Today I stumbled upon a Happiness Formula in “The Happiness Hypothesis” book (more about the book here). I`ve been very interested in Positive Psychology and have come across multiple definitions and frameworks regarding happiness and can confidently say that this is the most comprehensive one that I`ve ever come across. And without a doubt, it is the absolute inspiration of today.
It is one of the most important ideas of Positive Psychology and can be presented in the following way:
H=S+C+V
- H is, of course, Happiness 😉
- S is our biological set point. It is scientifically proven that our genes play an important role in the levels of happiness that we can achieve. A person`s average or typical level of happiness is known as their “affective style”. This style is linked to the activity in our brain. People that have more activity in the right side of the brain would be more prone to “withdrawal- oriented” style implying relatively lower levels of happiness that people who have more activity in the left area of the brain and who have more of an “approach-oriented” style.
- C are our external conditions. It is true that in most of the cases we adapt to our circumstances independently whether there are good or bad – this is referred to as the “adaptation principle”. However, it is proven that there some conditions are important to achieve lasting levels of satisfaction so it is worthwhile to develop an understanding of them:
- Noise
- Commuting
- Lack of control
- Shame
- Relationships
- V are our voluntary activities (and that’s where it gets very interesting). This is a matter of arranging your day and environment to increase both pleasures and gratifications. Pleasures have physical and sensory components; they can be derived from food, beach, sex and massages. They make us feel good only temporarily and have no lasting benefits.
- Gratifications are experiences that engage you fully, allow you to lose your self-consciousness. These are the types of activities that put you in a state of a “flow”. It often occurs while doing physical movements such as skiing, running or swimming, but also in other situations where we are involved in a task that is both challenging, but also closely matched to our abilities such as painting, writing or photography. The key aspects of Flow are: There is a clear challenge that engages your attention, you have the skills to meet the challenge and you get immediate feedback on how you are doing at each step.
- And this is where the main challenge lies. We need to find the right balance of pleasures and gratifications as we naturally have a tendency to go for pleasures and we should “encourage” ourselves to move to gratification-type of activities. They often come from learning something, improving something or accomplishing something. The key to finding your gratifications is to know your strengths.
I`ll end with two interesting scientific insights:
- People who report the greatest interest in attaining money, fame or beauty are consistently found to be less happy and even less healthy that those who pursue less materialistic goals.
- Research shows that it would serve us better to work less, earn less, accumulate less and consume more family time, vacations and other enjoyable activities.
So there it is. As usually my approach and advice is to take this with a pinch of salt. And use such insights as road maps that you need to customize for your own ways rather that as fixed recipes. In the end the path to happiness belongs to you only and nobody can walk it for you.
