The game of life, if you choose to play, is one of status.
For most of us, our daily decisions aren’t life or death. We make very few decisions that will influence or impact our immediate survival in the truest sense of the word. Instead, our decisions are largely focused on optimizing and improving our perceived status in the world.
Ultimately, the exchange of status roles drives human behavior.
There are three core frameworks that most decisions or actions are driven by:
Changing One’s Status
A desire to change one’s status can be seen in some of our most basic everyday decisions: driving a BMW, wearing a ring from Tiffany’s, carrying a Louis Vuitton bag, wearing Lululemon clothing, buying vs. renting a home.
Maintaining One’s Status
The best example of how our desire to maintain our status manifests is social media. Social media is purely an exercise in seeking status confirmation. We go there to check in and scroll through the lives of our “friends.” As we scroll, we are quickly — often subconsciously — making mental comparisons between what we see on our screens and our personal lives. When we feel like our “friends” are having more fun or doing cooler things, we respond by posting our own message or image that shows that we too live an awesome, fun, and exciting life. When they are doing something that we approve of or is something that “people like us” do — we like it. And the cycle continues. The positive feedback loop is strong.
Reinforcing Status
Status is so powerful because people naturally adopt the roles that they are given by society. Consider the Stanford Prison Experiment, in which Dr. Zimbardo found that people will readily conform to the social roles they are expected to play. Guards became derisive and aggressive. Prisoners became submissive and dependent. The roles were assigned at random — yet people inhabited them completely.
A simpler, everyday example: in New York, the average wedding costs $80,000. None of this is something people go out and do when they want to have a good time. It’s done because people like us do things like this. It’s about a momentary affirmation of status within a very small circle of friends and family.
A few questions:
Who and what forces in society dictate what you do? What roles are you playing? What status are you optimizing? Who are you putting down in the process of elevating yourself?
Status roles drive human behavior.
Once you see this, you may not be able to unsee it.