Kindness is Contagious
Have you seen the movie Pay it Forward? In it a 7th grade social studies teacher challenges his students to put into action a plan that will change the world for the better. One of the students, Trevor, decides that he will do a favor for three people and will ask each of them to “pay it forward” by doing favors for three other people and so on. I saw the movie years ago and was fascinated by the idea.
In the movie people directly ask the recipients of their good deed to pay it forward by doing something good for someone else. It turns out that reality is even better than the movies because people don’t need to be asked to pay it forward. Research shows that when people benefit from a kind act they are inspired to pay it forward and want to do a good deed for someone else.
Two professors, Nicholas Christakis from Harvard and James Fowler from the University of California-San Diego, designed an experimental study where one person gives money to a person they don’t know who in turn gives money to someone else who they don’t know and so on. The researchers found that generosity by the first person influenced the next person to give more and that this influence spread up to three degrees of separation, that is from person to person to person to person. So being kind is contagious; good deeds by one person can influence many other people to pay it forward. You can read more about social contagion in Christakis and Fowler’s book Connected.
Performing acts of kindness is a great way to increase your happiness. Doing a good deed for someone makes you feel great. And the fact that your good deed will likely inspire a domino effect of kind acts makes it even more powerful. So what will you do today to start a chain reaction of kind acts?
Discover Your Path to Happiness
Studies have identified many strategies for increasing positivity, yet there is no one true path to happiness. Research shows that different individuals benefit from different strategies. So in order to increase your happiness you need to figure out what works for you.
For me, exercise is one of the most important strategies for maintaining a positive focus. When I don’t have a chance to get to the gym my mood starts to sink. I try very hard to make time for exercise for me and for the people around me! But I have friends who truly hate to exercise. So while finding some way to stay fit is important, I’m sure that daily trips to the gym would not increase their happiness.
Another one of the happiness strategies that works best for me is to remind myself to have an attitude of gratitude. My cue is when I feel myself wanting to complain about something. I try to stop and deliberately look for something for which I can be grateful.
The other day one of the kids needed something for school. The first thought that popped into my mind was, “What a pain! When am I going to find time to run to the store?” But I stopped and reminded myself how lucky I am to be a mom and to have wonderful kids who are responsible enough to tell me ahead of time when they need something. And how blessed we are that we can afford to buy what we need. And isn’t it great that I have a flexible job so I can work in a trip to the store? Doing this really helps me to reframe situations so that I experience more positive emotions.
What happiness strategies work best for you? Nurturing relationships? Practicing acts of kindness? Using your strengths? Getting enough sleep? Pursuing your goals? Meditating? Figuring it out will get you on the path to happiness.
Oprah Gets it!
The final episode of The Oprah Winfrey Show aired yesterday. Oprah spent the hour talking about what she has learned over the last 25 years from all of the people she has met along the way. It sounds to me like she has learned how to be happy! Her advice to the audience included many of the key strategies for staying positive.
Here are some excerpts from Oprah’s talk:
What I know from sure from this experience with you is that we are all called and your real job in life is to figure out what that is and get about the business of doing it. Every time we have seen a person on this stage who is a success in their life, they spoke of the joy and they spoke of the juice that they receive from doing what they knew they were meant to be doing . . . that is what a calling is, it lights you up and it lets you know that you are exactly where you are supposed to be doing exactly what you are supposed to be doing.
And that is what I want for all of you and hope that you will take from this show; to live from the heart of yourself. You have to make a living, I understand that, but you also have to know what sparks the light in you so that you, in your own way, can illuminate the world . . .
What I want you to know as this show ends, each one of you has your own platform. Do not let the trappings here fool you. Mine is a stage in a studio. Yours is wherever you are, with your own reach, however small or however large that reach is . . . that is your talk show and that is where your power lies. In every way and everyday you are showing people exactly who you are. You are letting your life speak for you.
And when you do that you will receive in direct proportion to how you give . . . you can help somebody, you can listen, you can forgive, you can heal. You have the power to change somebody’s life . . .
My great wish for all of you is that you carry whatever you’re supposed to be doing, carry that forward and don’t waste any more time. Start embracing the life that is calling you and use your life to serve the world.
Yep, Oprah definitely gets it!
Last week there was a story featured on ABC World News about the amount of doctors who are now prescribing meditation to their patients. Over 6 million Americans have been advised by their health care providers to use meditation or other mind-body therapies. This isn’t surprising given the growing evidence showing that meditation works. It has been found to help with cardiovascular disease, anxiety, insomnia, asthma, diabetes, pain, and eating disorders. It can strengthen our immune system and lower our stress.
According to a Harvard study meditation can physically change our brain! They discovered that after people meditated for 8 weeks the areas of their brain associated with self-awareness and compassion grew while the area associated with stress shrank. The people in the study meditated for 30 minutes a day, but even five or ten minutes can make a difference.
In Buddha’s Brain, Rick Hanson explains that meditation can bring us more happiness, love and wisdom by increasing our concentration, compassion, empathy, and mood. What we focus our attention on shapes our mind. Through meditation we bring awareness to our body, which helps us to withdraw attention from stressful matters and to relax. I like the way Mark Thornton, author of Meditation in a New York Minute, puts it: “Meditation is a journey to the ocean of calm” that is deep inside of us and often hidden by the noise of our busy days.
You can meditate by following these three steps: 1) sit comfortably 2) focus on your breath and 3) every time your mind wanders gently return your attention to your breath. It sounds easy, but it’s not! The good news, Hanson assures us, is that we can become better at meditation. Our concentration is like a muscle that gets stronger with use. So don’t give up! The many benefits of meditation certainly make it worth the effort. It’s what the doctor ordered!
Want to be Happy? Get Off the Couch!
Positive psychology recognizes that it takes work to be happy. Improvements in well-being often require efforts that are not immediately rewarding. Doing something that gives you pleasure can increase the amount of positive emotions you experience in that moment, but simple pleasures like watching TV, eating a hot fudge sundae, or reading a magazine by the pool are not the key to real happiness.
Sustained happiness comes from the gratification you get from engaging in something challenging that results in accomplishment or personal growth. When you think of the things in life that have brought you the greatest amount of happiness, I bet they involved some degree of effort, maybe even hard work and frustration.
I have friends who have run marathons and despite the grueling training that they endured, finishing a marathon gave them a huge sense of accomplishment and increased their positivity in the long run. I can promise you that running a marathon would not make me happier, but getting my Ph.D. has contributed to my happiness over the years, as has learning Spanish.
Smaller accomplishments can also do the trick. Cleaning out my garage, although it didn’t give me great pleasure, has made me happier each time I drive in and notice the lack of clutter. Sometimes I think it would be fun to plan a dinner party, but wonder if I’d be happier spending my Saturday lounging on the couch. Each time I have opted to cook for friends it has definitely been worth the effort.
This weekend you might need to spend a few hours on the sofa watching the NBA Playoffs or House Hunters International in order to recharge your batteries. But don’t stay there all weekend! Make the effort to do something that will give you a sense of satisfaction afterward. Work in the yard, join a tennis round robin, take a cooking class, or start training for a local race. Your level of positivity will be much greater come Sunday evening if you do!
Having Fun at Work is Good Business
Creating a workplace where people play and have fun is good business. A fun work environment leads to more creativity, increased group cohesiveness, less conflict, less stress, and less turnover. It is also a great way to attract new employees.
In his book Shine, Dr. Edward Hallowell argues that peak performance is impossible without play. Play engages the imagination, which is responsible for all great discoveries. It is especially critical in today’s conceptual age where creative, right brain thinking is what is needed to excel.
There are many different ways to infuse the workplace with fun. You can play games, celebrate obscure holidays, or encourage people to decorate their offices in fun ways or to wear costumes to work on Halloween. Events involving food, like picnics or chili cook-offs, are almost always a hit. Some companies pick fun names for meeting rooms, like Play-Doh and Lincoln Logs rooms at Apple or Paris and Rio de Janeiro rooms at IBM. And how much fun must it be to come up with the logos on Google’s homepage?
Zappos has created a culture that values being fun and a little weird. You can see how much fun they have by watching the Delivering Happiness Happy Rap. According to Zappos:
one of the side effects of encouraging weirdness is that it encourages people to think outside the box and be more innovative. When you combine a little weirdness with making sure everyone is also having fun at work, it ends up being a win-win for everyone: Employees are more engaged in the work that they do, and the company as a whole becomes more innovative.
What does your company do to make work fun? I’d love to hear your stories!
We Learn Best From Success not Failure
I think it is important to learn from our mistakes. And I think it is extremely important for organizations to create climates in which people are not punished for their mistakes. But I think the whole idea of learning from our mistakes is overrated. In fact, I think we can learn more from our successes than we do from our failures.
Why? Because we are more open to learning new things when we are positive and making mistakes seldom causes us to experience positive emotions. Failure usually makes us feel pretty down in the dumps. The negative emotions it causes may lead us to focus on covering up our mistake because we are embarrassed or afraid of negative consequences. A performance review that highlights our weaknesses rather than our strengths leaves us feeling inadequate or worried about our job security. Some people are motivated by failure, but for most of us our failures don’t energize us or motivate us to keep at it in order to figure out how to succeed. Positive emotions do that!
A good example of this comes from a study of people who were videotaped while they were bowling. Afterward half of the bowlers were shown videos of their spares and strikes while the other half watched videos of the frames when they failed to knock all of the pins down. When they bowled again the half who had watched videos of the frames where they had bowled spares and strikes improved significantly more than the other half. Watching their successes boosted their positive emotions, which led to further success.
When mistakes are made we should do our very best to learn from them and move on. But focusing on what is going wrong and always looking for errors is not the best way to help people learn and grow. Looking for what they are doing right and celebrating their success is what leads people to thrive.
Why Religious People are Happier
Research shows that religious people in America are happier than non-religious people. Since many people will be celebrating Easter or Passover this week I thought it would be a good time to explore this issue. I think there are three main reasons why religion leads to increased happiness; they are people, peace, and purpose.
People
Belonging to a religious community gives people a sense of group identity and social support, providing them with a large network of friends and acquaintances. Happiness increases when we spend time with others who are supportive. Also, most religions encourage people to treat others in ways that increase happiness. For example, they teach us it is important to forgive and to help others.
Peace
People who believe in God find a source of comfort in knowing they are unconditionally loved and valued. This gives us a sense of calm and security. It also provides us with a source of hope when bad things happen. When facing the death of a loved one, divorce, a health crisis, or job loss the belief that God is in control and that things will get better helps us to cope.
Purpose
Finally, religion gives people a sense of purpose and we are happier when we feel that our life has meaning. The fact that over 30 million copies of Rick Warren’s The Purpose Driven Life have been sold shows the strong desire that people have to discover what they are here for. The belief that God has given us all gifts and that he wants us to use our gifts to serve others helps people to experience greater meaning in their lives. Religion can teach us how to view our lives as part of a broader divine plan.
So religion provides people with a sense of connectedness, security, and meaning. The fact that all three of these are strongly correlated with happiness helps to explain why religious people are happier.
How to Turn Your Work into a Calling
People who view their work as a calling experience higher job satisfaction and perform better. Do you wish you had a calling? All it takes is to change the way you view your work by focusing on the value that you provide.
A study of workers at a call center for a university fundraising organization shows how important it is to feel you are making a difference. Some of the callers read stories from other employees who described what they felt were the personal benefits of the job, including financial benefits and the development of skills and knowledge. Another group of callers read stories from the students who had benefited from the fundraising efforts and described how the scholarships they obtained had a positive impact on their lives.
A month later callers in the group that heard about the personal benefits of the job had the same number of pledges and raised the same amount of money as they had before the study. Callers in the group who heard stories about how people had benefited from the scholarships obtained more than twice the number of pledges and more than twice the amount of donation money. Learning how their work made a difference in people’s lives helped them to see its value and motivated them to drastically improve their performance.
Viewing your work as a calling will make you happier and more successful. So take a minute to identify the impact your work has on others. Start by connecting your daily actions to the company’s longer-term goals. List the tasks you do and write down the purpose of each one. What result does it lead to? Remember that the impact you have may not be on the end customer. It may come from helping coworkers accomplish their tasks.
There is value in every job. Which piece of the puzzle is your responsibility?
People typically see their work as a job, a career, or a calling. Those who view their work as a job do it mainly to earn a living. People who see their work as a career are interested in money, responsibility, and advancement. People who consider their work a calling believe the work they do serves an important purpose. They do the work for its own sake, not for financial or other benefits. They are passionate about what they do because they feel they are making a difference in the world.
Interestingly, whether or not people experience their work as a calling does not depend on the actual work they do. People in any occupation can have a job, career, or calling orientation. Meaning comes from how they understand the work they do, not the work itself. The fact is most any job has social value. So what matters is that the person recognize the value of the work he or she does.
In a classic example, a traveler happens upon 3 stonemasons hard at work. He asks them each in turn what they are doing. The first one responds that he is “cutting stone.” The second says he is “preparing a foundation.” The third stonemason declares that he is “building a cathedral!” In a modern day example, a hospital janitor explains that his work is as important as the work of the surgeons because if he doesn’t keep the hospital clean patients won’t get better.
People who view the work they do as a calling experience a sense of meaning that boosts their positivity. They are happier and, as a result, more likely to succeed. So how do you view your work? And what about your employees? Do they see the value of the work they do?
