Is this person genuinely happy?
Jan 272010
I have been teaching Happiness 101 as part of my private practice since April ’09 and only a month ago did I learn that former Harvard professor Tal Ben-Shahar released a DVD called “Happiness 101”! I just got it in the mail the other day after ordering it from PBS. It’s a great little video. In it, Tal gives a wonderful analogy of the downside of multitasking. First, think of two of your favorite songs. Go ahead, this is part of the exercise.
Please don’t proceed until you have your two songs in mind.
These two songs that you have now thought of your two songs, please rate them on a scale from 1-10 about how much you like them. Likely your top song is a 10 and your second fav is pretty close to that (a 9 or a 10). Take a few more seconds to think of how your songs sound. ‘Maybe even hum or sing a few bars from each one. Listening to each song will give you a Happiness Boost (Lyubomirsky, The How of Happiness). Think of how much you would enjoy that.
Now, imagine playing both songs at the same time. Playing a 10 song and a 9 song together does not yield a Happy experience of 19. Your two favorite songs played at the same time sounds more like NOISE, plummeting its listening pleasure to a 2 or 3 (at best).
Take this simple analogy and apply it to your own life. What are the things you enjoy doing most? For instance, it might be spending time with your children and reading. Trying to do both at the same time significantly lowers the experience of each activity. A lot of people are texting while doing other things. How much are they really enjoying these combined activities? Our current world is built around multi-tasking, especially at work. However, I am sure with a little effort you could find ways to do less multi-tasking and use mindfulness to fully enjoy the present moment.
Pick the dog!
~Frank
Jan 192010
What IS love exactly? How does it work? Are there reasons we love whom we love? Or is our love “unconditional”. If your love is unconditional, what exactly does that mean? Does it mean you will tolerate any behavior? Obviously much has been written on the subject of love. The founder of Positive Psychology, Martin Seligman, purports in his book Authentic Happiness that we love others for a particular combination of strengths that we hold dear. For instance, if we value honesty and our friend or partner exhibits honest behavior, then more tumblers in the key of love fall into place. Seligman lists 24 strengths that play a part in our feelings of friendship and love. You can test go onto Seligman’s site, www.authentichappiness.com and measure your strengths. Invite your significant other to take it too. It’s a great way to get to know each other better.
Jan 172010
Oxymoronic, isn’t it? Grief never feels good but there are good ways to grieve. This implies that if there are good ways to grieve, there are bad ways to grieve as well. The best way I can explain it is the band-aid analogy. You can do it the fast painful way or you can drag the pain out – possibly for years. While taking off the band-aid has two speeds – fast or slow – the speed of grief is more like slow or slower. Many have hoped that after two or three of those gut-wrenching sobbing sessions that they are all done, they’re over it. In her book, The Worst Loss, Barbara Rosof states that typically grieving lasts for weeks if not months depending on many things – particularly the strength of the relationship. No one wants to grieve. No one wants to feel that pain. Many people go to great extremes to avoid feeling their pain, immersing themselves in drugs, alcohol, work or an endless stream of projects. There is no way around it. The only way through it is to feel your feelings and allow yourself to heal. This is not to imply you will “get over it”. Grief is about learning to live with the loss. Aside from feeling your feelings, Rosof recommends two other critical points: your grief is unique and has its own timeline. Comparing your grief to others will probably only serve to make matters worse. The final point is to get support. Ironically, many people tend to isolate when they need to reach out the most. Caring Connections offers a grief support group. The Sharing Place offers support as well, not only to adults but specialize in helping children to grieve. If you are grieving, please reach out for help.
~Frank Clayton, LPC
Please pray for Haiti
Jan 122010
Mindfulness is one of the keys to being happy. After all, how can we enjoy the moment if we are not mindful? On the other end, mindfulness also helps us to be more aware of our negative thoughts, beliefs, patterns and behavior. Meditation is one of the best ways to improve mindfulness. Meditation can be done in many, many ways. One experiment in meditation I called the Right Now Game. The object of the Right Now Game is to become aware of all that is going on “right now”. What is going on for you right now? As Nick Nolte’s character in the movie The Peaceful Warrior says “There’s never nothing going on.” This, by the way, is a sound bite I hear when I open my computer. The rest of the quote is “Take out the trash. The trash is anything that distracts you from this moment – here, now”. It is a GREAT inspirational movie. As inspirational as it is, no, I did not get the idea for the Right Now Game from The Peaceful Warrior – but I certainly could have. There are SO many things going on right now – even if you are simply sitting and reading this article. “Sitting” and “reading” are, after all, verbs.
How to play the Right Now Game:
Say or think to yourself “Right now ___________________________” and fill in the blank.
Here are some examples:
Right now I am sitting. Right now I am reading. Right now my heart is pumping. Right now my bladder is digesting my food. Right now I am a husband. Right now I am a therapist. Right now I am living in Salt Lake City. Right now I am an American. Right now I am a friend. Right now I am pausing to think of what “right now” to write next. Right now I am adjusting my glasses. etc. etc.
I also suggest making sure you liberally pepper your “right nows” with how you are feeling: Right now I (physically) feel some tension in my shoulders. Right now (emotionally) I feel content.
Staying in touch with your emotions is an important part of mindfulness because so often we make decisions based on our emotion – AND a miriad of other reasons it might be important to be in touch with our feelings, but that’s an entirely different article.
The other “right now” I suggest is “Right now I am doing _____________________ because _______________”. This is important because if you do not at least occassionally think about why you are doing what you are doing, you might find yourself focusing so completely on being in the moment that you forget why you are there. For instance, “Right now I am driving to work because I want to keep my job.”
When I did this, I enjoyed it so much I did it for another two days. I never forgot where I laid my keys and I was more attentive and more alive than I had ever felt in my life. Give it a try – “right now” (sorry, I couldn’t resist).
~Frank
Please watch the attached video. I suggest you do so when you have a quiet moment and can give it your undivided attention. It’s less than three minutes long but could change the way you see your entire life.
Go ahead.
I’ll wait.
.
.
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Messages from Water
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Welcome back!
I know. It’s hard to believe, but it is true. It’s been scientifically proven. If you are still in a state of disbelief, I invite you to go to Dr. Emoto’s website by clicking here before reading on.
Like the man said in the video, if our thoughts can do that to water, imagine what our thoughts can do to us.
With that in mind, here are a few other sobering statistics:
The average person has 45,000 negative thoughts per day
The average person complains 70 times a day
Human beings are comprised of over 70% water
What messages are you telling yourself – both in thought and in word?
What messages are you telling yourself through your behavior?
What kinds of messages are you allowing into your world – and how are those messages effecting you?
What kind of TV are you watching? News? Crime shows? “Reality” shows of people behaving badly?
How about the radio? Have you really listened to the words of the music you listen to – and by singing along with it, what are you affirming to yourself?
Do your friends support you or do they tear you down?
Even your clothes are influencing you. Certainly if a word written on a vial can change water at a molecular level, then hate words written across your T-shirt can have an impact on you.
In Happiness 101 I constantly beat the drum of “CHOICE” and how the things you do every day can take you a step closer to happiness or further away.
Today is YOUR day. It’s your choice. ‘Make it a good one.
~Frank
Jan 052010
Sadly New Year’s resolutions seem to becoming something of a joke. It has become almost assumed that we will make this commitment to ourselves and break it by spring. I hope that if you have made a New Year’s resolution, that you take it seriously. Breaking promises to yourself breaks down your trust in your ability to follow through. If you have made a resolution, I offer the following tips to succeed:
Be specific: If your goal is not clear, how will you know when you have succeeded? For instance, if you said “I want to do more push-ups” – this is general. How would you know when you have done enough push-ups to say “Yea! I reached my goal”? To say “I want to do 10 more push-ups” is more specific.
Know your baseline: You must know where you are starting from to know how much you want to improve. If I want to do 10 MORE push-ups, I must first know how many push-ups I can do now. If your goal is something difficult to measure, you could determine a baseline by asking yourself where you are now on a scale from 1-10. For instance, “I want to be happier” is a great goal but how would you measure it? So you could ask yourself “On a scale from 1-10, how happy am I now?” You then record this number and revisit it at a set time.
Set a time limit: Without a time limit your goal would imply that it expected that you do this for the rest of your life. Even if you do have that intention, it is important to set regular times to review your goal. You want to also make sure the time frame you have set is reasonable.
Do-able: Is your goal reasonable? Is it something you can do? Is it something you have control over? For instance, if your goal is to lose weight, that’s great but if you have a thyroid problem or take medications that cause weight gain, you could be left feeling frustrated. A goal you have control over is, “I will work out for 30 minutes, four days a week.”
A final word (in writing): Please write your goal down – and date it. An old friend of mine used to say, “A goal not written is just a wish”
~Frank
Jan 032010
January 22nd and 23rd
Dino Watt
Think about it: Would a marriage not fair better with a specific plan for success. How about regular “meetings” where you could discuss how the relationship has gone thus far and what direction you would like to go – together, as a couple. Do you even know the aspirations to which your significant other is currently striving as an individual? How might those plans effect you? In this planning, communication is crucial. Therefore, Dino has invited me to teach about the basics of communication; to make sure the signal sent is the signal received. When I work with couples in my private practice we usually find miscommunication to be a basic part of the problem. In a very short period of time, you will learn how to communicate effectively and have the opportunity to practice it and use it in your daily life immediately. This technique is ideal when you do not feel heard, have difficulty saying what you want to say and dealing with irate people. I use this technique in my daily life as a therapist, a friend and a partner. Join us for “The Business of Marriage” workshop, Friday, January 22nd (starting at 9am) and Saturday January 23rd. Cost is merely $198 PER COUPLE! Plus you can get $50 off just by going to http://bizofmarriage.eventbrite.com/ and use the discount code: Happiness101. This workshop is not only for those in relationship. It is also for people that want to be in a good healthy relationship. In other words, everyone is welcome! See you there.
