Hi everyone, welcome back. I'm Michael Sandler, your host on Inspire Nation. Did you ever wish you could be happier right now?
Much happier? That life could be, well, happier in each moment, more puppies and roses, or that at least the sun could be shining more than half the time? Well then, do we have the show for you. Today we'll be talking with Tal Ben-Shahar, a former Harvard psychology professor and a leader in the field of positivity and happiness.
He's also the author of the best-selling book, Choose the Life You Want, The Mindful Way to Happiness. Today we'll be talking about at least 10 key ways to choose happiness in each moment, plus the power of smiling and why we both did it before starting the show, plus why we might want to forego that new Porsche and instead head for Cabo Pronto. Arriba!
Well, welcome to the show, Tal. Are you ready to shine? Am I ready? Let's do it. All right, well, before we dive into things, how in the world did you end up studying happiness?
Well, I became interested in happiness because of my own unhappiness. Uh-oh, some more research. Yeah, so I was an undergraduate at Harvard studying computer science, of all things, and I found myself in my sophomore year doing well academically, doing well in sports, I played squash, and yet being very unhappy. And it didn't make sense to me because when I looked at my life from the outside, you know, things looked great.
From the inside, it didn't feel that way. And then I decided to switch course and I switched from computer science to philosophy and psychology, focusing on how I can help myself initially and later others become happier. And did that feel like a lot more of a fit? Yes. Initially, I must say it was uncomfortable in that area.
I was much more... number-oriented. Oh yeah, that's one heck of a switch.
But then very quickly I fell in love with many of the philosophers, ancient philosophers, modern ones, as well as psychologists. So let's jump ahead a few years and let's talk about a little bit about the study of happiness. And am I reading correctly?
Was there really a study where they gave you money just to buy stuff so you could buy yourself happy? Yeah, I mean, wouldn't you want to be part of that study? Sign me up.
Let me get my list. Yeah, and the results were fascinating. So they gave a group of people a nice sum of money, and they told them, go spend it on yourself.
Go have fun with it. Indulge. And they did, and they bought themselves gadgets or shoes or whatever they wanted.
And then they measured their levels of happiness before and after. And, you know... No big surprise, levels of happiness went up.
You know, this is the first time in recorded history when you actually have scientific evidence for Carrie Bradshaw's claim from Sex and the City that buying shoes makes you happier. I think that's amazing. So I've got to ask, what's the stick?
What's the shelf life on that happiness? Exactly. So they brought them in a day later and they found that there was no impact whatsoever.
So shoppers high lasted... maximum a day and then gone, disappeared. And then they brought in another group of people and they gave them the exact same amount of money with a slightly different instruction. Instead of telling them go spend it on yourself, they told them go spend it on someone else.
So, you know, they could donate it or help someone, whatever. And they experienced the same high as the shoppers did with one major difference. It lasted. a lot longer than a day.
So after a week, they could still see some impact of that contribution, of that help. Very cool. So I guess that would bring us to reason number one, we would say act of kindness then?
Yeah, to give. I'm originally from Israel, and my mother tongue is Hebrew. And in Hebrew, the word to give is Natan, which is spelled N-A-T-A-N. N-A-T-A-N. That's a polydrome.
In other words, it reads the same way from both directions. Good point. It's not a coincidence because when I give, I also receive. It's a two-way street.
And, you know, today we have the data, the research, to back up this ancient linguistic wisdom. Fascinating. So that'd be way number one, helping people. And... Let's talk then, go from there to being present.
You talk about specifically a beautiful story about a designer. A blind designer. Eric, I wonder if you could share that with us.
Sure, yes. So Eric, you know, it sounds like an oxymoron, a blind designer, but Eric is actually... And we're talking like a home designer here.
A home designer, yeah, yeah. And he's a leading designer who's sought after by numerous clients, designs beautiful homes, and he goes into a place and he, I mean, he describes it this way, he feels... the place and obviously uses his other senses as well whether it's smell or touch but he senses a place and with that he's and with the clients help as well because he speaks to them and and feels the reaction to different to different attempts or two different experiments and he designs a beautiful home now You think about Helen Keller as an even more extreme example.
Not only was she blind, she was also deaf. And the levels of sensitivity that she was able to bring to her interactions, to her writing. And we too, we need to use our senses, whether we have all five of them or not. We need to use them and to use them we need to be present. We need to be mindful.
Now, the interesting thing about mindfulness is that it doesn't just make us better designers or better writers. It makes us a lot happier. It contributes to our psychological well-being.
It also contributes to our physical well-being, strengthening our immune system. So when you're talking about being mindful, can you go into more depth what exactly we're looking at? And I'm picturing also there's, just with Helen Keller, an element of gratitude.
I'm not taking for granted what I do have. Yeah, exactly. I just finished a small study and a children's book on Helen Keller, who is the consummate appreciator. She didn't take for granted what she had. She was grateful for it and just about at every moment in her life.
Now, if we combine being present and gratitude, that's a very powerful. very powerful duo in terms of increasing our levels of happiness. Because we can also be grateful and not mindful, and that's not as effective. But being mindful and experiencing what Barbara Fredrickson calls heartfelt positivity, feeling just good in the moment, again, that contributes to psychological, physical, interpersonal well-being.
I think that can also lead to... If people were to put themselves in my shoes on occasion or my lack of shoes, going out walking barefoot and even going around the block, all of a sudden I'm like, wow, look at that tree. Wow, look at that squirrel.
Look at that chipmunk. This is great. Because you're just in the, if you got the gratitude and the mindfulness going on, you're just in the wonderment of it all.
Yeah. And if you really think about it, really think about it, everything is a wonder. You know, whether it's that chipmunk or whether it's the fact that. You know, we're talking to one another, you know, I'm in Tel Aviv, you're just outside New York City, and whoever is watching is wherever they are, you know, so the wonder of technology, the wonder of sight or sound, you know, people think, oh well, you know, we've really made advances in science and we understand the way things, we don't, we understand, we don't even understand how the law of gravity works, I mean, we know it's there, but why?
So, you know, the world is a wonder. It's what Einstein said. He said there are two ways to look at the world.
Either nothing is a miracle or everything is a miracle. You know, I opt for the second. Me as well. And I often look at Skype itself as a miracle.
It really is. It's working today. Woohoo! So what are some key ways then? Let's jump down the mindfulness rabbit hole because I think this is...
This is the crux of things. We were talking off air beforehand, and your book goes over 101. It's amazing, 101 different ways that we can experience more happiness and learn how to appreciate things more. But it all comes back to mindfulness. So can you give us some key ways to cultivate this presence for the purpose, in this case, of happiness? Right.
So let me draw an analogy first. So if you had asked me... So give us some tips about becoming fit, physically healthy. I would say that you have two options. One is to go to the gym and work out there or use a stationary bike or whatever.
Another one is to cultivate an active lifestyle. Now, they're not mutually exclusive. We could do both. The same with mindfulness.
One way, the equivalent of going to the gym would be sitting down, closing your eyes and taking deep breaths, focusing on the air going in and then going out. That would be the formal meditation. At the same time, just like to become fit, you don't need to go to the gym, you can also just lead a more active lifestyle.
We can bring mindfulness to everyday life. And, for example, in terms of listening, you know, whether it's right now, you know, listening to this Skype interview or you and I listening to one another or listening to your daughter as she shares her experience from school or listening to a colleague at work. At every moment, every interaction, we can bring mindfulness to it.
Now, the interesting thing about being mindful, say, in a conversation is that it doesn't just contribute to our own happiness and our own physical health. just like every mindfulness exercise does, it also contributes to the well-being and physical health of the person who is listened to. So it's a win-win. Well, back up.
I want to hear that one again. You weren't listening? Oh, no.
No, I was being very mindful, but I think this one, this one is a mind-bender for people or it's a mind-blower for people. It's a big one. So there's research done by people like Osnad Buskila.
and others showing that actually listening to someone contributes to their physical health. Now, we've known for a long time that children who are listened to, their self-esteem is higher, they grow up to be healthier, happier adults. And now we see it also in the workplace that employees are sick less often when they're listened to usually by their boss but also by their colleagues.
By the way, one of the best predictors of people's not just job satisfaction, but also productivity at work is the answer to the question, do you have a best friend at work? Wow. And a lot of it has to do with the fact that you have someone to hear you out.
So we get someone to hear us out. We become better listeners. We become better listeners. We have somebody who can listen to us. Which also might mean a dog or a cat.
Well, sorry, there's also research on that, on pets. And, of course, you know, having pets contributes to well-being for many reasons, by the way. One of the things is, you know, you take your dog out for a walk, you exercise, you meet people, which all, of course, contributes to well-being.
But I guess also someone, I don't know if someone who listens to you, but someone who you feel... that you're seen by. You feel visible.
That makes sense. That makes sense. What would be some other keys? Let's say that we're trying to cultivate that mindfulness in everyday life.
A few key ways that we can do that. Right. So, you know, in the book, I talk about how at every moment in our life, we have a choice. And it really is at every moment. So it's also kind of...
cultivating mindfulness in terms of the way I sit, the way I carry myself. So, you know, work by Amy Cuddy on physical posture, of course, matters a lot. It's when I do the dishes, I can be mindful of, you know, the water.
When I eat, I recently participated in a meditation workshop where the teacher had us eat a raisin, one raisin for 15 minutes. Wow. We smelt it. We looked at it.
Eventually, we put it in our mouth. Before we even tasted it, we just felt the texture there. Now, this is not something that I'd recommend doing on a daily basis.
We get not very high return on effort there. But even if we spent five minutes at the beginning of each meal or even one meal a day for 10 minutes, just... Absorbing those smells and tastes, we'd not just enjoy the meal more, we'd also begin to eat more healthfully. We'd be more mindful of what we ingest. I lived in France for a few years, and the pace with which they would eat dinners at first was painstaking, to say the least.
And then I actually came to appreciate it over time. And we're talking, you know, instead of a... A five-minute meal or a 30-minute meal, you're talking a two-or three-hour endeavor.
Right. And again, it doesn't have to be every day and three times a day. We wouldn't get much work done. But we can do it.
Even a little bit more of the time, and this is the wonderful thing about the meditation work. Yeah, you can go out and meditate for eight hours a day for, you know, going on a six-month retreat, and that would probably make a significant, enhance your levels of well-being in a significant way. However, even just 10 minutes or five minutes a day of meditation, of mindful eating, of mindful listening, that in and of itself can go a long way.
So I want to jump into choices here in a second, but before I do that, I want to hit one that I think you bring up fairly frequently, and it's one that I think about a lot as well, which is posture. So I wonder if you can be up nice and tall and talk to us about posture. Yes, okay. Give me a minute.
Ah, that's a lot better. Okay. All right.
So research by Amy Cuddy, who's a Harvard Business School professor. It's shown that people who assume a posture, either what she calls a high power pose, which would be something like this, chest up, shoulders back. Or sitting like this, feeling very good about yourself.
High power pose. Two minutes of that reduces levels of cortisol, which is the stress hormone. And increases levels of testosterone, which is associated with self-confidence and self-esteem. Let me back you up for one second.
For people who couldn't see it, the second pose, you had your hands behind your head, up behind your head with your elbows out to the side. I would call this almost like the CEO pose. They're leaning back in their chair. You're coming into their office and they're like, all right. Little one, what do you want now?
I'd call it the big shot pose. Say that one more time. I'd call it the big shot pose.
Yes, the big shot pose. And you're saying that it changes our chemistry. Yes, increases your testosterone levels and reduces your cortisol levels. You become more confident, less stressed. On the other hand… low power pose, which would be the opposite of, so it would be, you know, sitting down like this or, uh, shoulders together, rounded forward with your hand, you know, protecting your neck, you know, sort of, uh, demonstrating a lack of confidence sitting for two minutes like that actually increases cortisol levels, which are your stress hormones and D uh, decreases, um, your testosterone levels, which is your self-confidence and strength.
Fascinating from a, uh, a hunter, what a predator-prey perspective. I don't know why this popped into my head. When you put your hands in front of you like that, I felt like you're a deer in the woods waiting to be pounced upon.
Right. And, you know, there are evolutionary reasons why you would do that. You know, you're declaring that, you know, I don't want to fight, you know, I came in peace.
But when we do it, you know, on a regular basis, when we're sitting in front of a computer, and, you know, the way we very often sit in front of a computer is hunched forward. That's actually not healthy for, certainly not for our backs, but also not for our psychology. It's a lot better to sit up straight and if you need to type, to type this way, or once in a while to get up and stretch your hands up and so on, can make a big difference to our psychological well-being. So let's go from here to some more everyday choices that we can make in the moment. whether it's getting cut off or whatever, choices we can make to make us happier at that particular second.
Yes, so for me one of the big ones, and as I see it, it's really the foundation of positive psychology, which is the science of happiness, is what I've come to call the permission to be human. And the permission to be human is about allowing ourselves to experience any and all emotions. Because one of the mistakes that many of the self-help...
books, gurus, advocates make is that they talk about the possibility of being happy all the time. And what that means is having no painful emotions. But it's also a setup.
It's a setup for failure because there are two kinds of people who don't experience painful emotions like anger, sadness, envy, disappointment. Disappointment, anxiety, two kinds of people. The first kind are the psychopaths. Okay. And the second type of person who does not experience painful emotions is dead.
So, you know, experiencing these emotions is actually a good sign. It's, you know, not a psychopath and alive. You've got a pulse.
Yeah, you actually, you talk about in your book, one that I think it was you who experienced with your one month old, was it one month old son? Yeah. And you're very honest in sharing there.
It's a real human emotion you went through. Yeah, so I experienced envy toward my, you know, my, toward my child. Why?
Because for the first time since my wife and I had been together, here was someone who was getting more attention than I was. I had no magic. No matter how much I cried, right? So, you know, that led to feelings of envy.
Now, the thing is, there were two ways to deal with that emotion. One way was to reject it. Now, there's a lot of research showing, and we don't need research for that because we, you know, all of us have experienced it, that when we try to reject the emotion. So if I said to myself, I don't feel envy, you know, I don't feel jealousy, how could I? This would be horrible.
If I continued along that path, that emotion would have actually intensified. What we resist persists. Yes, and not only that, it would also exact a high, not just psychological, but also physical price. So there's work by John Sarno from NYU, who's a medical doctor, showing that a lot of the back problems that we have are as a result. of suppressing certain emotions, emotions that we're unwilling to accept.
So for example, me experiencing envy toward my son whom I love so dearly, that can happen and I suppress it. It has to come out in some way. And the way it very often comes out is it goes to the weakest link. And for many people, the weakest link is the lower back. So that manifests itself as backache.
And on the other hand, when I let it out, when I express it, And I say, okay, you know, I'm envious. It's part of being human. I'm neither a psychopath nor dead.
I'm okay. I'm human. Yes, I have a pulse, as you say. Then it actually goes away.
I allow it to flow through me and out of me. And then that leaves a space, openness to also experiencing the wonderful emotions. Because, you know, if we block the painful emotions, we're inadvertently... Also blocking the pleasurable ones because emotions flow through the same pipeline. And if I block one set, I'm blocking the other.
Wow. So we actually have to be open to experience that. It makes a lot of sense.
Yeah. And experience could be crying. Experience could be sharing with others. Experiencing could be writing about it. We choose our favorite method.
There's a back surgeon, his name, I'm just going to space at this moment, who has an exercise. where he has you write down your negative emotions, write down whatever is bothering you, and then you tear it up and you put you tear it up into many little pieces and you put it in the trash can. So you got it out. Yes, you got it out. After first acknowledging it.
Yes, you have to acknowledge it first or else there's your back problems again. Yeah. So let's talk about getting lucky and specifically characteristics of a lucky person because I found this fascinating.
Yeah, I must say I did too. So this is by Professor Wiseman, and as his name suggests, he is indeed a very wise man. And he was very interested in the phenomenon of luck.
Why are some people luckier than others? And, you know, some of it has to do with, you know, good fortune, you know, you were in the right place at the right time. But what he identified were actual psychological characteristics. a way to approach life that makes some people luckier than others. For example, the people who are luckier actually believe that they're lucky.
So it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Another thing, they're much more open to being surprised. In other words, they're much more mindful.
For example, two people could walk in the street and one would be open and look around and suddenly see, oh, there is a $10 bill. So lucky. Well, because you were open to that luck.
And it happens in more important situations such as relationships. I'm looking for a person whom I'll fall in love with. I'm much more likely to find that person than if I close myself off and don't put myself on the line or in situations where I may meet such a person.
So you can attribute it to luck or you can attribute it to raising the chances of that happening. Because of my behaviors. Another thing that lucky people do is they interpret events more positively.
So this was an interesting one. So when lucky people, for example, break their hand, they would very often say something to the effect of, you know, I'm so lucky because I could have fallen on my head. That would have been a lot worse. Whereas unlucky people would say, oh, you know, I'm so unlucky. I fell on my hand.
And that ends up. leading to more lucky or unlucky experiences depending on interpretation. So, geez, I want to stay on that topic, but it leads, it segues so perfectly into being a benefit finder rather than a fault finder and your history with squash.
Yeah, so the benefit finder is a term that I got from Henry David Thoreau who wrote about it in the 1840s. And he said he talked actually about the fault finder, which is its opposite. And he said the fault finder will find faults even in paradise. And the same idea applies to benefit finder. We can find benefits in just about every situation.
And what I did and what I talk about in my book is how the exact same situation can be interpreted in two radically different ways. So, you know, one example would be from squash. You know, when I was in my late teens, early 20s, I got injured. And that unfortunately...
And you were a national class... player, I believe. Yeah, I played professional squash and that was my life. I remember at the age of 16, actually having that thought and saying, what am I going to do with my life once I can't play squash anymore?
I mean, there was nothing else that interested me, certainly not to the same degree, extent, intensity. And yet I got injured and I got injured and the doctor said, you know, it's over for you. And that was devastating. Now, Now, looking back at it, one way to interpret it, the injury decimated my squash career. It ended my dream, which was to continue being a professional player, to be one of the best in the world.
Instead, I can also interpret it by saying I'm fortunate because as a result of that, I became much more interested in academia. That's the reason why I went to Harvard, because I didn't turn to be a professional squash player. And there I discovered my passion, which is psychology.
And other examples in my life would be failures that I had, whether it's academic failures or not getting... We'll put that in quotes. Failures in quotes. No. No.
No, they're real failures because, you know, when they happened, they were very real. They weren't in quotes. You know, they hurt and, you know, some of them, whether they made me cry or very disappointed.
So they were very real. And yet, without them, I wouldn't have learned certain lessons. You know, when I have a group of people in class, I ask them to do the following. And I say, you know, think about... the most important experiences, the experiences you learned most from in your life.
So, you know, I give them a minute for that. And then I say, okay, now put your hand up if it was a painful or difficult experience. Over 90%. My hands up.
Yeah. So, you know, if we think about them, when they happen, they hurt, you know, their disappointments, failures, whatever they are. But a benefit finder learns to, in the long term, find benefit in these as well.
You know, so You know when many people say things happen for the best? Yeah, or everything happens for a reason. Everything happens for a reason, or everything happens for the best.
I don't completely buy that. But what I do buy is that while things do not necessarily happen for the best, some people are able to make the best of things that happen. Ooh, I like that. And the benefit finder is able to do that. And I must say, I'm not a naturally born benefit finder, so I'm much more of a pessimist, but it's something that can be learned.
And what have you done personally to kind of rewire or catch yourself in that moment? Yes, so two main things that I do, or three main things. One thing is that I teach it, and by teaching it, I'm reinforcing it. Second, writing about it, so that there's a lot of work on journaling and how important that is.
The third thing that I do, and I don't just do it for that, I do it for many things that I want to introduce into my life, I have reminders around me. So, you know, whether it's, you know, I have pictures on my wall or whether, you know, I wear a bracelet. I almost always wear a bracelet and this bracelet reminds me of certain things.
So, for example, until recently I wore it to remind me just to return to the here and now, to be present. And now specifically as of yesterday, I have something new that I want to be reminded of, which is to be more playful. Because, you know, I've been traveling a lot and, you know, busy and distracted and, you know, just be playful.
The reminder helps embed desired behavior or approach. Do you do mental, like self-talk, reframing in the head when you catch yourself? Yes, and more now than in the past because I catch myself more often.
So, for instance, when I'm feeling down and then on top of feeling down, I say to myself, Come on, you're feeling down? You're the happiness professor. What's going on here? No pressure.
Exactly. And then immediately what comes to mind, permission to be human, not a psychopath nor dead. Or when I'm with my kids and my mind is elsewhere at work, what I do is I remind myself, return to the present, being the here and now. It's such a privilege to be spending time with them.
So yes, these... this voice exists and at the same time it's also important to let go of the voice and just be. Makes sense. So going back to the fun side of things, you have chapter 25 in your book bringing humor and lightness and you even talk about Norman Cousins. Yeah, so you know Norman Cousins is, you know, it's the first time when people really started to think about the healing power of humor, you know, and he healed himself from what doctors thought was a chronic disease.
He healed himself by prescribing humorous activities, whether it was watching sitcoms or telling jokes. And, you know, the power of humor is just remarkable. And the thing today is that we have humor accessible to us literally at our fingertips, you know, so I can go right now and, you know, on YouTube, look for my favorite podcast.
my favorite comedian and just laugh. The thing though that we need to keep in mind about humor is that one of the things that kill humor is two things, distraction and being too busy. So one of my favorite comedians is Alan DeGeneres. Oh, he's great. She's amazing and, you know, so positive and also combining it with dance.
Again, a great duo, dance and humor. Which you talk about. There's a video that I recommend on your website that talks about, see if I get this right, the wonder drug in exercise. And you talk about dance in there. Yes, that's right.
So everybody should go. This is a shameless plug for your website. Go and check that out.
Thank you. So Ellen DeGeneres talks about too busy disorder. TBD, too busy disorder, which you said so many of us have.
And that's one of the things that really unfortunately kills playfulness and humor. So it's important. That's why it's so important to do less rather than more, to shed off layers of busyness. It sounds like we need a drug for that TBD. Well, soon it will be on the shelf.
It won't just be restless leg. It gets. Are you doing too much?
Then do we have the drug for you? They used to call it a hammer, but... Oh my, which is another one, humor and laughter. So you talk about being optimistic. And I found this fascinating.
I've been a running coach for years, so I've seen this firsthand. Roger Bannister and the mile. And when you change, when you shift what you believe is possible, how... everything shifts. Yeah.
You know, this is something that's very difficult for us in the West to understand, to fathom the mind-body connection. You know, how is it possible that just when Roger Bannister ran the mile in under four minutes, suddenly the same year, dozens of people ran the mile in under four minutes? If you're not a runner, four minutes is considered the miracle mile. It was this threshold, sort of like the sound barrier. That they're going, all the physiologists, all the guys with the fancy titles are saying, you'll have a, your heart will explode, something will happen, you just, you can't get past four minutes.
The limits of human ability. Bingo. Yeah.
And yet Roger Bannister does it, you know, in the... Who was a med school student. Yes. Back in 1954, and suddenly everyone's doing it, just because they started to believe that it's possible. And you know, we see it in education, teachers who believe.
Edit the Particular students are the best students in class. These students actually become the best, even though they were randomly picked out of a hat and the teachers were actually lied to about their potential. We see it with athletes. One of the best predictors of success is, you know, do you believe that you can do well?
We see it even with the effect of placebo drugs that can have a healing impact. just like real drugs, just because there is a belief that they will work. So it's a, you know, our mind is a miraculous thing.
So how do we go to shift that belief? And I'm thinking of kids now because, well, I know growing up for myself, my mom had us IQ tested. I came out with one number. I was on one path, my sister on another number. They put her on another path.
And so you were given somebody else's belief. And then they're treating you based on that belief, and you're actually wiring yourself based on the belief. So then how do you flip that around? Yeah, first of all, it's not easy. And the way as a society that we need to deal with that is through the system of education.
And again, Robert Rosenthal, who was a professor at Harvard in his very famous Pygmalion in the Classroom experiments. show that if you tell teachers that students have high IQs, even if they don't, these students begin to perform in according to these expectations. So first of all, we need to get teachers to really understand that basically each and every student has the potential to be a lot smarter than their performance would suggest.
So that's the first thing on a system. on a system level, on an individual level, the best way to increase, well, two best ways that I can think of right now to increase our abilities. One is to focus on the things that we are already good at, or the things where our strengths lie.
So for example, if my strength is in writing, I want to focus on writing. If my strength is in crunching numbers, That's what I want to focus on and do a lot more of it. And that will increase my overall levels of self-confidence and I'll perform better in different areas, not just in crunching numbers or in writing.
So that's one area. The second area, and I go here to the amazing work of Carol Dweck from Stanford. So she does work on mindset showing that how our mindset, whether it's a fixed mindset or a growth mindset. affects our performance.
So if we believe in the growth mindset, which is I can learn, I can grow, I can develop, then that becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. I actually grow, develop, and learn. If I think that it's fixed, that I was born with a certain IQ and that is not going to change, then I remain fixed. That too becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. So we've got to be real careful to watch those prophecies.
Yes. Watch those expectations. So let's dive into a little bit more of the fun side of things here.
The fun side of happiness. There's a funny way to put that. Why shouldn't we get the Porsche and instead take a vacation?
Specifically, chapter 21 of your book, you talk about the value of experiences over goods and how that can have a lot more of a lasting bite to it. Yes. Yes.
So, you know, when you ask most people, if you had the choice, let's say you get a bonus at the end of the year. You can buy a new car or go on a family vacation or vacation with your friends. What do you do? Most people would say, well, I want that new car because that new car will last me for, you know, for years to come.
Whereas vacation, it's over in a week. Well, it turns out that most people are wrong. That one week vacation actually overall increases our levels of happiness much more than the car. Experiences contribute more to happiness than things do. Can you look at this in a sense as if, I don't even know what the perfect example is.
I want to think of a computer maybe. And each experience is putting in a software. You can put in one piece of software that gives it a certain level of happiness. That's one experience. Another one raises it more and more until you've got this bursting happiness machine where there's, if not, if you just get another mouse, it still hasn't affected the happiness at all.
Yeah, I think it's a nice metaphor to use. Yes. Which is related to the way it actually works on a psychological level.
You see, because every experience is not just defined or confined to the time during which it takes place, but it has a trickle effect. So that vacation will have a trickle effect, will affect, in your metaphor, the rest of the system, the rest of the computer. It will affect...
you know, the week after as well, because you've become closer to your family or to your friends. And that will also affect the week after because you also remember, think back to that experience, and that will have an upward spiral impact potentially on your life, much more so, it turns out, than getting more things. I think you've inspired me here because what I'm hearing in the back of my mind, and many people listening may also be hearing this.
Which is we should shoot for more experiences, more positive experiences, any chance we can that that's going to add to a level of fulfillment. Good. Exactly that.
And I would add to that it doesn't have to be that incredible trip around the world or even that one week vacation in the Seychelles. It can be small experiences such as going, you know, right now and having a conversation. with your friend or partner or kid and consciously, mindfully, bringing positive energy and appreciation and savoring to that experience.
So it's the small things that can make a big difference. Once again, because they can spiral up potentially. Woohoo! Tiki is spiraling up. The importance of dreams.
And I must... applaud your parents send send them all my love because they did great on this one yeah so you know my parents you know if there's one thing that they did was they indulged uh me when it came to my dreams so they took my dreams or my my brother and sister's dreams very seriously and again that's related to something which we spoke about at the beginning which is listening you You know, they listened to my dream. They didn't discard them or say, oh, that's not that. That's a kid. Let's move on.
And they really listened and they were there with me. And that made me as a kid take my dream seriously as well. Beautiful. So what would you say is or what do you mean by leading a spiritual experience? Yes.
So, you know, when it comes to spirituality. The most significant element is the experience being a meaningful, purposeful one. You know, a monk who doesn't see his work as meaningful is less spiritual than an investment banker who sees her work as important and significant. So that is the element that makes our life, our experiences spiritual.
And now finding that purposeful or... Spiritual in our life doesn't have to be in those very great experiences or big aha moments or special moments even. In just about every moment in our life, we can experience the spiritual in what we do.
We can experience it in our interaction with our best friend. We can experience it when we think about... the impact, the potential impact of our work. And as we wrap things up, Jessica always likes me to ask a question about kids.
What can we do to be cultivating this more in our kids? First thing, first and foremost, lead by example. You know, ultimately kids do what we do rather than what we say.
So, you know, there's a win-win aspect here that when we cultivate, when we work on our happiness through all these... activities through the choices that we make not but by directly pursuing happiness because directly pursuing happiness can actually be counterproductive but rather doing things. So chasing after happiness isn't going to make us happy?
No, no it actually potentially will make us less happy and perhaps even lonelier but going for those choices that we know contribute to happiness whether it's sitting up straight whether it's expressing gratitude on a regular basis, whether it's exercising regularly, whether it's spending time with people we care about and who care about us, whether it's being present and being mindful when listening or when washing the dishes, when we bring all these activities into our life. When we give ourselves the permission to be human, when we do these things, we become happier and we also indirectly affect our kids. Woohoo!
Any last words of wisdom that you want to share with people? It's the small things that make a big difference. You know, when people think about... pursuing happiness, they often look for that, you know, one or a few life-changing activities or things or even experiences.
But, you know, the happiness is in the details. So it's those minute-to-minute decisions we make that make all the difference. They're much bigger than those few big life choices. Do I go to this school or that school?
Do I move to this town or that? It's, yeah. It's those small choices that we make, and it's those small experiences that we fully experience. You know, there's a wonderful book by Jon Kabat-Zinn called Wherever You Go, There You Are.
So it's being present to the experiences, the good ones as well as the painful ones, being present. So a last wrap-up question I have that we have for all of our guests, which is, what brings you? The greatest happiness or what I call the woohoo! For me it's spending time with my family and friends, hands down.
So where can people go to find out more and to find your book? Well, my books are on Amazon or Barnes & Noble and also my website. Which is talbenshahar.com. Fantastic. And we'll have links and more information on this interview on our inspirenationshow.com website as well.
So we can drive them over your way. So I want to thank you so much for being on the show. This was so much fun.
And working with us with the time zone difference. So good morning. Good evening. Thank you very much. So.
For everyone out there, this is Michael Sandler saying, be well, have fun, choose the life and happiness you want, and shine bright. Woohoo! Thank you.
Thank you very much, Michael. Thank you. This was wonderful.
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