Happiness

[aliskye]

So, I'm channeling Shawn Achor (http://www.forbes.com/sites/danschawbel/2013/09/10/shawn-achor-what-you-need-to-do-before-experiencing-happiness/) Look for his TED talk, and trying to be more positive.

I'm pretty much an optimist and generally a happy person, but I've been in a funk lately because I really want to be done with work. The work load has increased and there are some difficult people I'd rather not deal with on a daily basis. But I can't really afford to retire yet and need to give it another 4-5 years. (Math needs to be done.)

Shawn Achor talks about 5 things to do to create a positive "Tetris effect" of happiness. Two of them are exercise and mediation. I'm working on that. One is to a random act of kindness. (One of the suggestions is to write a one-to-two sentence email recognizing someone for their work or support. That's fun.) One is to list 3 things you are grateful for everyday. I'm doing that on Facebook.

The last is to journal one positive experience you've had over the last 24 hours. I'm going to use LJ for that. (I feel like I'm mostly writing for myself here, so it's pretty perfect. I'll save the Wordpress blog for project stuff.)

I'm not sure I really had a specific positive experience yesterday. (I didn't get a lot done but I organized everything and made a new priority list.) But I felt good. I kept thinking of things I'm grateful for that I can list on FB in the coming days. And I kept thinking of people I want to write emails to to thank them for their work, or thank them for their help or thank them for being an inspiration to me. And it all boosted my outlook quite a bit.

Comments

[raventhourne.livejournal.com]

There was a Pin I Pinned on Pinterest that was basically "Make a list, it will make you feel better" and its the truth. My apprentice just learned the lesson of "a clean workspace lets your mind run free" and its being positive that will help with that. I've forwarded this link to my women's working group at work, we watch a lot of TED talks to help with our career development and to help women in STEM at work.

[aliskye.livejournal.com]

I wish I could get my office to watch some of the TED talks. I think it would be transformative.

[ta-wanda.livejournal.com]

Just so you know, this post helped me. I particularly like the idea of a short positive email. Recognition of effort or good effect is something that most of us need. It seems like it would be simple to do, but in my former job, I'm sure there were months at a time when I had no clue whether I was helping anyone or not. I'm going to make an effort to let people know, specifically, when they make my life better.