happiness – Emily Downward

Love, Birds & Happiness

September 18, 2012emilydownward

When you’re in love, everything seems special: the birds sing so sweetly, there is beauty all around you, and you can’t stop smiling. If only there was a way to bottle this feeling and pull it out on days when you don’t feel so good!

Maybe we can…

Scientists have discovered we have mirror neurons in our brain, which enable us to feel what another is feeling. This allows us to empathize with others, and it also comes into play when we are reading a great novel or watching a play or a movie and feel the emotions of the character within our own bodies. Have you ever identified with a character so much you laughed out loud? (I’ve done this before reading a great book by myself in a restaurant. Who cares if I got crazy looks? Laughter is good!) Or found yourself crying during a touching scene in a movie? (Steel Magnolias or Terms of Endearment are sure tear-jerkers for me.)

Mirror neurons make it possible to feel something even if you’re not experiencing it yourself.

Knowing that our brains control what we feel, we can leverage it in our favor: saturate our minds with treasured memories and flood our brains with the feel good emotions and chemicals.

Martha Beck describes the technique of Sense-Drenching in her latest book, Finding Your Way in a Wild New World, as one of the techniques to get to Wordlessness, a state of being where you shift your consciousness out of the verbal processing and into the more creative, intuitive and sensory brain regions. To try it, you simply come up specific sensory experiences or memories for each of the five senses. Start with your favorite tastes, imagining experiencing them in detail. Add in memories of your favorite scents, unrelated to the taste memory. Next, add in tactile sensations, like touching a kitten or holding a newborn. Then, call to mind the memory of sounds you love, like birds singing, wind chimes or the ocean. Finally, remember your favorite sights: a scenic overlook, a beautiful painting, or a loved one’s face. Try holding all these sense memories in your mind at the same time – this shifts your brain from thinking verbally to the peaceful state of Wordlessness.

In the field of Positive Psychology, researchers have determined to maintain a more positive outlook, you need to have 3 positive experiences for every 1 negative one, and interestingly, they found that the frequency is more important that the severity. You can leverage this, especially on tough days, by increasing the positive experiences in your day. Listen to your favorite music, take a favored snack with you to work, or wear your favorite color. Gratitude helps me, too, by keeping my focus on what I have rather than what I don’t have or don’t want.

Wishing you all a little extra happiness this week!

Stop the Internal Violence

September 4, 2012emilydownward

“Nonviolence means avoiding not only external physical violence but also internal violence of spirit. You not only refuse to shoot a man, but you refuse to hate him.”

~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

The people who come to me for coaching aren’t struggling with self-control over whether to shoot someone or not. (Whew!) But this quote by MLK made me think of violence or nonviolence towards the self. Many of my clients would never act violently towards others, and yet the thoughts in their heads about themselves are atrocious.

What does your inner dialogue say to you about you? Is it mostly encouraging, focusing on your unique strengths and talents? Or does it constantly keep a record of your mistakes, noting all the things you don’t do well, comparing you to others in a poor light?

I’m always so impressed by those who have a mostly positive inner dialogue. As for me, I wasn’t wired that way. My inner dialogue was mostly negative, perfectionistic (an impossible goal that keeps one frustrated and dejected), and critical. And while I’ve made great progress at strengthening and listening to my positive inner voice, the negative voice is still there. It’s like the weakened Voldemort in the Harry Potter series. It doesn’t have as much power as it once did, but you know it could still be dangerous.

In the field of positive psychology, researchers have created a formula for happiness:

Happiness = Set Point + Circumstances + Voluntary Variables

Your Happiness level (a subjective measure) is about 50% due to your Set Point, or your genetic predisposition on how you view the world. Another 8-12% is the Circumstances or conditions you were born into: your socioeconomic status, your gender, the family you are born into. That leaves 38-42% of your happiness up to Voluntary Variables, the ways in which you intentionally intervene on yourself, your choices and actions. (That’s where the magic can happen!)

Isn’t it interesting that Circumstances are only 8-12%? We often hear the differences between the Haves and the Have-Not’s emphasized, the privileges or lack of opportunities between groups or countries being touted as determining factors of success or failure. But researchers have shown that the Circumstances are not NEARLY as important as how we think about things, how we look at the situation. It’s not what you have or not, it’s the story you’re telling yourself about it.

When I went through coach training, in addition to learning amazing tools to help others live their best lives, it was an intensive experience to rewire my own brain, creating new ways of thinking that serve me, rather than crippling me. It is my great joy to be able to help others now with what I’ve learned and help them find more peace, joy and success.

So what is your inner dialogue telling you? Is it working for you, or against you?

Mindfulness

August 28, 2012emilydownward

One of my mom’s cousins died unexpectedly a couple weeks ago.

A friend of mine was recently diagnosed with cancer and is awaiting treatment to begin.

And my dad is now home recuperating after a few days in the hospital.

Sometimes we get so caught up in our daily lives – completing work projects, keeping up with our emails, grocery shopping, dealing with traffic – it takes a major event to wake us up, to remind us what life is REALLY all about.

I believe we all have unique purposes here, as we are “spiritual beings having a human experience,” as French philosopher Pierre Teilhard de Chardin put it. But whatever our different purposes, I truly believe we are supposed to be happy.

Sometimes “happy” seems difficult to achieve, particularly when life knocks you down. My mentor Martha Beck says, “This is not a world where it is possible to stay on track, it’s a world designed for us to lose the track and then wander around feeling morose until we find it again.” So we lose our footing. We realize we are so far away from happy that we’ve forgotten what happy feels like. But that realization is the first step back. You must have awareness before you can begin to make changes.

I think the major events that occur in life give us an opportunity to assess our lives. For me, as the fragility of life becomes more apparent in my awareness, I also become aware of what I value and what I am grateful for. With a stronger sense of what’s truly important, I can choose more deliberately how I spend my time and energies, what things I will focus on, and what things I will discard.

Getting What You Want

August 21, 2012emilydownward

What do you want? What do you really want?

It’s a standard question coaches pose to clients, one that I pose to new clients, and one that I have pondered myself. What do I really want?

During times of great stress, sometimes all I could muster as an answer is for the stress or cause of pain to end. I think when you’re in the thick of it, it’s difficult to dream big. Like if you’re in the foyer of an Italian restaurant and someone asks you what you want to eat, you think of the Italian options – lasagna, spaghetti, manicotti, ravioli – you don’t even consider other cuisines, like Thai, Indian, or French, which you could have if you stepped out the door and walked down the street. You limit your options subconsciously. We do this in other areas of our lives, too.

So allow yourself to dream big, dream without rules or limitations, dream beyond your current circumstances, and come up with your heart’s desire. Got it?

Now, consider that what you really want isn’t what you’ve got in mind, but rather what you think having that thing or experience will make you feel. It’s all about the feeling state. How do you imagine you’ll feel when you have that perfect job, tons of money, the ideal body or your soul mate? That’s what you’re really after.

As Martha Beck writes in her book Steering by Starlight, while we think we’ll get these feelings by getting what we want, “External circumstances do not create feeling states. Feeling states create external circumstances.” Martha gives this example in the book:

“You’re an employer looking for someone to hire. Two candidates apply. One is desperate and frantic. ‘Please, please, I need this job; you’ve got to help me,’ he begs. The other candidate is calm and confident. He asks, ‘How can I help you?’”

Once you recognize the feeling state you’re after and find ways to feel that (or recognize where you already have this in your life), you’re much more likely to get what you’re wanting. (And you may find you don’t want it anymore, or at least not as much, once you realize you’ve already got what you really want, the feeling.)

Several of my clients are working towards their next promotion, and one mentioned to me that she really wanted the next title, that when she got that, then she would feel confident. Having been on both sides of that title (before and after), I told her from my experience that having the title doesn’t bestow that confidence. In fact, acting with confidence now, she’s more likely to receive that promotion.

So consider what you want, and then go deeper: what will you feel when you have that or experience that? Finding ways to experience that feeling now will not only give you more happiness, it will also make it easier for you to get those things you wanted in the first place.

Staying In-the-Moment

August 7, 2012emilydownward

I was on vacation last week, watching the beautiful ocean and feeling amazingly grateful to get to swim with the fish, but I missed quite a bit of the Olympics. I effectively unplugged, though, so I was able to shield myself from much of the results. I’ve enjoyed catching up on all my recordings and watching an overload of Olympic events since I’ve been back. I so admire these exquisite athletes and love watching them charge towards their goals and dreams. The triumphant smiles and tears of joy give me goose bumps.

One of the things I’ve noticed across events is the value of staying in the present moment. Several of the athletes have mentioned it, how they have to get out of their heads, not over-think things. I believe it’s been the deciding factor for many of the athletes. Watching the gymnastics, you can almost see it on their faces, whether they are thinking or whether they are fully focused on the element as they are doing it. When one of the gymnasts had a fall or an error, the ability to stay focused became even more important, not to let the internal dialogue take over but to continue to finish the routine in the way they had practiced thousands of times.

I think the ability to stay present is not only critical to success, it is also a key element in happiness. On my recent vacation, my nephew lamented on Day 2 that we only had 3 days left. In his mind, he was already leaving! While what he said was true, I reminded him that it was also true that right at that moment, we were in paradise, that “today” we would get to snorkel with the fish.

I had to chuckle at my nephew. I’ve been guilty of looking ahead so much that I miss what’s right under my nose, too. Other times, I’ve focused too much on looking back. And while it’s valuable to review what happened to make changes to your technique and approach for the future, and it’s definitely valuable to look ahead for planning and setting goals, the only thing we ever have is Now. This moment is the only one you are living right now.

Right now, find something you are grateful for. (If nothing else, you’re breathing – your body is effortlessly pulling in oxygen and sustaining life. You’re reading – your eyes and brain are working in magnificent symphony to comprehend.)

Right now – or, right after you finish reading this! – focus on the task in front of you. Write down other ideas or other tasks on your To-Do list to help clear your mind to stay present.

So channel your favorite Olympian and remember to stay focused. You’ll be less stressed, more focused and more likely to gain success and happiness.

The Secret to Happiness

May 8, 2012emilydownward

HappyMan — photo by Neal Fowler, Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/31878512@N06/3490869804/

“Happiness is not something the world owes you or can give you. It is not passive. It is not rest… Happiness is an activity of the soul in accord with excellence.” ~ Norman Melchert, philosopher, author, professor

I’ve been taking a fascinating continuing education class on Positive Psychology. The field of psychology has been largely focused on disease, but for the last 20 years or so, there has been a growing trend of looking at the positive side, looking at what makes people resilient and happy. What a fantastic idea: instead of singularly looking at what’s wrong, let’s look at what’s right!

We hear so much about Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, but statistically, a person is just as likely to experience Post-Traumatic Growth from a challenging event. At the beginning of my career, I worked with a number of cancer survivors. Many of them, even those who had recurring disease and who knew they would die from their cancers, would tell me it was the best thing that ever happened to them. They viewed their cancer experience as a wake-up call, to recognize what was truly important and discard petty grievances and stresses that didn’t matter.

Two of the prominent researchers in Positive Psychology, Martin Seligman, PhD and Ed Diener, PhD, have quantified a formula for happiness:

Happiness = Genetic Set-Point + Circumstances + Voluntary Variables

Your genetic set point is what you’re born with. I think of it as how optimistic or pessimistic you naturally are. This accounts for about 50% of your happiness, and as something you’re born with, you can’t really change this.

Your circumstances — where you live, the things that happen to you — account for about 8-12% of your happiness. Surprising? Sometimes in the Western world in particular, we believe that we need more, more, more to be happy. But many studies have shown that’s not the case.

So the remainder of happiness, anywhere from 38-42%, is made up of voluntary variables. This includes the ways in which we intentionally intervene on ourselves, our choices of thought and action.

The exciting news here is that while we can’t change our genetic set-point and may have limited control on our circumstances, we absolutely have control over the voluntary variables. This is why people say you can choose to be happy. I also think of the “glass half full” concept here. If you have a glass with your favorite beverage in it, do you consider it half full or half empty? Are you focusing on what you have or what you don’t have? And of course, there’s always the slightly sassy answer about being thankful you even have a glass!