Cultivating Happiness

In my journey of pursuing happiness, I read many great books from a variety of authors and taken several courses on positive psychology. Some of the authors and educators are world’s leading psychologists, some were psychiatrists, others were Buddhist practitioners. All of the messages from them converge to one definition of true happiness, or a good life that is largely relevant in the context of others.

Aristotle famously stated “A good life is a happy life” yet the term he used to refer to “happy” (eudaimonia) actually was focused on the process of flourishing instead of a state of positive emotions. Flourishing involves living a virtuous life in which you pursue excellence in the context of your work, relationships and community. Similarly, as positive psychology experts would state it, Other People Matter.

Evolving from the hunter gatherer era, human beings are hard-wired to be social animals (imagine in the ancient times, if you were left alone, chances were high that demise was near) and altruistic (to help a group to survive sometimes involves making individual sacrifices).

The importance of social connection in one’s well-being is straightforward to comprehend yet to me, being selfless leads to happiness sounded counterintuitive in the beginning. Yet when I tried too hard to focus on making myself better only to advance myself, I eventually hit a wall and disappointment ensued.

After taking VIA character strength, I identified my top signature strength to be kindness. I then really understood that intrinsically I want to help people more, not less. But I also learnt that it is important not to overuse your strength at the sacrifice of your own baseline self-care. Since then, I tried to create goals that not only deepen my crafts in areas that I am passionate about, I also put the goals in the context of community service and I felt a renewed sense of motivations that are more wholesome than their more self-centered predecessor.

Since then, I have been able to be more open minded about my mission in life, to explore a variety of pathways to pursue these life goals and to develop more resilience and grit in my will power. Interestingly, by focusing on broadening the impact to others, I am able to better focus on the process and less self-conscious. Using terminology from neuro-science, I have switched off the overdrive of my “self-circuit” which led to self-doubt, insecurity and anxiety.

So, if you have not tried this already, I challenge you to intentionally get involved with some philanthropic work. It doesn’t need to involve writing a check to your favorite charity, helping out anyone in need with a kind act is sufficient for you to experience that positive impact altruistic effort plays in your brain.

Be well and have a good life!