The Happiness Advantage - Shawn Anchor | Summarized Books

The Happiness Advantage - How A Positive Brain Fuels For Success In Work And Life

Happiness gives your brain a competitive edge and sets you up for success

One common misconception in our society today is that we see happiness as the end result of being successful. The prevailing creed at companies and schools at any level is this: Focus on productivity and performance, even to the detriment of our emotional and physical well-being, and you will eventually become more successful, and therefore happier.

Happiness causes success and achievement, not the other way round.

However, thanks to strides in positive psychology, this myth has been turned on its head. Several studies have proven that happiness precedes important outcomes and indicators of success.

For instance, in a study to prove that happiness is a direct indicator of success, researchers measured the initial level of positive emotions in 272 employees, then monitored their job performance over the next eighteen months. They discovered that even after controlling other factors, those who were happier at the beginning ended up receiving better evaluations and higher pay later on.

In another study, researchers found that how happy individuals were as college freshmen predicted how high their income was nineteen years later, regardless of their initial level of wealth.

Before we take a closer look at how happiness leads to success, let's define happiness and understand exactly what it's all about.

To be happy, you need to have a positive mood in the present and have a positive outlook for the future.

According to scientists, happiness is essentially the experience of positive emotions — pleasure combined with deeper feelings of meaning and purpose. Happiness signifies a positive mood in the present and a positive outlook for the future. For the author, happiness is the joy we feel striving after our potential.

The three measurable components of happiness:
• Pleasure
• Engagement
• Meaning.

The pioneer of positive psychology, Martin Seligman, broke down happiness into three measurable components: pleasure, engagement, and meaning. Through his studies, he confirmed that people who pursue only pleasure experience only part of the benefits happiness can bring, while those who pursue all three routes lead the fullest lives.

So, instead of moping around waiting for a big break or a huge success that will change your situation and make you happy, start by being happy regardless of your current situation and success will automatically follow.

When you’re happy, your performance will improve, and success will easily follow.

People who put their heads down and wait for work to bring eventual happiness put themselves at a huge disadvantage, while those who capitalize on positivity every chance they get always come out ahead. In fact, studies have shown that happiness can improve our physical health, which in turn keeps us working faster and longer and therefore makes us more likely to succeed.

Hence, as much as you can, endeavor to stay happy and approach your day with maximum optimism. Even the smallest shots of positivity daily can give you a tremendous edge at achieving success.

“Happiness functions as the cause, not just the result, of good health.”

How to improve your mood and raise your happiness baseline

When you stay positive and happy, you are giving yourself a great edge at achieving great success at whatever you do in life. So to enjoy the happy and fulfilled life you crave, you will have to train your brain to always dwell on positive emotions rather than neutral or negative ones.

Happiness triggers the release of neurochemicals like dopamine and serotonin which helps you think more quickly and creatively and become better at solving problems.

Positive emotions flood our brains with neurochemicals like dopamine and serotonin that not only make us feel good, but also increase the capacity of the learning centers of our brains. And through a series of biochemical reactions, they help us think more quickly and creatively, become more skilled at complex analysis and problem solving, and see and invent new ways of doing things.

You can increase the level of your happiness regardless of your temperament or current mood.

Obviously, we are all different in our temperaments and there are people for whom positivity comes more naturally. The good news is, you can change your happiness baseline, regardless of whether you’re a naturally happier or moody person.

While we each have a happiness baseline that we fluctuate around daily, with conscious effort, we can increase that baseline permanently so that even when we are going up and down, we are doing so at a higher level. And according to the author, there are some actions that can boost both short-term emotions and permanently increase your happiness levels.

Here is how to improve your mood and raise your happiness throughout the day.

How to improve your happiness level throughout the day:
• By mediating
• By looking forward to something
• By being kind
• By exercising
• By infusing positivity into your surroundings
• By spending money

Meditate. Studies have shown that meditation helps grow the left prefrontal cortex — the part of our brain most responsible for feeling happy. So, take just five minutes each day to watch your breath go in and out. This will help you reduce stress, improve happiness and even your immunity over time. Also, it's been proven that in the minutes right after meditating, we experience feelings of calm and contentment, as well as heightened awareness and empathy.

Taking just five minutes a day to meditate. Meditation helps reduce stress, improve happiness and immunity.

Find something to look forward to. The anticipation of a reward or joyful events like a movie or a holiday can boost your endorphin levels and light up the pleasure centers in your brain so you feel as happy as when you enjoy the actual event.

Altruistic acts reduce stress and improve mental health.

Perform conscious acts of kindness. Charitable acts like giving to friends or strangers have been found to reduce stress and improve mental health. So, pick one day a week and make a point of committing five acts of kindness.

Infuse positivity into your surroundings. This has a great influence on your mindset and well – being. Surround your workspace with pictures of loved ones, make time to go for a walk on a nice day, and stay away from negative and violent TV programs.

Exercise triggers the release of happiness hormones, reduces stress and improves motivation.

Exercise. Exercise of any form — be it running, biking, or weightlifting — triggers the release of endorphins, reduces stress and improves motivation. Physical activities also help us get into the flow — that “locked-in” feeling of total engagement that we usually get when we’re at our most productive. Studies have shown that exercise is as effective as antidepressant medication in the short term, and is even more efficient than medication in the long-term.

To increase the level of your positivity for the day, you could run a couple of laps or do some cycling in the morning.

Spend money (but not on stuff). Contrary to popular belief, money can buy happiness, but only if used to do things rather than to simply have things. Investing in meaningful experiences and activities has been proven to bring more lasting happiness than pleasure from material acquisitions.

Putting your talent into use is a good way to boost your positivity level.

Exercise a Signature Strength. We are all good at something — perhaps you give excellent advice, or you’re great with little kids, or you cook amazing dishes. Each time we use a skill, whatever it is, we feel a burst of positivity. So if you ever find yourself in need of a happiness booster, revisit a talent you haven’t used in a while.

As you integrate these happiness activities into your daily life, you will not only start to feel better, but you’ll begin to notice how your enhanced positivity makes you more efficient, motivated, productive and also sets you up for greater achievement.

Changing Your Mindset: Use your fulcrum and lever to get your desired outcome

The greatest scientist and mathematician of ancient Greece, Archimedes famously asserted that with a long enough lever and the right fulcrum, a man could single-handedly move the world.

Your mindset is your fulcrum while your belief is your lever.

In life, our power to maximize our potential is based on two essential things:
1. The length of our lever — how much potential power and possibility we believe we have, and
2. The position of our fulcrum — the mindset with which we create the power to change.

Move your fulcrum in a positive direction, and the power of your lever will be magnified, ready to move everything up.

So whether you are a student who is trying to get better grades, a junior executive trying to get better pay, or a teacher hoping to better inspire students, you don’t need to try so hard to generate power and produce results. All you have to do is move your fulcrum — your mindset — in a positive direction, and the power of your lever will be magnified, ready to move everything up.

The more we move our fulcrum, the more our lever lengthens and so the more power we generate. Put simply, by changing your mindset and extending your belief of what’s possible, you can enhance your ability to create what initially seemed impossible. It is your fulcrum and lever that determines what you can accomplish in life, not the circumstances around you, not even the weight of the world.

Happiness is all about aligning our mindset to always see the ways to rise above our circumstances.

Essentially, happiness is not about lying to ourselves, or neglecting the negative, but about adjusting our brain so that we always see the ways to rise above our circumstances.

The Tetris Effect: Training your brain to capitalize on opportunities

The Tetris Effect is a cognitive phenomenon that occurs when we focus so much attention and time on something to the point that it radically changes our thoughts, mental images, and behaviors. This effect was named after the tendency for people to start seeing the world in sequences of Tetris blocks after playing the game of Tetris for a long time.

We tend to miss what we’re not looking for.

Naturally, the human brain is wired in such a way that we often find it difficult to see what is right in front of us if we’re not focusing directly on it. In the same vein, when we are looking for something, we see it everywhere. For instance, you hear a song once, and suddenly it seems it’s always on the radio. You buy a new style of jacket, and soon everyone you see on the street is wearing the exact same style.

Negative Tetris Effect: a cognitive pattern that decreases your overall success rates.

This is why focusing on the wrong things in life will cause you to miss out on great opportunities that are right in front of you. If you choose to focus on the negative and find fault in everything, you'll find it very difficult to see positivity in anything around you, no matter how excellent they are. This is known as the Negative Tetris Effect

Positive Tetris Effect: a mindset that constantly picks up on the positives in every situation.

The Positive Tetris Effect, on the other hand, is a way of seeing that constantly picks up on the positives in all situations. Having a positive outlook on things trains our brains to scan the world for the opportunities and ideas that allow our success rate to grow.

Three of the most important tools available to us: happiness, gratitude, and optimism

When our brains constantly scan for and focus on the positive, we benefit from three of the most important tools we have as humans: happiness, gratitude, and optimism.

So the more you pick up on the positive around you, the better you’ll feel. And as we’ve established earlier, your happiness has a great influence on your performance at work.

The more positive you are, the more grateful you become, and the more successful you become.

The second mechanism of the Positive Tetris effect is gratitude, because the more opportunities for positivity we see, the more grateful we become. Studies have also shown that consistently grateful people are more energetic, emotionally intelligent, forgiving, and less likely to be depressed, anxious, or lonely.

Positivity yields an endless trend of optimism.

Optimism is the third driver of the Positive Tetris Effect. The more your brain picks up on the positive, the more you’ll expect this trend to continue, and so the more optimistic you’ll be. And as it turns out, optimism is a tremendously powerful predictor of work performance.

Take three to five minutes each day to make a list of the good things in your job, your career, and your life.

The best way to adopt the Positive Tetris Effect is by making a daily list of the good things in your job, your career, and your life. When you write down a list of “three good things” that happened that day, you're forcing your brain to scan the last 24 hours for potential positives.

This will give you a vivid recollection of the things that brought you small or large laughs, feelings of accomplishment at work, a strengthened connection with family, a glimmer of hope for the future.

Focusing on the positive trains your brain to recognize opportunities.

Focusing on the good things in your life trains your brain to become more skilled at noticing and focusing on possibilities for personal and professional growth, and seizing opportunities to act on them.

And by training your brain to adopt a Positive Tetris Effect, you won't just be improving your chance at happiness, you'll be setting off a chain of events that will help you reap all the benefits of a positive brain.

Falling upward — capitalizing on setbacks and adversities to become happier, and more successful

One thing that is very common to each of us as a member of the human species is that we all experience adversity of one kind or another at some point in our lives. Mistakes. Obstacles. Failure. Frustration. Misery. We have many words to express the levels of hardship that can befall us at any given time in our personal or professional lives.

However, one thing the majority of us often fail to notice is that each setback we experience in life comes with some opportunity for growth that we can teach ourselves to see and take advantage of.

Essentially, we have three mental paths during crisis or adversity. The first path is the one that keeps circling around our current situation. The second is the one that leads us to start thinking about the worst – case scenarios. The third path is the one that leads us from failure or setback to a place where we are even stronger and more capable than before the fall.

We tend to lose sight of hope the moment we start facing adversities.

Unfortunately, finding the third path in difficult times isn’t easy. In a crisis, economic or otherwise, we tend to get so stuck in the misery of the status quo that we forget a positive and productive path is available. Our ability to find the Third Path is the difference between those who are crippled by failure and those who rise above it.

Rather than see failure as a stumbling block, see it as a stepping-stone to greatness.

The most successful people see difficulty not as a stumbling block, but as a stepping-stone to greatness. Indeed, early failure is often the fuel for the very ideas that eventually transform industries, make record profits, and reinvent careers.

For instance, Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team because he was not good enough. And by turning his failure and adversities into a stepping stone, Jordan went ahead to become one of the greatest men to ever play the game of basketball. Jordan once said: “I’ve failed over and over again in my life, and that is why I succeed.”

Every setback you experience has a great opportunity hidden in it.

Failures and adversities always come with great opportunities in disguise. And the way we choose to see a setback is what ultimately determines whether or not we are going to come out of it stronger than before.

So the next time you're feeling hopeless or helpless about some setback in your career, some frustration at your job, or some disappointment in your personal life, remember that there is always the Third Path upwards — all you have to do is to find it.

Success is about using the downfall brought about by the failure to propel yourself upward.

And most importantly, remember that success is not about never falling down or even simply about falling and getting back up over and over. Success is not just about simple resilience. It’s about using that downward momentum to propel ourselves upward.

Success is about capitalizing on setbacks and adversities to become happier, more motivated, and even more successful.

"It's Not Falling Down, It's Falling Up"

Use the Zorro circle to regain control of situations and take charge of your own fate

In today's world of intense and fierce competition, one of the most prominent drivers of success is the belief that our behavior matters; that we are in charge and have control over our future.

The feeling of being in charge of our own fate is a powerful driver success.

Having the innate feeling that we are in control, that we are in charge of our own fate, whether we are at work or at home, is one of the most powerful drivers of both well-being and performance. For instance, studies have shown that among students, greater feelings of control lead to higher levels of happiness, higher grades and more motivation to pursue the careers they truly want.

Likewise, workers who feel they have high levels of control at the office perform better at their jobs and report more job satisfaction. Employees who felt in control of their workplace also had lower levels of stress, work-family conflict, and job turnover.

Believing that our actions determine our fates in life spurs to work harder; and when we see this hard work pay off, our belief in ourselves only grows stronger.

Unfortunately, given how essential it is to our success and well-being, we don't always feel in control. Whenever our workload and stresses seem to pile up faster than we can keep up, feelings of control are often the first things to desert us, particularly when we try to take on too much at once.

To have a clear understanding of how this happens, we need to take a good look inside the brain. As humans, our actions are determined by the two dueling components of our brain: our knee jerk-like emotional system, which we will refer to as the Jerk, and our rational, cognitive system, which we'll call the Thinker.

The Jerk is the part of our brain that initiates the “fight or flight” response.

Evolutionarily speaking, the Jerk is the oldest part of the brain, and it is based in the limbic (emotional) region. Whenever we are in a stressful situation, the Jerk leaps into action and floods our body with adrenaline and stress hormones, sparking an immediate, innate reflex — a “fight or flight” response.

The Thinker is the part of our brain that initiates the “think, then react” response.

Conversely, the Thinker is the rational system in the brain that resides mostly in the prefrontal cortex. This is what we use to think logically, draw conclusions from many pieces of information, and plan for the future. Its main purpose is to initiate the “think, then react” response.

Emotional hijacking: when we are in crisis, the Jerk overpowers the Thinker causing us to act irrationally.

When we are under pressure, we experience an “emotional hijacking.” The Jerk overpowers the Thinker’s defenses, driving us into action without conscious thought. Instead of “think, then react,” the Jerk responds with “fight or flight.”

The Zorro Circle signifies our circle of control.

So how do we reclaim control from the Jerk and put it back into the hands of the Thinker? The answer is the Zorro Circle. Self-awareness is the first goal we need to conquer — or circle we need to draw.

Cultivate self-awareness by sorting out your feelings

To achieve this, we have to identify our feelings during distress and put those feelings into words. Verbalizing the stress and helplessness you are feeling is the first step toward regaining control. You can do it by writing down your feelings in a journal or talking to a trusted coworker or confidant.

Once you’ve mastered the self-awareness circle, your next goal should be to identify which aspects of the situation you have control over and which you don’t.

Accepting that some things are just beyond your control helps you focus your energy on the ones you can control.

By doing this, you will be able to recognize the stresses that you have to let go of because they’re out of your hands, while at the same time identifying the areas where your efforts will have a real impact, so that you can then focus your energy accordingly.

Tackling one small challenge at a time — a narrow circle that slowly expands outward — essentially helps you relearn that your actions do have a direct effect on your outcomes, that you are largely the master of your own fate. With an increasingly internal locus of control and greater confidence in your abilities, you can then expand your efforts outward

Conclusion

We become more successful when we are happier and more positive, not the other way around. A vast majority of us have been taught since we were kids that that success brings happiness. We were made to believe in a popular creed: Focus on productivity and performance, even to the detriment of our emotional and physical well-being, and you will eventually become more successful, and therefore happier.

However, thanks to strides in positive psychology, this myth has been turned on its head. When you’re happy and have an optimistic outlook on life, you tend to be more motivated, resilient, creative and efficient, which in turn enhances your performance and improves your results.

Increase your happiness level with meditation. Take just five minutes each day to watch your breath go in and out. This will help you reduce stress, improve happiness and even immunity over time. In fact, it's been proven that in the minutes right after meditating, we experience feelings of calm and contentment, as well as heightened awareness and empathy.