It's all in the mind...

Today, happiness is… well it’s my birthday J Do you like your birthdays? Or do you have another special day in the year that makes you feel different? It seems so obvious that some days might just make you feel happy. But have you ever thought more deeply about what’s really going on? How do you know to feel happy on that day? How do I know to feel happy on my birthday?

For me, it’s about a day that’s just mine, and I choose not to do anything that’s like work. I usually see my children, even though they are now grown up. For some of you, a day away from the children would be more of a treat! Such facts reveal that there are two separate things going on: the external event, and the “feeling” – which is something that we generate inside ourselves. Clearly, the outside event cannot make you happy all by itself; you have to do something on the inside.

That begs that question – how do you know to feel happy? Or unhappy? Or to bring on any other feeling state? Obviously, it’s bound up with what things mean to you, individually. If you had a different meaning, then it would change the internal response that you generate.

Now that is interesting. Because most of us go about trying to change external circumstances to feel better. But how much control do you have over the people and circumstances of your life? What if you learned to change your response to them? Well, it can be done more easily than you realise. The ways and means for internal change are so varied and widely available these days – more so than at any time in our history. Happiness? It’s all in the mind. 

A moving and powerful message

A moving and powerful message in a poem by modern "spoken word" poet Steven Duncan. Listen to this and become drawn in by is simple truths. (Sometimes no picture? The audio will play.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fBQUnHsZPc

Feeling happy versus happiness?

You know when you have felt really good, don’t you? Maybe the thought went through your mind, “I feel really happy?”  Is this the same thing as happiness? Seriously – is feeling happy the same thing as happiness?

Let’s say you got promoted at work, and this led you to feel really happy; you celebrate with friends and put the money down on a new car. Great. You are really happy. Then three weeks later your workload has changed, and you have a lot more “responsibilities” and various less-than-desirable tasks to do. Still happy? Perhaps. After all, you expected the change in your job.

Perhaps like many others, you “fell into” your job years ago, and simply stuck with it. Because, well, you didn’t mind the work, had no better ideas or qualifications, or perhaps it was the family business. It has ups and downs, but you reason that you have no reason to complain; you are reasonably content. Some people might regard this reasonable happiness to be as good as it gets. Freud aimed lower; he urged his patients to accept ordinary unhappiness.

So perhaps we should average out our happiness over time, and optimise that? Actually, happiness research looks at both how often you have had happy feelings in recent weeks, and asks about your average – or general happiness with your life. They are related, but they are not necessarily the same thing. Which measurement makes more sense to you? Which have you been using to rate your life? Do you ever think about this to guide your decisions? Are you happy about that?

Bruce Lipton PhD: You are not a victim of your genes

Bruce Lipton PhD was a medical school professor and specialized in how the cells of our body receive and process information.

What he realised was that cells respond to their environments – and NOT their genes. In other words, they have a kind of fundamental awareness, to which they respond internally. This discovery overturned a long-held conventional view that our genes run the show. He was saying that “genetic determinism”, the idea that your genes govern your health and your personality traits is simply wrong.

He also showed how external influences of electromagnetic fields – energy fields - also influenced the cells, both in bad way as in microwaves and other electromagnetic fields around us, and in a good way as in energy healing techniques.  This totally undermined the whole basis of modern medicine, which says that drugs - which aim to interfere with internal cells processes - are the only way to treat the body. He was instrumental in developing a whole new field of study, now known as epigenetics, which means “control over the genes” by outside influences (including ourselves).

Lipton’s findings when he was at Stanford University have been replicated many times since. In other words he has been proved right.  Almost all of the cells that make up your body are “amoeba-like” – individual organisms that have evolved to specialize and co-operate in a mutual  survival strategy. These cells are self-determining, not governed by their genes, and act in a co-ordinated “swarm” to nurture themselves and to grow.

Humans are a collective of this cell-consciousness, and “so we are not victims of our genes,” to quote Lipton, “but masters of our own fates, able to create lives overflowing with peace, happiness, and love. We can also promote healing of disease. And what’s more, he has left his ivory towers of academia and put his ideas into practice. He is a far happier and successful person now than ever he was before. So we are not talking “New Age” nonsense when we talk of healing and creating happy lives; we are talking basic cellular biology. There’s food for thought.

Listen to him present his ideas in these videos. But be warned, he talks “rapid-fire” like rubber bullets with messages on them! 

Part 1 - watch him present his theories and their important implications for happiness and fulfilment: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLl7X5TkF_Q

Part 2 – what you can actually do in practice to make dramatic changes to your life, fulfilment and happiness: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQuSY-eT02Y

The “101” on motivation

I was talking to this sales guy in DFS the furniture shop, and he was doing his routine on me. They are heavy sellers in there. However, I knew what I wanted, and planned my approach before I went to the shop – and took a friend to make sure that it was two-onto-one in my favour. I was also able to use my NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) experience to unpick his crucial moves, and to keep things going where I wanted.

Anyhow, I got my deal and he got his sale, and we got chatting. He told me how he had been through a tough six months, including a period of depression. Sales targets were tough. He brought up the topic of motivation, and so I gave him my “101” on motivation. I said that I thought there are only three things that go wrong  to do with motivation:

 

1. You set a deliberate goal that you really must have, but….
   the truth is, it’s like homework, or clearing up your room as a kid; you don’t really want to do it, in your heart. So what happens? You set your mind with a “should do it” attitude, and sometimes you do indeed find the motivation to do the things required… but eventually you fall back into your old ways. Maybe you repeat the cycle.
   
   
2. You have an aspiration – a kind of dreamy goal – that you would dearly and wholeheartedly love, but….
   the honest truth is that inside you, you don’t really believe it will ever happen. And the likelihood is, because of your inner, unconscious truth, it is very unlikely ever to happen. So your motivation towards this goal will be there sometimes, but fades away when things get difficult. Perhaps the cycle will repeat.
   
   
3. Nobody ever said you could have what you really want.
   Because it’s selfish, or because life’s hard work, or because you are not one of the gifted ones, or because it’s just a matter of lucky breaks…. Fill in your own reason. So you maybe never set a compelling goal that’s truly meaningful to you personally. In this case, sometimes you find yourself “given” tasks that you like, or “falling into them”, and for these you feel motivated – for a while. At other times, you get tasks that, well, you don’t really care for - the situation rather as in (2) above. Motivation goes up and down. Good days and bad days.

The sales guy told me that they get loads of expensive trainers coming in and teaching motivation. But this was the first time he had got something meaningful and straightforward. Which was nice  - but more importantly, it told me that I was on the right lines, since this guy lived in motivation city.

So here’s the deal: the only solution for sustained motivation is to trust you heart in setting your goals, find ways to overcome inner doubts about your “right” to have them and about your ability to get there. And that’s also a recipe for a happy life that you love. 

How motivation is linked to happiness and loving your life

Success depends on large helpings of motivation, doesn’t it? Motivation is the inner drive to get on and do something. But do you find that your motivation rises and falls? There are the obvious reasons why this might be expected, like being tired, or bored, or having to do tasks that you don’t particularly like. But motivation can even vary on the average, over time. Is there more to it than meets the eye? Well, quite probably.

The most powerful motivation comes about when we set our sights on rewards that are truly meaningful to us; in other words, our hearts are also set on the outcome. Consider a very topical goal that many of us might say “yes” to, such as becoming significantly fitter and healthier. But what proportion of us will find ourselves out jogging, cycling, or down the gym? Or changing our eating patterns? Very few people ever find the inner motivation consistently to do what it takes to exercise regularly or change their eating habits. Even though we might really “want” the goal.

Several studies have demonstrated that motivation is very tough to create “on demand” – meaning that if a task is not tied to a strong inner personal desire, it will be difficult to continue working toward that task for very long. Going back to our previous example of healthy eating, there are cases where people have struggled for a long time to lead a healthy lifestyle, and are then struck with a serious health problem – such as a heart attack, or cancer. Often they suddenly find that they are able to quit smoking, change their exercise habits, and lose weight. Did motivation suddenly get created? In fact no, it did not. They simply now saw their lifestyle habits as tied to something different that was already important to them – survival!

Motivation comes from two places: (a) fear of loss or avoiding life-harming threats, which can be expressed as “away from” motivation, or (b) or desire for gain or life-enhancement, which can be expressed as “towards” motivation. In other words, like whipping a horse into action with a stick versus tempting it forward with a carrot. Both work in certain circumstances, as long as they are deeply meaningful (ask the horse.)  But more importantly, sticks get you moving, and carrots keep you moving. Sir Ken Robinson, who I introduced you too in an earlier article, talks of being in your “element”, to engage your heart. Setting a goal with only your “head” will not be so effective.

There is another major contributor to motivation problems. Imagine yourself being chased by a bully as a kid (a “stick” motivator); once you got away, did you keep running? No, at least not anything like as fast. There’s the core limitation to stick motivators; they collapse at some point. They may repeat, causing motivation cycles of boom and bust, or feast followed by famine. Stick motivators are very common. They may be set consciously, but very often they hide in the depths of the mind, out of awareness. They might take the form of the dread of financial insecurity, or the need to prove oneself, or the push for recognition. In relationships they might be the fear of being alone, or the need to be loved or appreciated. Same problem – boom and bust cycles. What can you do about them? Well, you can begin by asking yourself, honestly, “why do I do what I do? And, why is it important to me?” in connection with any goal you seek. 

"Give people back to themselves" - Sir Ken Robinson

I’ll come straight to the point today – I want to introduce Sir Ken Robinson to you. He’s a scouser who “done good.” Funny, articulate and clever. But mainstream (note the knighthood which he got for his kind of work) – which is what some of us prefer. Not everyone can take the American stuff straight on the chin.

Ken bangs on about how our upbringing – and education in particular – can do the opposite of what it intended, and stunt our development by putting a straight-jacket around us. He bangs on about how if we “turn this the other way … you release resources and give people back to themselves.” It’s about being “in your element.” This is not New Age waffle. He sees this is as the core of discovering how to create a life that you love ALL of. Enjoy his short talks at the links below; there’s a very good chance they will get you thinking (in a good way). And do consider buying his books if you like his stuff.ON-LINE Videos:

1. "Schools kill creativity"
2. "Bring on the learning revolution!"
3. "How to escape education's death valley"
Books by Ken:

The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything
Finding Your Element: How to Discover Your Talents and Passions and Transform Your Life
[Also: "Outof Our Minds: Learning to be Creative"]

Too busy to be happy? I’ll be happy when ….

I have written before about that research supports the idea that some people are just naturally happier than others (Diener et al., 1999). It is also found that happier people tend to react more positively to life’s ups and downs. But even more significant, that the more sanguine, sceptical rational types amongst us would do well to take note of, is that happier people tend to act in ways that increase their chances of achieving even more rewarding outcomes. 
In other words, happy people make successful lives, and not the other way around. That means, if your general philosophy on life is that you set about achieving things, because that is more important than happiness, then your approach is flawed. Because happy people make more success.
By the same token, if your general “plan” follows the logic of “I’ll be happy when I have achieved [some goal or objective]” then your plan is flawed. On balance, achievements don’t produce happiness  - rather, happiness produces success.  Happy people make happy lives. 

Personal happiness?

In my first article, I talked about “kinds” of happiness, or happiness for some reason – good or bad, and even being happy for no reason.  Whatever your views on this, there is certainly more to it than meets the eye. Let’s talk about good or bad reasons for happiness for a moment. What does it mean, “good” or “bad”? According to whom? According to what? Well, it might seem natural to suggest that the individual is the relevant “judge”, do you think?  That raises questions however… I mean, for example, if the neighbours are happy blasting out their music, or some kids have great fun driving their off-road motorbikes all over the common and churning it up, what then? 

Should we take account of others? Some might say that we should. In which case, let’s take another, more tricky, example; what if a certain entrepreneur successfully created the largest book-selling business in the country, and it made him very happy. Rightfully so? What if, in so doing, his business put thousands of small booksellers out of business, making them very unhappy? Whose happiness counts more? Does it matter then?

Perhaps some of you might look to the larger scale, and explore whether someone’s source of happiness contributed to the UK economy, or service to the public. That’s an interesting idea isn’t it - the idea that happiness may be involved in the good of society? Could we extend that to the whole country, or Europe, or the whole planet?  

Money makes you happier? It depends what you mean by happy....

In my last post I wrote about how happiness (or unhappiness)  tends to “wear off” over time, as we adapt or become accustomed to whatever made us happy (or unhappy).  This phenomenon has been called the “hedonic treadmill,” since the implication is that no matter how hard we work, we will arrive back exactly where we started. Richard Easterlin first reported signs of this phenomenon in research surveys of happiness, so triggering a controversy that still runs and runs.  

As you might expect, research seems to support the notion that there are certain basic needs to be met which do have a big impact on happiness; things like food, physical safety and comfort for example. In monetary terms in the Western world, this is somewhere around the equivalent of US$10,000 (See Diener & Seligman, “Beyond Money” APA, 2004, http://internal.psychology.illinois.edu/~ediener/Documents/Diener-Seligman_2004.pdf). But beyond that basic level the rise in reported happiness measured as a feeling (psychologists call this “positive affect”) with increasing income is relatively weak. 

However, there are more things to consider in all of this than meets the eye. It especially matters what you choose to measure as “happiness.” Happiness as a feeling might be surveyed by asking people how happy do they feel, today, yesterday, and “in general” and to rate it on a scale on a scale of 1 to 6. On the other hand, if you ask people to rate their “satisfaction with life,” then a slightly different picture emerges. 

Afghans, for example, were happier than the world average as measured by the happiness question, but scored much lower than the world average when they were asked about how satisfied they are with life, and lower still when asked how it compared to “the best possible life”. Whilst surprisingly cheerful, it is not unexpected that Afghans know that life is better elsewhere. (Graham, 2010, “More on the Easterlin Paradox: A Response to Wolfers” http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/up-front/posts/2010/12/15-happiness-easterlin-graham) 

So, as far as I have understood it, the latest conclusions are that in fact the more your earn the more satisfied you may be - which is a kind of “mental” evaluation - but it is far less clear that you'll feel much happier. You pays your money and takes your choice?