The happiest race in the world has taught me

living in the present moment is the only way to what makes you happy.

There was a time I was in a very bad state.

At the dinner table, the mind wanders and a meal is finished with no memory of the food as if it had never been tasted.

Being in a relationship, but always haunted by the fear of “breaking up”, never really enjoying every moment together.

For example, when participating in a competition, all I thought about was “not to lose”.

In this state, I didn’t seem to be connecting with the reality of the problem, but rather wandering around in anxiety, as if the only way to move on was to resolve those worries.

However, these “worries” are endless.

It wasn’t until later that I read a story about the Pirahã tribe.

The happiest race in the world

The Pirahã are a primitive tribe living in the Amazon rainforest. To this day, they continue to hunt and fish in the jungle, maintaining a lifestyle similar to that of primitive times.

The psychologists discover that the Pirahã are the people who feel the happiest in the world.

In reality, however, life for the Pirahã was full of stress.

They are attacked by venomous reptiles or insects, worry about contracting untreatable infectious diseases, and are often subjected to violence by invading foreigners.

How do the Pirahã manage to live in such conditions with a level of happiness that is rare in the developed world ?

Living in the present moment

In explaining the causes of this phenomenon, psychologists emphasize the concept of living in the present moment.

It refers to a state of mind that is not concerned with facts that are divorced from one’s own experience, and is simply the attitude of accepting things as they are.

One piece of evidence for this view is the tendency of Pirahã people to talk only about things they have actually seen and heard.

Caught a fish, went boating, laughed with the kids, friend died of malaria …

The topics they talk about are all based on reality, with little to no fiction.

The questions “I wish I had more money” or “I wish I had done things differently” do not come up.

In other words, there is no past or future in the conversation of the Pirahans.

Because of this, they don’t worry about tomorrow or feel remorse for past failures; they simply enjoy the present moment.

The Pirahans differ from us in that their culture does not tend to explore things that are not well founded.

For example, even if thoughts such as “What if I am attacked by a beast while hunting” or “Will I starve if I don’t find my prey?” come to mind, they do not think further about it, and therefore don’t let their anxiety linger.

Further, even if they were injured in the course of hunting, they would not complain, “Why did I end up like this?” or worry, “Am I going to die from the pain?”.

When they are injured, all they do is accept the fact that “I am feeling pain because of my injury” and get as much treatment as they can.

No matter how much they curse their fate, the problem will never be solved, so they decisively submit to the reality of the pain and do what they have to do.

Thus, the Pirahã people call themselves “simple people” and the outsiders “thinking heads”. For them, who never make up unnecessary plots, such a name is indeed in line with reality.

Learn from the Pirahans and become happy

When we are overly anxious and constantly presuppose all sorts of bad endings, such as losing our jobs and not succeeding, we are not actually facing the reality of our lives and cannot really live in the present.

And learning to live in the present moment in Pirahã means transforming fears of the future into concrete problems in front of us, and focusing on current feelings, versus actions.

For example, enjoying every meal without worrying about the future.

enjoying every appointment without obsessing about the outcome.

At this point, anxiety becomes concrete, imagination becomes real, and the unknown becomes part of the moment.

“Living in the present moment” is a pursuit, a kind of self-awareness, when we find ourselves deviating from reality, we can return in time, return to the problem at hand, return to the real world, and take action to solve the problem.

And this is the only way to find happiness.