October 2009
- Thread starter Ally
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- Joined
- Mar 24, 2009
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Leaved the Dark Behind: Paul McKena shows you how to increase your levels of Happiness
Over the past few days, I`ve shown you techniques to help you control stress and make it work for you in a positive way. Today, in the final part of this series, I`m going to show you how to increase your levels of happiness and joy by looking at your life in a fresh, new way...
Trying to find time and space for everything we feel we must do is a matter of prioritising what matters.
One of my friends had to change his mobile phone. Before giving out the new number, he decided to try a little experiment called the 80/20 rule, which he had used to restructure his business. He made the assumption that 80 per cent of his stress was coming from 20 per cent of the people he knew, so he made a list of everyone in his life who increased his energy and all the people who brought it down.
Then he didn`t give the new number to the ones he no longer wanted to spend time with! The 80/20 rule was put forward by Wilfred Pareto, a 19th-century economist, who was surprised to discover 80 per cent of the world`s wealth was concentrated in the hands of 20 per cent of the
Read the full article here.
Over the past few days, I`ve shown you techniques to help you control stress and make it work for you in a positive way. Today, in the final part of this series, I`m going to show you how to increase your levels of happiness and joy by looking at your life in a fresh, new way...
Trying to find time and space for everything we feel we must do is a matter of prioritising what matters.
One of my friends had to change his mobile phone. Before giving out the new number, he decided to try a little experiment called the 80/20 rule, which he had used to restructure his business. He made the assumption that 80 per cent of his stress was coming from 20 per cent of the people he knew, so he made a list of everyone in his life who increased his energy and all the people who brought it down.
Then he didn`t give the new number to the ones he no longer wanted to spend time with! The 80/20 rule was put forward by Wilfred Pareto, a 19th-century economist, who was surprised to discover 80 per cent of the world`s wealth was concentrated in the hands of 20 per cent of the
Read the full article here.
- Joined
- Mar 24, 2009
- Messages
- 16,743
The New Optimism: How You can be Happy
Psychiatrists used to study misery. Then one day Martin Seligman, the (now very wealthy) father of the positive psychology movement, had the bright idea of turning things on their heads. Rather than study unhappy people, he thought, why not look at happy people?
Better yet, why not deconstruct their thoughts and put them together again in someone else`s head? This upside-down approach to mental health became the foundation for the biggest psychological movement of our time and the focus of the first world Congress on Positive Psychology in Philadelphia this summer.
This is also how Ben Renshaw, a "happiness" coach came to be sitting at my kitchen table. An indirect disciple of Seligman, Renshaw and his partner Robert Holden (whose book Be Happy: Release the Power of Happiness in You has just come out) are in the business of turning pessimists like me into, if not Pollyannas, then at least moderately upbeat personalities. Later this autumn they are running a London-based course to help turn our city`s mood around.
But Renshaw`s challenge was to turn my thinking around, and in one week or less. He would use methods developed in the Happiness Project that he and Holden founded in 1995. Much of this was to be done by comparing our responses to the same events and completing certain exercises.
From the moment Renshaw, a former musician dressed in a bright Hawaiian shirt, sat down and politely refused a second glass of red wine, I knew we were on different wavelengths. Words such as "great", "terrific", "success" and "connect" quickly came streaming from his mouth. My normal response to positive people is to get instantly negative, and this is where many of us get it wrong.
Read the full article here.
Psychiatrists used to study misery. Then one day Martin Seligman, the (now very wealthy) father of the positive psychology movement, had the bright idea of turning things on their heads. Rather than study unhappy people, he thought, why not look at happy people?
Better yet, why not deconstruct their thoughts and put them together again in someone else`s head? This upside-down approach to mental health became the foundation for the biggest psychological movement of our time and the focus of the first world Congress on Positive Psychology in Philadelphia this summer.
This is also how Ben Renshaw, a "happiness" coach came to be sitting at my kitchen table. An indirect disciple of Seligman, Renshaw and his partner Robert Holden (whose book Be Happy: Release the Power of Happiness in You has just come out) are in the business of turning pessimists like me into, if not Pollyannas, then at least moderately upbeat personalities. Later this autumn they are running a London-based course to help turn our city`s mood around.
But Renshaw`s challenge was to turn my thinking around, and in one week or less. He would use methods developed in the Happiness Project that he and Holden founded in 1995. Much of this was to be done by comparing our responses to the same events and completing certain exercises.
From the moment Renshaw, a former musician dressed in a bright Hawaiian shirt, sat down and politely refused a second glass of red wine, I knew we were on different wavelengths. Words such as "great", "terrific", "success" and "connect" quickly came streaming from his mouth. My normal response to positive people is to get instantly negative, and this is where many of us get it wrong.
Read the full article here.