experience, and season. Absolute happiness does not exist anywhere. And the decisive point is that all of them work strongly "when they change." The same stimulus becomes familiar if it continues. No matter how delicious the food is, it doesn't create a sense of happiness when you're full. Marriage, promotion, and an increase in annual income all create a surge of happiness at the moment of the initial jump, and after that, it becomes an everyday thing. Happiness is the rate of change.

Why Can't People Be Happy? The Dual Structure of Comparison and Brainwashing

Herein lies another trap. Happiness is not born from absolute evaluation, but from relative evaluation. Whether one is happy is not decided solely within oneself, but through comparison with others. In the past, the comparative targets were limited to a few celebrities. Now, through social media, embellished happiness of people in close proximity flows into our field of vision daily.

In addition to this, there's the fact that the very definition of happiness is manufactured by corporate marketing. A better house, a better income, a better job, a better family. Happiness brainwashing traps us with the same structure as GDP brainwashing. Unknowingly, we are made to run according to a framework of happiness defined by someone else. The reason we can't be happy isn't due to our own lack of ability. It's because we're made to run within relative evaluation and brainwashing without knowing the structure of happiness.

Towards Three-Dimensional Happiness—Breaking Free from the Curse of Time

Now, here's the main point. Dopamine-driven happiness is zero-dimensional. Superiority derived from comparing yourself to others is one-dimensional. Fulfillment from evolving beyond your past self is two-dimensional. These are states of being trapped by the demon of the time axis, and you'll never be satisfied.

The goal should be three-dimensional happiness. A sense of experiencing the depth of this moment – space, environment, love, humanity, music, hobbies – it's all part of it. When we move away from the fourth dimension of time and think in three dimensions, happiness in the here and now emerges. It's a perspective that observes the fulfillment of being in this moment, without overly romanticizing the past or despairing of the future. To achieve happiness in a three-dimensional way, we need to expand our inner sense of space. Widen your perspective and take in a broader outline of yourself.

Happiness (a fourth dimension) expands its contours to a field of resonance beyond the self. The way to happiness lies not in acquiring something, but in understanding the structure of happiness and reconstructing oneself as a wider space.

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