#ELI5

Scientists studying things about the human body, often study the same things in animals. Like, they might test a drug on mice, because if they get it wrong, and the mice die ... well that's sad, but it's not as bad as a human dying.

So at one point, pretend they test some drugs that "makes people smarter". They test it on rats first (in case it kills the rat!).

They put normal rats into a maze, with cheese at the end. Then they time how long it takes the rat to get to the cheese.

Then every week they give the rat a little of the "smarter drug". And then they re-test the rat, to see if it found the cheese faster.

Sometimes they put smart AND dumb rats in the same maze at the same time. Now it's a race to the cheese, and maybe the smarter one wins?

Okay so far?

Now imagine what it's like to be that rat. Your entire life, your entire reason for existing, is to navigate the maze, and find the cheese. Did you find an all-expense paid vacation? No. Did you find a truckload of gold? No. You just found ... cheese.

And once you find the cheese ... what then? Well you eat the cheese, and you're happy for a few minutes. And then you go back into your cage, and do the same damn thing again tomorrow, and the next day, AND THE NEXT DAY.

Now you're an office worker.  You work at your desk.  You try and do your job.  You get paid at the end of the week.  You take your paycheck home, buy food, pay rent, buy gasoline .... 

And then you wake up Monday morning and DO IT ALL OVER AGAIN.  For what?  For wealth?  For a life of ease?  No.  You do it for "cheese", for a tiny bit of happiness.  And your entire life is just this repeated daily repetition, over and over, for apparently no big benefit.

**Don't you feel a little like that rat??**

Don't you feel like you're in a "rat race"?