from NewsOK.com
Monday's newspaper had a great article on dealing with stress. Are you dealing with stress in your life? Well, I have some good news and bad news for you. The good news is that stress doesn't exist; at least it's not part of our outer world. Although the outer world can be full of dangers such as traffic accidents, snakebites, tornadoes, etc., stress isn't part of our outer world. The bad news is that stress can and does reside in our inner world. Although you can't touch it, see it, smell it or hear it, it's a silent, invisible enemy that sneaks up on us if we allow it.
If you were born as recently as 150 years ago, you would live and die in pretty much the same outer world. Oh, you might have seen a "new and improved” whale oil for your lamps, or perhaps your buggy whip would be made of better leather. But all in all, your outer world would have seen little change. Compare that life to the outer world we live in today. The iPod you're so proud of will be a dinosaur in just a few years. Buy a new computer, and it's obsolete before you know it. All the new technologies that are meant to make life easier for us have caused stress to creep into our lives; not from the outside, from the inside.
You can't watch TV without seeing a commercial (or worse, an infomercial) about some amazing new gadget that will make your life complete. All your friends and neighbors have it, and you know your life finally will be perfect once you have it, too. Out comes the credit card; up goes your mounting debt; in comes the product. But your life doesn't get any better.
Sound familiar? It's like the story of the guy who drove to a car dealership, walked up to a salesperson and asked, "Aren't you the one who sold me that car a few months ago?” The salesperson said, "Why, yes, I am. Why do you ask?” The man responded, "Would you mind telling me how wonderful the car is again; I'm getting kind of depressed.”
As an avid golfer, I see firsthand all the "new and improved” balls, clubs, you-name-it things that will help you become the golfer of your dreams. Hogwash! I can promise you two things: First, you cannot "buy” a golf game. Second, there will always be "new and improved” equipment to buy. My friend is a fine player, and his equipment is 25 years old. Get the picture?
Now, I'm not condemning new products and advancing technology. What I'm saying is that you need to build a personal buffer that asks, "Do I really need this?” Trust me! Your life will be "new and improved” as soon as you realize that happiness is an inside job. William Butler Yeats said, "Happiness is neither virtue nor pleasure, not this thing nor that but simply growth. We are happy when we are growing.”
You can do this! Do not give stress permission to come into your life. You already have more "things” than 99 percent of the people who have ever lived. Now, go out there and make it a great day! Carpe diem.
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Sunday, April 20, 2008
Reasons for opulence and happiness and causes for ruin
from
By Gamini Jayasinghe
More than two thousand five hundred years ago, Buddha enunciated four causes that lead to weal and happiness in this world and four other causes for the spiritual progress, conducive to the good and happiness of a noble son in the other world. The Exalted One also enunciated twelve causes for some one to face a ruinous state.
On one occasion, the Blessed One was dwelling amongst the Kolians, His maternal relatives in the town named Kakkarapatta. A Kolian son named Dighajanu approached Him and requested Him to preach the Doctrine or things that lead to weal and happiness in this world and things conducive to the good and happiness in the other world.
The literary meaning of Dighajanu is ‘long knee.’ Dighajanu’s family name was Vyaggapajja, so called because his ancestors were born on a forest path infested with tigers.
The four causes the Enlightened One enunciated for the good and happiness in this very life are Uttanasampada–the achievement through persistent effort, Arakkhanasampada–the achievement of wariness, Kalyanamittata – good friendship and Samajivikata–balanced livelihood.
The Enlightened One told Vyaggapajja that whatever the occupation of a clansman, whether a cultivator, herdsman, trader, soldier, a public servant or an artisan of any sort, he is able to manage his job if he becomes skillful and not become lazy. If he is skillful, he will be endowed with reasoning as to ways and means thereof. “This is called the achievement of persistent effort,” the Buddha said, explaining the meaning of Arakkhasampada. The Enlightened One told Vyaggapajja that if a person who is in possession of resources earned by right means, by dint of effort, by strength of arms and by the sweat of his brow and if the resources are managed economically and well protected, the king would not seize them, thieves would not steel them, fire would not burn them, water will not destroy them and ill disposed heirs will not carry away them. “That is the achievement of wariness,” Buddha told Vyaggapajja and explained the third cause “Kalyanamittata” good friendship.
The Enlightened One told Vyaggapajja that if a clansman has house holders and house holders’ sons young or old but highly cultured, full of faith, (Saddha), full or virtue (Sila) full of charity (Caga) and full of wisdom (Panna) to move about and work together and to engage in discussions, that is his achievement of ‘Kalyanamitta’–good friendship whether he lives in a village or a town. The Blessed One told Vyaggapajja that the fourth requirement for a clansman to be conducive to the good and happiness is ‘Samajivikata’–balanced livelihood. “There should be a balance between income and expenditure.” Buddha told Vyggapajja.
One should not spend everything one earns like a man who shakes the tree to eat wood apple. When he shakes the tree all the fruits fall. He eats some of them but most of the fruits get wasted. Income should not be in excess of expenditure. There should be some savings. This does not mean that one should be a miser, but one should lead a steady life being neither too extravagant nor too sordid. Abstinence from debauchery or behaving in an immoral manner, abstinence from drunkenness, non-indulgence in gambling and friendship, companionship and intimacy with the good are the four sources of development.
Thathagtaha also explained four things that are conducive to the good and happiness of a noble person in the next world. They are Saddha Sampadha – achievement of faith, Sila Sampada – achievement of virtue, Caga Sampada – achievement of charity and Panna Sampada – achievement of wisdom. Saddha Sampada is the faith in the Enlightenment of the Thathagatha, the Blessed One.
Sila Sampada or the achievement of virtue is the abstinence from killing, stealing, lewdness, lying and indulge in intoxicants that cause infatuation and heedlessness.
Caga Sampada, the achievement of charity is to be with heart free from the stain of avarice, devoted to charity, open handed and delighting in generosity. “If a clansman is wise, is endowed with wisdom that leads to one’s development and with noble penetrative insight that leads to the complete destruction of suffering, that is called the achievement of wisdom,” Buddha told Vyagapajja.
By Gamini Jayasinghe
More than two thousand five hundred years ago, Buddha enunciated four causes that lead to weal and happiness in this world and four other causes for the spiritual progress, conducive to the good and happiness of a noble son in the other world. The Exalted One also enunciated twelve causes for some one to face a ruinous state.
On one occasion, the Blessed One was dwelling amongst the Kolians, His maternal relatives in the town named Kakkarapatta. A Kolian son named Dighajanu approached Him and requested Him to preach the Doctrine or things that lead to weal and happiness in this world and things conducive to the good and happiness in the other world.
The literary meaning of Dighajanu is ‘long knee.’ Dighajanu’s family name was Vyaggapajja, so called because his ancestors were born on a forest path infested with tigers.
The four causes the Enlightened One enunciated for the good and happiness in this very life are Uttanasampada–the achievement through persistent effort, Arakkhanasampada–the achievement of wariness, Kalyanamittata – good friendship and Samajivikata–balanced livelihood.
The Enlightened One told Vyaggapajja that whatever the occupation of a clansman, whether a cultivator, herdsman, trader, soldier, a public servant or an artisan of any sort, he is able to manage his job if he becomes skillful and not become lazy. If he is skillful, he will be endowed with reasoning as to ways and means thereof. “This is called the achievement of persistent effort,” the Buddha said, explaining the meaning of Arakkhasampada. The Enlightened One told Vyaggapajja that if a person who is in possession of resources earned by right means, by dint of effort, by strength of arms and by the sweat of his brow and if the resources are managed economically and well protected, the king would not seize them, thieves would not steel them, fire would not burn them, water will not destroy them and ill disposed heirs will not carry away them. “That is the achievement of wariness,” Buddha told Vyaggapajja and explained the third cause “Kalyanamittata” good friendship.
The Enlightened One told Vyaggapajja that if a clansman has house holders and house holders’ sons young or old but highly cultured, full of faith, (Saddha), full or virtue (Sila) full of charity (Caga) and full of wisdom (Panna) to move about and work together and to engage in discussions, that is his achievement of ‘Kalyanamitta’–good friendship whether he lives in a village or a town. The Blessed One told Vyaggapajja that the fourth requirement for a clansman to be conducive to the good and happiness is ‘Samajivikata’–balanced livelihood. “There should be a balance between income and expenditure.” Buddha told Vyggapajja.
One should not spend everything one earns like a man who shakes the tree to eat wood apple. When he shakes the tree all the fruits fall. He eats some of them but most of the fruits get wasted. Income should not be in excess of expenditure. There should be some savings. This does not mean that one should be a miser, but one should lead a steady life being neither too extravagant nor too sordid. Abstinence from debauchery or behaving in an immoral manner, abstinence from drunkenness, non-indulgence in gambling and friendship, companionship and intimacy with the good are the four sources of development.
Thathagtaha also explained four things that are conducive to the good and happiness of a noble person in the next world. They are Saddha Sampadha – achievement of faith, Sila Sampada – achievement of virtue, Caga Sampada – achievement of charity and Panna Sampada – achievement of wisdom. Saddha Sampada is the faith in the Enlightenment of the Thathagatha, the Blessed One.
Sila Sampada or the achievement of virtue is the abstinence from killing, stealing, lewdness, lying and indulge in intoxicants that cause infatuation and heedlessness.
Caga Sampada, the achievement of charity is to be with heart free from the stain of avarice, devoted to charity, open handed and delighting in generosity. “If a clansman is wise, is endowed with wisdom that leads to one’s development and with noble penetrative insight that leads to the complete destruction of suffering, that is called the achievement of wisdom,” Buddha told Vyagapajja.
Sex, love and the push-up bra
from Ask Sam
You may have caught that little news factoid recently that stipulated sex might just be a cure for the female blues. Which is good news really (especially for the gents trying to cheer up their surly ladies) considering a whopping estimated 800,000 Aussies suffer from depression each year. So what better antidote could there be for the blues (other than chocolate) than getting frisky between the sheets?
"Having sex helps them feel that closeness and security," surmises Dr Sabura Allen, clinical psychologist and the lead researcher in the Monash University study.
The findings revealed that women associate sex with love (much to the horror of male booty-call buddies!).
The study also discovered that, surprisingly, single women have less sex than single men, which makes you wonder who all these men are getting it on with in the first place ...
Two blokes, David Blanchflower, a Dartmouth College economist, and Andrew Oswald of the University of Warwick in England, undertook a similar survey. They polled 16,000 people and found that sex is so important to happiness, we should be increasing it's frequency from once a month to once a week, (hear that folks?). Adding fuel to the more-sex debate is the fact that the happiness generated from the increased hanky-panky is equivalent to being told you're getting a $50,000 raise on your income!
Economists have also calculated that a lasting marriage equates to the happiness generated by getting an extra $100,000 each year. (Divorce depletes happiness levels equivalent to losing $66,000 annually.)
Then there's the recent story I read in The Economist magazine, which cited a study carried out by the World Database of Happiness in Rotterdam (it collects information about what makes people happy and why), which revealed this: "Married, extroverted optimists are happier than single, pessimistic introverts". Ouch!
Despite its reliability, all these studies sort of threw me off a little. Because it got me wondering: what happened to us being Proud Singletons? Aren't quirky alones supposedly the happy ones? Aren't we a generation of independent women who don't actually need a man?
Not according to science. Yep, apparently we've all been duped. "We do need men more now than ever", says my smug-married friend, J. By J's reckoning, the ultimate antidote for a mutual friend of ours who is constantly complaining she's depressed, is simply this: "Find her a bloke!"
Yet considering our mutual friend is smart, gorgeous, articulate, and doesn't have a smoking habit or penchant for bad boys, I had to wonder why she was finding it so difficult to nab a man.
"Maybe it's because she smells of desperation," J proffered. "She thinks she won't be happy until she has a man and the guys know it. They can see it from a mile away."
Hence J's pushy ways and myriad blind dates aren't helping her case either.
But if love, sex and companionship are really the answers to our ultimate happiness, then I'm a little worried about our generation's future ...
Strange happiness stats:
* 47% of men would give up sex for six months for a 50-inch plasma (Comet Poll, UK)
* 40% of women prefer shoes over sex (Daily Mail)
* 52% of women prefer chocolate over sex (Cadbury)
* 100% of men prefer sex over shoes (Ask Sam Blog)
Q: What is happiness to you? When are you most happy?
STOP PRESS!
If you had to name the best invention ever, you would probably surmise it had something to do with your new Blackberry (email and SMS!), Facebook (friends and prospective dates!) or caramel cappuccinos with extra froth. But recent research has proven otherwise. According to a survey conducted by the British store Debenhams, the ultimate fashion invention ever is in fact the push-up bra. That's right folks. The magic tool that gives us more cleavage (without plastic surgery) rates above g-strings, flip-flops and sneakers as the invention of the century. No doubt they bring about happiness to both sexes alike ...
You may have caught that little news factoid recently that stipulated sex might just be a cure for the female blues. Which is good news really (especially for the gents trying to cheer up their surly ladies) considering a whopping estimated 800,000 Aussies suffer from depression each year. So what better antidote could there be for the blues (other than chocolate) than getting frisky between the sheets?
"Having sex helps them feel that closeness and security," surmises Dr Sabura Allen, clinical psychologist and the lead researcher in the Monash University study.
The findings revealed that women associate sex with love (much to the horror of male booty-call buddies!).
The study also discovered that, surprisingly, single women have less sex than single men, which makes you wonder who all these men are getting it on with in the first place ...
Two blokes, David Blanchflower, a Dartmouth College economist, and Andrew Oswald of the University of Warwick in England, undertook a similar survey. They polled 16,000 people and found that sex is so important to happiness, we should be increasing it's frequency from once a month to once a week, (hear that folks?). Adding fuel to the more-sex debate is the fact that the happiness generated from the increased hanky-panky is equivalent to being told you're getting a $50,000 raise on your income!
Economists have also calculated that a lasting marriage equates to the happiness generated by getting an extra $100,000 each year. (Divorce depletes happiness levels equivalent to losing $66,000 annually.)
Then there's the recent story I read in The Economist magazine, which cited a study carried out by the World Database of Happiness in Rotterdam (it collects information about what makes people happy and why), which revealed this: "Married, extroverted optimists are happier than single, pessimistic introverts". Ouch!
Despite its reliability, all these studies sort of threw me off a little. Because it got me wondering: what happened to us being Proud Singletons? Aren't quirky alones supposedly the happy ones? Aren't we a generation of independent women who don't actually need a man?
Not according to science. Yep, apparently we've all been duped. "We do need men more now than ever", says my smug-married friend, J. By J's reckoning, the ultimate antidote for a mutual friend of ours who is constantly complaining she's depressed, is simply this: "Find her a bloke!"
Yet considering our mutual friend is smart, gorgeous, articulate, and doesn't have a smoking habit or penchant for bad boys, I had to wonder why she was finding it so difficult to nab a man.
"Maybe it's because she smells of desperation," J proffered. "She thinks she won't be happy until she has a man and the guys know it. They can see it from a mile away."
Hence J's pushy ways and myriad blind dates aren't helping her case either.
But if love, sex and companionship are really the answers to our ultimate happiness, then I'm a little worried about our generation's future ...
Strange happiness stats:
* 47% of men would give up sex for six months for a 50-inch plasma (Comet Poll, UK)
* 40% of women prefer shoes over sex (Daily Mail)
* 52% of women prefer chocolate over sex (Cadbury)
* 100% of men prefer sex over shoes (Ask Sam Blog)
Q: What is happiness to you? When are you most happy?
STOP PRESS!
If you had to name the best invention ever, you would probably surmise it had something to do with your new Blackberry (email and SMS!), Facebook (friends and prospective dates!) or caramel cappuccinos with extra froth. But recent research has proven otherwise. According to a survey conducted by the British store Debenhams, the ultimate fashion invention ever is in fact the push-up bra. That's right folks. The magic tool that gives us more cleavage (without plastic surgery) rates above g-strings, flip-flops and sneakers as the invention of the century. No doubt they bring about happiness to both sexes alike ...
Monday, April 14, 2008
Happy now - The course claiming to replace the blues with true happiness
Happy now? The course claiming to replace the blues with true happiness | the Daily Mail
Happy now? The course claiming to replace the blues with true happiness
By ANNA PASTERNAK - More by this author » Last updated at 20:36pm on 13th April 2008
Comments Comments
More than fame, money, success and celebrity, we crave happiness. Happiness has become the holy grail of our society. But why, when we have so much, is it so elusive?
This week, a social trends study by the Office of National Statistics revealed that although we are healthier and twice as well off as we were in 1987, we are no happier.
Modern expectation is that we should be continuously happy, but if we can't buy it, work for it or damn well conjure it up, how do we make ourselves happier?
Replacing sadness with smiles: Can Robert Holden teach you how to be happy?
Psychologist Dr Robert Holden believes that happiness is within everyone's grasp.
Once a year, he runs a five-day happiness course, spread over eight weeks, which he devised for a BBC QED documentary, How To Be Happy.
Professor Richard Davidson, from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, tested participants during the eight weeks and for six months afterwards.
Using data from psychological tests and EEG brain scans, he concluded: "What these results show is that the happiness training not only changes the way you feel, it actually changes the way your brain functions."
Oprah was so impressed by Holden when he appeared on her show last summer, that she insisted all her staff undertook his course.
And as someone who has felt disappointed by life for sometime, I jumped at the chance to try it for myself. Here is my diary of the experience.
February 10
I have just spent two eight-hour days with a group of 40 people who have each paid £349 for the course. The female/male ratio is 3 to 1, and my fellow participants range in age from the 30s to 70s.
We include businessmen, a cancer survivor, a nurse, a policeman and a musician. Our unhappiness levels range from a woman who witnessed her parents and husband commit suicide, to a corporate woman who has an obsession with how many floors people have in their homes (when she's stressed, she drives around London counting floors).
Robert Holden is an unlikely guru. A boyish 43-year-old, he doesn't take the hard-sell approach. He starts by asking: "Will this course make you happy? The honest answer is no. Because nothing or no one can make you happy."
He turns positive thinking upside down, telling us that happiness is not the absence of sadness. More, it is the capacity to embrace our sadness and understand it.
"You will never be happy as long as you are afraid of your sadness. You don't have to learn to like your unhappiness - but you do have to learn not to be afraid of it.
"If you're running away from unhappiness, we won't believe in your smile."
His key message is that it is not selfimprovement that will make us happy, but self-acceptance.
"Classically, people believe that if they improve themselves enough, they will be happy. But we can never improve enough.
"We are turning into a society of destination addicts. Self-acceptance is key. Unless you're happy with yourself, you will not be happy with who you're with or what you've got."
For two days we have defined our concepts of happiness and unhappiness.
We have paired off for exercises like the cheesy New Age practice of looking in a mirror and answering "What do I see?" (Mainly how old and exhausted I look.)
Day two: Holden explains the difference between who we really are and who we think we are: our "essential self" as opposed to our "self-concepts".
He warns that self-image can be extremely detrimental to happiness. Often, we allow our "story" about who we think we are to become our identity.
"You can try to change your thoughts, but they are driven by your identity. If you want to change your thinking, change your identity."
I suddenly clicked that when introducing myself, I always say: "I am a single mother." And, with that, I underline my singleness and broadcast all my negative judgments about myself.
In front of the group, Holden made me go through my emotional responses to being a single mother. First came my anger; then beneath it lay heartbreak; then exhaustion; then my aloneness, and finally the paralysing fear of letting someone else in. I started sobbing uncontrollably.
I honestly hadn't realised until then that I deliberately keep myself single because I feel so ashamed of my personal past - a marriage that didn't work, then a child with a man who left me - that I daren't risk another relationship for fear of making another mistake.
Ironically, although I write about my experiences, making a public joke of my pain in my Daisy Dooley Does Divorce column in this section, I had no idea how much private shame I carry, and how deeply I punish myself.
When Robert Holden said: "You must let go of your hope for a better past" something released inside. I felt unbelievably drained but buoyant. As if I've re-ignited hope.
March 10
It is two weeks since our third day on learning how to bring abundance into our lives, and, spookily, this stuff is working.
We've had to do a daily gratitude journal (a self-help technique pioneered by Oprah) but it's amazing how writing down everything you appreciate in your life makes you feel enriched, as opposed to lacking.
"If you're addicted to the idea of lack, you will never see what is here, only what you think should be here."
We look at three types of happiness; joy, pleasure and satisfaction.
Joy is, according to Holden "the unreasonable happiness of your true nature". We can't control it. It's that unscheduled bubbling up of delight.
Pleasure is sensual happiness and it is transient. That bar of chocolate, glass of wine, great sex.
Satisfaction is external. I am happy with that, because . . .
Satisfaction seems to have a friend called comparison. It doesn't matter how much we've got, when we care how much everyone else has too.
If we become disconnected from our true sense of joy, then pleasure or satisfaction will be short-lived. If we resist joy, increasingly our pleasures will turn dark. A line of chocolate soon turns into a line of cocaine.
In essence, the more you feel your feelings, positive and negative, instead of numbing them with addictive distractions, the more easily you will access your joy.
Next, what is the real "more" that we want? "It doesn't matter how much fame, money, success, status we have, we still feel that things are not enough," warns Dr Holden.
So we tune in and examine what we really want more of in our lives by interviewing each other. Sure, more money to pay the bills - but qualities like more peace and relaxation figure highly for everyone.
March 28
On day four, people shared their extraordinary abundance stories. One woman told of a 30-year estrangement with her father who had broken her arm when he physically abused her as a child.
Since our last gathering, she had heard from him for the first time in three decades to discover he had gifted property to her.
"It feels like the only apology I'm going to get," she said. By letting go of her painful past and finally accepting it, she allowed herself to receive abundance.
All around were other examples of self-acceptance leading to healing and transformation. People's appearances even seemed to be changing - we kept remarking how much lighter and freer we seemed, our faces less fraught.
We kicked off today, controversially, talking about our relationship with God, or any spiritual influence.
Apparently, when very happy people are interviewed and asked: "Why are you happy?" they reply: "Because of my relationship with God." This is whatever god they believe in.
Earlier this month, the Royal Economic Society's conference in Coventry used data from across Europe to investigate the effect of being religious on life satisfaction, and concluded that those with religious beliefs are likelier to be happier than atheists or agnostics.
Again, Holden highlighted that the more we connect with ourselves and our core beliefs, the greater our connection will be with others and the world around us.
"The more you accept yourself, the more abundant you will feel. While the more you love yourself, the more loved you will feel."
Later, we examined how our parents influenced our ideas of happiness, then did meditative forgiveness exercises led by Holden, as forgiveness is the biggie when it comes to emotional well-being.
"Forgiveness is the awareness that nothing has happened to the essence of who you are. Sure, your self-image may have taken a battering, but that is not you. The past is over, but most of us are still hanging on."
The message that Robert Holden has repeatedly driven home is that if you think something has to happen for you to be happier, you'll always be in the process of becoming happy, as opposed to being happy.
We had to sit for ten minutes in silence and just be happy. I got the giggles and felt wellbeing flood through me.
It is amazing that it is possible simply to choose to be happy, even for a neurotic sceptic - or, as Holden puts it, a "functional independent" like me.
Friday, April 4
In psychology, there is a pie chart which defines happiness. The popular belief is that 50 per cent of our happiness is based on our genes, and within that is a set point determining our average happiness.
Forty per cent is choice, and a staggeringly small 10 per cent is circumstance.
Holden believes that 50 per cent is not determined by our genes but by our selfimage.
"Hence, when we begin to truly see ourselves and update our self-image, we can begin to expand our range on happiness."
Eight weeks ago, Holden asked us to fill in a form answering a simple question: If you could take a pill to feel constantly happy, would you?
Three out of four in a group of 40 said no to synthetic happiness; the same result as in a national poll. Clearly, most of us want to experience the gamut of authentic human emotion.
Conclusion
Robert Holden is one of Britain's bestkept secrets. The tragedy is that he's so in demand in the corporate world that he can't run these courses on a national scale.
Truly inspirational, without being evangelical, he invites a new way of being.
I still get angry, frustrated and sad - but it no longer feels terminal. When my old negativity and self-pity creep in, I write a list of gratitude: ridiculously simple but instantly effective.
Eight weeks ago, I felt defeated by life. Though outwardly nothing has changed for me, the internal transformation has been significant.
In examining my unhappiness with being a single mother, an inner emptiness I've had for ages has evaporated.
The relief is endless. And for others who did the course, too. One woman said that Robert Holden saved her life.
She was seriously considering suicide but now sees much to live for. Finally, I've learned that happiness is a useless goal for the future.
It's only here and now that we can choose to accept ourselves and be happy.
Happy now? The course claiming to replace the blues with true happiness
By ANNA PASTERNAK - More by this author » Last updated at 20:36pm on 13th April 2008
Comments Comments
More than fame, money, success and celebrity, we crave happiness. Happiness has become the holy grail of our society. But why, when we have so much, is it so elusive?
This week, a social trends study by the Office of National Statistics revealed that although we are healthier and twice as well off as we were in 1987, we are no happier.
Modern expectation is that we should be continuously happy, but if we can't buy it, work for it or damn well conjure it up, how do we make ourselves happier?
Replacing sadness with smiles: Can Robert Holden teach you how to be happy?
Psychologist Dr Robert Holden believes that happiness is within everyone's grasp.
Once a year, he runs a five-day happiness course, spread over eight weeks, which he devised for a BBC QED documentary, How To Be Happy.
Professor Richard Davidson, from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, tested participants during the eight weeks and for six months afterwards.
Using data from psychological tests and EEG brain scans, he concluded: "What these results show is that the happiness training not only changes the way you feel, it actually changes the way your brain functions."
Oprah was so impressed by Holden when he appeared on her show last summer, that she insisted all her staff undertook his course.
And as someone who has felt disappointed by life for sometime, I jumped at the chance to try it for myself. Here is my diary of the experience.
February 10
I have just spent two eight-hour days with a group of 40 people who have each paid £349 for the course. The female/male ratio is 3 to 1, and my fellow participants range in age from the 30s to 70s.
We include businessmen, a cancer survivor, a nurse, a policeman and a musician. Our unhappiness levels range from a woman who witnessed her parents and husband commit suicide, to a corporate woman who has an obsession with how many floors people have in their homes (when she's stressed, she drives around London counting floors).
Robert Holden is an unlikely guru. A boyish 43-year-old, he doesn't take the hard-sell approach. He starts by asking: "Will this course make you happy? The honest answer is no. Because nothing or no one can make you happy."
He turns positive thinking upside down, telling us that happiness is not the absence of sadness. More, it is the capacity to embrace our sadness and understand it.
"You will never be happy as long as you are afraid of your sadness. You don't have to learn to like your unhappiness - but you do have to learn not to be afraid of it.
"If you're running away from unhappiness, we won't believe in your smile."
His key message is that it is not selfimprovement that will make us happy, but self-acceptance.
"Classically, people believe that if they improve themselves enough, they will be happy. But we can never improve enough.
"We are turning into a society of destination addicts. Self-acceptance is key. Unless you're happy with yourself, you will not be happy with who you're with or what you've got."
For two days we have defined our concepts of happiness and unhappiness.
We have paired off for exercises like the cheesy New Age practice of looking in a mirror and answering "What do I see?" (Mainly how old and exhausted I look.)
Day two: Holden explains the difference between who we really are and who we think we are: our "essential self" as opposed to our "self-concepts".
He warns that self-image can be extremely detrimental to happiness. Often, we allow our "story" about who we think we are to become our identity.
"You can try to change your thoughts, but they are driven by your identity. If you want to change your thinking, change your identity."
I suddenly clicked that when introducing myself, I always say: "I am a single mother." And, with that, I underline my singleness and broadcast all my negative judgments about myself.
In front of the group, Holden made me go through my emotional responses to being a single mother. First came my anger; then beneath it lay heartbreak; then exhaustion; then my aloneness, and finally the paralysing fear of letting someone else in. I started sobbing uncontrollably.
I honestly hadn't realised until then that I deliberately keep myself single because I feel so ashamed of my personal past - a marriage that didn't work, then a child with a man who left me - that I daren't risk another relationship for fear of making another mistake.
Ironically, although I write about my experiences, making a public joke of my pain in my Daisy Dooley Does Divorce column in this section, I had no idea how much private shame I carry, and how deeply I punish myself.
When Robert Holden said: "You must let go of your hope for a better past" something released inside. I felt unbelievably drained but buoyant. As if I've re-ignited hope.
March 10
It is two weeks since our third day on learning how to bring abundance into our lives, and, spookily, this stuff is working.
We've had to do a daily gratitude journal (a self-help technique pioneered by Oprah) but it's amazing how writing down everything you appreciate in your life makes you feel enriched, as opposed to lacking.
"If you're addicted to the idea of lack, you will never see what is here, only what you think should be here."
We look at three types of happiness; joy, pleasure and satisfaction.
Joy is, according to Holden "the unreasonable happiness of your true nature". We can't control it. It's that unscheduled bubbling up of delight.
Pleasure is sensual happiness and it is transient. That bar of chocolate, glass of wine, great sex.
Satisfaction is external. I am happy with that, because . . .
Satisfaction seems to have a friend called comparison. It doesn't matter how much we've got, when we care how much everyone else has too.
If we become disconnected from our true sense of joy, then pleasure or satisfaction will be short-lived. If we resist joy, increasingly our pleasures will turn dark. A line of chocolate soon turns into a line of cocaine.
In essence, the more you feel your feelings, positive and negative, instead of numbing them with addictive distractions, the more easily you will access your joy.
Next, what is the real "more" that we want? "It doesn't matter how much fame, money, success, status we have, we still feel that things are not enough," warns Dr Holden.
So we tune in and examine what we really want more of in our lives by interviewing each other. Sure, more money to pay the bills - but qualities like more peace and relaxation figure highly for everyone.
March 28
On day four, people shared their extraordinary abundance stories. One woman told of a 30-year estrangement with her father who had broken her arm when he physically abused her as a child.
Since our last gathering, she had heard from him for the first time in three decades to discover he had gifted property to her.
"It feels like the only apology I'm going to get," she said. By letting go of her painful past and finally accepting it, she allowed herself to receive abundance.
All around were other examples of self-acceptance leading to healing and transformation. People's appearances even seemed to be changing - we kept remarking how much lighter and freer we seemed, our faces less fraught.
We kicked off today, controversially, talking about our relationship with God, or any spiritual influence.
Apparently, when very happy people are interviewed and asked: "Why are you happy?" they reply: "Because of my relationship with God." This is whatever god they believe in.
Earlier this month, the Royal Economic Society's conference in Coventry used data from across Europe to investigate the effect of being religious on life satisfaction, and concluded that those with religious beliefs are likelier to be happier than atheists or agnostics.
Again, Holden highlighted that the more we connect with ourselves and our core beliefs, the greater our connection will be with others and the world around us.
"The more you accept yourself, the more abundant you will feel. While the more you love yourself, the more loved you will feel."
Later, we examined how our parents influenced our ideas of happiness, then did meditative forgiveness exercises led by Holden, as forgiveness is the biggie when it comes to emotional well-being.
"Forgiveness is the awareness that nothing has happened to the essence of who you are. Sure, your self-image may have taken a battering, but that is not you. The past is over, but most of us are still hanging on."
The message that Robert Holden has repeatedly driven home is that if you think something has to happen for you to be happier, you'll always be in the process of becoming happy, as opposed to being happy.
We had to sit for ten minutes in silence and just be happy. I got the giggles and felt wellbeing flood through me.
It is amazing that it is possible simply to choose to be happy, even for a neurotic sceptic - or, as Holden puts it, a "functional independent" like me.
Friday, April 4
In psychology, there is a pie chart which defines happiness. The popular belief is that 50 per cent of our happiness is based on our genes, and within that is a set point determining our average happiness.
Forty per cent is choice, and a staggeringly small 10 per cent is circumstance.
Holden believes that 50 per cent is not determined by our genes but by our selfimage.
"Hence, when we begin to truly see ourselves and update our self-image, we can begin to expand our range on happiness."
Eight weeks ago, Holden asked us to fill in a form answering a simple question: If you could take a pill to feel constantly happy, would you?
Three out of four in a group of 40 said no to synthetic happiness; the same result as in a national poll. Clearly, most of us want to experience the gamut of authentic human emotion.
Conclusion
Robert Holden is one of Britain's bestkept secrets. The tragedy is that he's so in demand in the corporate world that he can't run these courses on a national scale.
Truly inspirational, without being evangelical, he invites a new way of being.
I still get angry, frustrated and sad - but it no longer feels terminal. When my old negativity and self-pity creep in, I write a list of gratitude: ridiculously simple but instantly effective.
Eight weeks ago, I felt defeated by life. Though outwardly nothing has changed for me, the internal transformation has been significant.
In examining my unhappiness with being a single mother, an inner emptiness I've had for ages has evaporated.
The relief is endless. And for others who did the course, too. One woman said that Robert Holden saved her life.
She was seriously considering suicide but now sees much to live for. Finally, I've learned that happiness is a useless goal for the future.
It's only here and now that we can choose to accept ourselves and be happy.
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