Schwartz: I don't know. I mean, I actually teach in a positive psychology master's program, and I teach basically about how to make good decisions and how to derive satisfaction from good decisions. That's more about my Paradox of Choice book, but the stuff on wisdom is really all about what authentic happiness is, what kind of person you need to be, to be happy when all is said and done at the end of your life. I don't know what whoever said that wants.
Kall: Can you talk just a little bit about how wisdom applies to happiness?
Schwartz: Well, sure. We have good evidence that the two most important determinants of people's well being are meaningful work and close relations to other people. What I believe is the case, is that meaningful work and good social relations both depend on wisdom. You need to be wise in order to figure out how to do your work in a way that serves the people you're working with and for, and you need to be wise in order to know how to manage as a spouse, as a friend, as a parent. There is no formula, there's a right thing to do, often, but it's going to depend on the particular person and the particular situation you're in, and that's what wisdom is about. People who are not wise will not have meaningful work and will not have successful relations with others. Seldman is big about all these strengths that contribute to happiness; my view is that there is one strength that is the master, the dominant strength that all the others depend on, and it's wisdom. If the TED talk were a little bit longer, I would have ended it with a little riff on how being wise not only benefits the people you interact with, but it also benefits you, because it makes for better work and better relations with others, but I didn't have enough time.
Kall: And what else would you have said if you had a little more time?
Schwartz: Well, you're going to have to read my book when I write it.
Kall: Is it in the works?
Schwartz: It is in the works. I should say that all of the stuff on wisdom is the product of collaboration with a colleague of mine named Ken Sharp, who also teaches at Swarthmore. We've been teaching a course on wisdom together for several years and we are now writing a book.
Kall: That sounds like an amazing book. What do you teach at the master's program on positive psychology?
Schwartz: I'm part of... one of the courses that the students take consists of four of us, each coming in for a weekend. I don't know what we have in common, and I don't remember what it's called, so I teach stuff on decision making and happiness. Essentially, I teach the stuff that's in this book of mine, The Paradox of Choice.
Kall: And in terms of happiness, what is your word on decision making?
Schwartz: Well, first of all, it's important to understand that looking for the best is a self-defeating, misery-making strategy; that we should, in general, be looking for good enough, not the best. Good enough could mean you have low standards or very high standards, but it means that you don't need to look at every possibility before you choose; you just need to look at possibilities until you find one that meets your standards. We call people that do this 'satisficers' and the evidence is that people who are satisficers are much more satisfied with the decisions they make than people who are out to find the best. If there's a single lesson that I have to offer people when it comes to making themselves more satisfied with their lives, it is that they know that good enough is almost always good enough.
Kall: How do you get there? How do you get them to...
Schwartz: Well, that... I don't know the answer to that, because people who aren't already doing this obviously feel the need to find the best. What I tell people is that nobody is looking for the best in every area of life. Each of us accepts good enough sometimes, so that means that each of us knows how to do it. The trick is just to do that in more areas of life - a good enough job, a good enough restaurant, a good enough place to go on vacation, a good enough place to go to college. We know how to do it when we're buying postage stamps, where you're not looking for the best postage stamp. Well, we just need to use that decision-making strategy more and give up on this phantom quest for the best.
Kall: And is this a big chunk of your book that you're working on?
Schwartz: No, no, this is a big chunk of the book on The Paradox of Choice.
Kall: And the new book, will it be a chapter or something like that?
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