Latest / Hardiness with Dr Paul Taylor / Beyond the Pursuit: Understanding Happiness Through Connection with Professor Sonja Lyubomirsky

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Beyond the Pursuit: Understanding Happiness Through Connection with Professor Sonja Lyubomirsky · Hardiness with Dr Paul Taylor

• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Hey, everyone, you are about to be in for a
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: big treat with Sonya Lubermirski. She is an absolute guru
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: in happiness research, like right up there in some of
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: the top five happiness researchers in the world, and I
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: highly recommend that you check out her website and her books,
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: and particularly her latest book, which is The How to
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: Feel Loved.
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: So just jump on that. Get it on Amazon. You
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: won't regret it.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: Professor Sonya Lubermitski, Welcome to the podcast. It's a pleasure
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: to be the pesthetic Irishman's attempt at pronouncing.
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: Your the empire.
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  Speaker 3: I love it.
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  Speaker 1: When I think of happiness, I think of researchers such
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  Speaker 1: as Ed Danny A, Professor Richard Laird or emeritus Professor
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  Speaker 1: Richard Laird, Marty Seligman, Corey Keyes, and Sonya Lubermitski. I
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  Speaker 1: would put you in with those guys. When did you
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: decide that happiness was going to be something that you
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: studied in your career?
• 1:22
  Speaker 4: Nineteen eighty nine, so that was what was that thirty
• 1:26
  Speaker 4: seven years ago or something thirty eight years ago?
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  Speaker 3: Thirty seven years ago.
• 1:32
  Speaker 4: Yeah, So I got to grad school at Stanford and
• 1:35
  Speaker 4: by the way, just this morning I went to there
• 1:37
  Speaker 4: was a zoom with sort of happiness Pioneers with Marty
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  Speaker 4: Seligman and ow Wow Laird and John Ellio and Ed
• 1:44
  Speaker 4: Diner's son, you know, a dinner passed away last So yeah,
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  Speaker 4: that was really beautiful.
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  Speaker 3: We kind of talked about the state of the field
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  Speaker 3: and all of that.
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  Speaker 4: But anyway, okay, getting back too, So yeah, so when
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  Speaker 4: I started grad school. On the very first day of
• 2:00
  Speaker 4: grad school, this was at Stanford, I was getting my
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  Speaker 4: PhD in social psychology, and I met with my new advisor.
• 2:05
  Speaker 4: His name is Lee Ross, and he was the world's
• 2:08
  Speaker 4: expert on conflict and negotiations, so kind of like maybe
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  Speaker 4: the opposite of happiness. And we took a walk around
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  Speaker 4: campus and we started talking about happiness and you know,
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  Speaker 4: what is a secret to happiness and why are some
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  Speaker 4: people happier than others?
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  Speaker 3: And back then, I mean.
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  Speaker 4: Some economists were studying, you know, wellbeing and Ed Deaner
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  Speaker 4: at Niversity of Illinois was studying well being, but really
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  Speaker 4: it was not a field yet at all.
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  Speaker 3: So again, thirty thirty seven years ago.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, and so let's let's define happiness because you talked
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: about well being there, so a lot of people talk
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  Speaker 1: about subjective wellbeing. There's human flourishing and what what definition
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  Speaker 1: of happiness do you like?
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  Speaker 2: And why?
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  Speaker 3: Sure?
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  Speaker 4: Well I define happiness Actually the way the Ed Deaner,
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  Speaker 4: the founder of the field, defines it is that happiness
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  Speaker 4: really has two components, and the first component is the
• 3:01
  Speaker 4: experience of positive emotions. Right, So happy people are more
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  Speaker 4: likely to experience joy, enthusiasm, calm, curiosity, affection, you know, serenity.
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  Speaker 3: I mean, of course the experienced negative emotions too, but
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  Speaker 3: you know, not too too chronically. But that's not enough.
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  Speaker 4: The second component of happiness is believing that your life
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  Speaker 4: is good, you know, being satisfied with your life, being
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  Speaker 4: satisfied with the progress.
• 3:27
  Speaker 3: That you're making towards your life goals.
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  Speaker 4: Right, So I think I like to think about these
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  Speaker 4: two components of happiness as being happy in your life
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  Speaker 4: and being happy with your life.
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  Speaker 3: So you really need all of those to be a happy.
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  Speaker 1: And your research I remember reading a particular study from you,
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  Speaker 1: and actually I've talked about it when I'm doing corporate
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  Speaker 1: talks that showed that approximately fifty ish percent of your
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: happiness was genetically based, but about I think it was
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  Speaker 1: about forty percent was actually under your troll.
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  Speaker 2: Did I get those numbers right?
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  Speaker 3: Well, you got the numbers right, but the couple caveats.
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  Speaker 4: One is the numbers were estimates that we sort of
• 4:12
  Speaker 4: estimated these numbers, you know, like twenty years ago, and
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  Speaker 4: I don't use the numbers anymore because people treat them
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  Speaker 4: too seriously, right, So we don't really know.
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  Speaker 3: It's not really forty percent. I don't know what percent
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  Speaker 3: it is.
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  Speaker 4: But the way I like to think about it is
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  Speaker 4: that there's like three buckets of influences on your happiness.
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  Speaker 4: In one bucket is your genetics, like we know from
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  Speaker 4: lots of research on behavioral From behavioral genetics, you know,
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  Speaker 4: identical twins are much more alike in their happiness levels
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  Speaker 4: than our fraternal twins, right, So that shows that there's
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  Speaker 4: a genetic influence on happiness.
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  Speaker 3: We know that to be true.
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  Speaker 4: And then the other bucket is your life circumstances, right
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  Speaker 4: like how rich you are and how attractive you are,
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  Speaker 4: and are you married, and how old are you and
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  Speaker 4: you know, what do you do? You know in terms
• 4:55
  Speaker 4: of your job, so that also influences your happiness depending
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  Speaker 4: on where you are and your life circum stances. And
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  Speaker 4: then A third bucket is sort of what you actually
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  Speaker 4: can do every day to impact your happiness, right, how
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  Speaker 4: you think, how you act, how you behave every day.
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  Speaker 4: And so now I don't put numbers on them, but
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  Speaker 4: that all three of those are major and.
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  Speaker 1: If they identify a number of candidate genes or is
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  Speaker 1: it is it too tricky to get right down to
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  Speaker 1: that level.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's two tricky.
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  Speaker 4: I mean there are there is research in molecular genetics
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  Speaker 4: where you know there are candidate genes, but I think
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  Speaker 4: there are many of them.
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  Speaker 3: I don't know if there are hundreds.
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  Speaker 4: Or thousands, and so it's just there's no single gene
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  Speaker 4: that really has a big impact. That's true for by
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  Speaker 4: the way, a lot of human traits. You know, that's
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  Speaker 4: not just happening. It's true for almost everything. It's very
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  Speaker 4: rare when there's like one gene that explains like a disease,
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  Speaker 4: sometimes that happens, right, but it's very rare anyway. So yeah,
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  Speaker 4: but we know that their genetic influences, like we know
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  Speaker 4: you look around you right, like, I don't know do
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  Speaker 4: you have kids if you have more than one kid,
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  Speaker 4: like I have four kids. You know, some of ours
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  Speaker 4: my kids are happier than others, like and I feel
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  Speaker 4: like they were raised in similar environments, you know, And
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  Speaker 4: and yet there's definitely genetic influencers.
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  Speaker 1: And what about have you looked at anything around stages
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  Speaker 1: of life in terms of because I know there's this
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  Speaker 1: kind of inverted ship are used to be in the
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: research they inverted you shape with the age, But before
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  Speaker 1: we get into that early life, like, we know that
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  Speaker 1: early life has a big impact on so many things.
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  Speaker 4: Right right, right, Well, two different questions, right, yes, of course,
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  Speaker 4: like if you have like trauma in early life, you
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  Speaker 4: know that could really influence by the way, can influence
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  Speaker 4: you with both positive and negative ways. You know, often
• 6:45
  Speaker 4: it's negative, but sometimes you become more resilient. But in
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  Speaker 4: terms of life stages, I don't do this research, but
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  Speaker 4: other people do. I don't really believe in the inverted
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  Speaker 4: you because that research is often done in the field
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  Speaker 4: of economics, where they control for a lot of variables,
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  Speaker 4: and we feel look at raw data. Basically, my understanding
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  Speaker 4: is the least happy people are young people, right, so
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  Speaker 4: ages fourteen to twenty eight, And that.
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  Speaker 3: Makes sense, doesn't it make sense?
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  Speaker 4: I mean they're not happy, right, and they haven't even
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  Speaker 4: in this age of AI and social media, like even
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  Speaker 4: not thinking about that they haven't found they don't know
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  Speaker 4: who they are yet, right, they're finding their identity, they
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  Speaker 4: haven't found their life partner. You know, they're still sort
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  Speaker 4: of discovering themselves, you know, so it makes sense that
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  Speaker 4: that would be they don't have that the self esteem
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  Speaker 4: that's you know, that's core to them maybe is still
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  Speaker 4: a little shaky. Right anyway, So young people are tend
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  Speaker 4: to be the least happy, and people tend to get
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  Speaker 4: happier as they age. I mean there might be a
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  Speaker 4: dip in midlife if there's a lot going on to exactly, yeah,
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  Speaker 4: or the Sandwich generation, right, you have the kids, you
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  Speaker 4: have work stress, you have taken care of your parents.
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  Speaker 4: But you know, people, a lot of research shows that
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  Speaker 4: people tend to get happier as they get older, and
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  Speaker 4: like the happiest people are actually you know, on the
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  Speaker 4: older side, and then usually there's a dip somewhere because
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  Speaker 4: of health or you know, other reasons.
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  Speaker 3: But yeah, I kind of like that research because we
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  Speaker 3: have a lot to look forward to.
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  Speaker 1: That's true, and and tell me also over time, so
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  Speaker 1: we talked about there's been a lot of talk about
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  Speaker 1: our young people and mental health issues, like, like, are
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  Speaker 1: they are they completely you know, there's there's one actually
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  Speaker 1: really like.
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  Speaker 2: To the other.
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  Speaker 1: So can you have some mental health just issues and
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  Speaker 1: still have levels of happiness or well being or are
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  Speaker 1: they completely Are they variables that just do not interact? No?
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  Speaker 3: No, you can.
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  Speaker 4: And you know, if you're talking about depression and anxiety,
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  Speaker 4: which are probably the two most common mental health conditions,
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  Speaker 4: those are both a pisodic, right, so at least some
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  Speaker 4: of it is. So you might be depressed or anxious,
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  Speaker 4: you know, have kind of an episode and then and
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  Speaker 4: then you go back kind of a little bit, back
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  Speaker 4: to baseline. And so clearly, when you're in the middle
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  Speaker 4: of a sort of a depressive episode, you're not going
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  Speaker 4: to be happy. You know, that's yeah, that's not possible.
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  Speaker 4: But you know, between episodes you certainly can be happy,
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  Speaker 4: So it's certainly possible. But actually, mental health issues really
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  Speaker 4: are one of the biggest.
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  Speaker 3: Challenges to happiness. I mean, it's just.
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  Speaker 4: Really and so people who are experiencing them, you know,
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  Speaker 4: it's not your fault, like it's biological usually, and it's
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  Speaker 4: just really really hard to be happy when you're you're
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  Speaker 4: sort of battling.
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  Speaker 3: With your brain kind of like being unhappy.
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  Speaker 4: So that's not to say that the strategies that I've
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  Speaker 4: been studying my whole career can't help, you know, So
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  Speaker 4: there are definitely things you can try to practice to
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  Speaker 4: increase the level of happiness, no.
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  Speaker 1: Matter, definitely want to get into strategies, but I'm interested.
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  Speaker 1: Has there been any research, so, say, some of these
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  Speaker 1: going on with a reasonably stable level of happiness and
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  Speaker 1: they have an episode of mental health, do they come
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  Speaker 1: back to their baseline level of happiness or when they
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  Speaker 1: come back, is it at a lower level? Has anybody
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  Speaker 1: looked into that?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah? They have? And again I'm not an expert in
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  Speaker 3: this area.
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  Speaker 4: I'm not a clinical psychologist, but I think often they
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  Speaker 4: do come back to their baseline.
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  Speaker 3: You know, but that baseline is lower.
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  Speaker 4: Than people who've never been depressed usually, you know, And
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  Speaker 4: I have looked at some research like people who kind
• 10:29
  Speaker 4: of used to be depressed, like they're still less happy
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  Speaker 4: than people who've never been depressed. But it's certainly as
• 10:35
  Speaker 4: possible to go back from that, you know. There's there's
• 10:37
  Speaker 4: definitely hope and and antidepress and medication, you know, and
• 10:40
  Speaker 4: and again practices that you can try to embrace in
• 10:45
  Speaker 4: your daily life. Can can help you know, I'm just
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  Speaker 4: saying that it's not easy, and so when people are
• 10:50
  Speaker 4: having a hard time, you know, it's it's a lot.
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: Of differences culture around the world, countries bigger old is
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: that play, Like if you're born in Russia versus America
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  Speaker 1: versus Africa versus you know.
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  Speaker 2: How much of a role does that play?
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  Speaker 1: Country of origin and early upbringing and that sort of culture, right, I.
• 11:15
  Speaker 3: Mean it does.
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  Speaker 4: So culture certainly plays a role when you compare average
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  Speaker 4: happiness levels in different countries, and you probably have know this.
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  Speaker 4: You know, if the World Happiness Report, you know, comes
• 11:25
  Speaker 4: out with these sort of average ratings, they are huge
• 11:28
  Speaker 4: differences in from like the Nordic countries that are the
• 11:31
  Speaker 4: highest to like you know, say developing countries and say
• 11:34
  Speaker 4: Africa and are really low in happiness. And so certainly
• 11:39
  Speaker 4: that that plays a role. And the thing is why
• 11:42
  Speaker 4: is that play a role? Because there's so many factors,
• 11:44
  Speaker 4: right that are all right, So it turns out if
• 11:46
  Speaker 4: you live in a country that has corruption, that that
• 11:49
  Speaker 4: that that there's a war going on, that there's a
• 11:51
  Speaker 4: lot of poverty. You know, there's not not not no
• 11:54
  Speaker 4: equal rights, there's no democracy, right that those are correlations
• 11:58
  Speaker 4: of you know, low happiness levels.
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  Speaker 3: But then when you see people immigrating, so there's lots
• 12:02
  Speaker 3: of research.
• 12:03
  Speaker 4: Again I'm not an expert on this, but when people
• 12:05
  Speaker 4: immigrate to sort of countries that are happier, then they
• 12:09
  Speaker 4: get happier. Right, So it's not like genetic You know,
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  Speaker 4: you're born and I was born in Russia, so I
• 12:14
  Speaker 4: was born in a very unhappy country. I don't know
• 12:17
  Speaker 4: what I would be what I've been like, yes, control right,
• 12:20
  Speaker 4: I don't know I stayed what I've been like. But
• 12:24
  Speaker 4: I'm certainly a pretty happy person, and that some of
• 12:27
  Speaker 4: that has to do with the fact that I live
• 12:30
  Speaker 4: in the United States and I have a really good time.
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: So we talked about genetics. Has anybody looked into epigenetic effects.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, what we're now seeing in the research around
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: genetics and epigenetics is that, you know, the epigenetics, it
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: kind of tells the hard ware hard to run, and
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: we see that there are certainly some transgenerational epigenetic effects.
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  Speaker 1: Has there been any research around that from a happiness
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: perspect that you're aware of.
• 13:02
  Speaker 4: I believe there isn't. Again, this is not in my
• 13:05
  Speaker 4: in my wheelhouse. You know, I'm not a geneticist, but
• 13:07
  Speaker 4: certainly you can't separate genetics and epigenetics, right, because epigenetics
• 13:10
  Speaker 4: is how sort of genes get turned on and off,
• 13:12
  Speaker 4: and that's how they actually have their impact on people,
• 13:16
  Speaker 4: on our phenomenology, and so they really go together. And
• 13:21
  Speaker 4: so again I'm not an expert in this, but yeah,
• 13:24
  Speaker 4: like so if you if I have a predisposition for
• 13:27
  Speaker 4: happiness and I'm an environment where you know, sort of
• 13:31
  Speaker 4: sort of certain genes are turned on because it's a
• 13:33
  Speaker 4: bad environment or it's a good environment, right, that's going
• 13:36
  Speaker 4: to affect our my happiness overall. But again, I really
• 13:39
  Speaker 4: can't answer this question. I'm really more an expert on
• 13:43
  Speaker 4: on what people can do to become happier. And really
• 13:46
  Speaker 4: I'd love to talk about my new book, How to
• 13:48
  Speaker 4: Feel Loved, which is really like the key to happiness
• 13:51
  Speaker 4: is sort of social connection and relationships and sort of
• 13:54
  Speaker 4: feeling loved and what people can do in their daily life,
• 13:57
  Speaker 4: you know, to feel more loved.
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: That we are going to dig into.
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: I got one more that I'm going to throw at
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: you before we jump into the sword of things that
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: you can really influence, and a lot of people, particularly
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: in the West, in inverted commas and you know, are
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: brainwashed to believe that you can get happiness through money
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: and through achievement.
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: And how much do those.
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: Factors actually play a role? I mean, clearly, if you're very,
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: very poor, that's going to have an impact. But you know,
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: words that diminishing returns when it comes to money. And
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: what sort of role does achievement because that plays into
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: your self esteem? And how does that roll out in
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: the literature?
• 14:45
  Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, no, you know, it's it's complicated, right, it's
• 14:48
  Speaker 4: a very new question. Absolutely, money and achievement makes people happy.
• 14:52
  Speaker 4: And by the way, if anyone's interested, I have a
• 14:54
  Speaker 4: newsletter where every two weeks I tackle exactly these questions, right,
• 14:58
  Speaker 4: the question of the question money and my website is
• 15:03
  Speaker 4: how to Feel Loved dot com. I have the newsletter there.
• 15:05
  Speaker 4: But so one of the newsletters was about money and achievement.
• 15:08
  Speaker 4: And so the answer really is that money does make
• 15:11
  Speaker 4: us happier, but not as much as we think it does.
• 15:15
  Speaker 4: And it makes us happier when we spend it, right, right,
• 15:18
  Speaker 4: when we spend money on actually really three buckets, you know, connection,
• 15:22
  Speaker 4: connecting with others, contribution where we're helping others, and personal
• 15:27
  Speaker 4: growth where you're growing as a person learning something new.
• 15:30
  Speaker 4: So when you spend the money in those ways, it's
• 15:32
  Speaker 4: going to make you happier than if you spend your
• 15:34
  Speaker 4: money on like another possession that you put in your car,
• 15:37
  Speaker 4: in your garage, or you put on your shelf. And
• 15:40
  Speaker 4: then achievement too, you know absolutely, Like you know, when
• 15:43
  Speaker 4: I write a book, when I write a paper, when
• 15:45
  Speaker 4: I you know, like win an award, I mean, that
• 15:47
  Speaker 4: makes me happy. And I think that's a lot of
• 15:49
  Speaker 4: people will will say the same thing.
• 15:51
  Speaker 3: And it's not just about the achievement. It sort of
• 15:54
  Speaker 3: is the process of getting.
• 15:55
  Speaker 4: There, right, Like I mean presumably people, yeah, like we're
• 15:59
  Speaker 4: we we care about making an impact in the world, right,
• 16:02
  Speaker 4: So achievement is sort of a marker of that. But
• 16:06
  Speaker 4: if you're only focused on the achievement, if you're only
• 16:09
  Speaker 4: focused on the end goal as opposed to kind of
• 16:11
  Speaker 4: a journey to get there, you're not going to be
• 16:14
  Speaker 4: as happy. And again, it sounds like a cliche, but
• 16:16
  Speaker 4: research supports it that really focusing on the journey to
• 16:20
  Speaker 4: get there is it's more closely associated with happiness than
• 16:24
  Speaker 4: just achieving that one thing, because once we achieve, we
• 16:27
  Speaker 4: just want more.
• 16:28
  Speaker 3: It's called the hendonic treadmill.
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 16:31
  Speaker 3: We don't just.
• 16:31
  Speaker 4: Stay there and be like, oh, I'm really happy, I'm
• 16:33
  Speaker 4: going to stay on this mountain forever.
• 16:35
  Speaker 3: We want to climb there.
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: I remember reading a book jeez must be thirty five
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: years ago, Zen in the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: Robert Percik, and I remember him to use this analogy
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: about getting up the mountain and people just are in
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: a rush to get to the top of the mountain
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: and there was a little freeze in there. That's stuck
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: in my mind. And sometimes it's better to travel than
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: to get there.
• 17:00
  Speaker 3: I love that. And actually I just heard another phrase.
• 17:02
  Speaker 4: Actually it's from a Ted talk and it was something like,
• 17:05
  Speaker 4: when you get to the top of the mountain, there's
• 17:06
  Speaker 4: three things that are true.
• 17:07
  Speaker 3: And I think I got this right.
• 17:09
  Speaker 4: One is your alone. Another, it's cold, so that's interest
• 17:15
  Speaker 4: I thought. But the other the third is the odd
• 17:18
  Speaker 4: way that goes down, right, And.
• 17:22
  Speaker 3: I love that.
• 17:22
  Speaker 4: It's like, Okay, I mean doesn't mean we should climb
• 17:25
  Speaker 4: the mountain. And actually I really like, you know, evolutionary
• 17:28
  Speaker 4: theory explains a lot you know, you could argue it's
• 17:30
  Speaker 4: evolutionarily adaptive for us to always.
• 17:33
  Speaker 3: Want more, right, because if we didn't always want more,
• 17:35
  Speaker 3: human beings.
• 17:35
  Speaker 4: Were just like they would find a source of food
• 17:37
  Speaker 4: and they would find a friend.
• 17:38
  Speaker 3: They'd be like, Okay, I'm done. You know, I'm just
• 17:40
  Speaker 3: gonna sit.
• 17:41
  Speaker 4: Here and I'm not going to make any more progress, right,
• 17:44
  Speaker 4: I'm not going to make any more advances. I'm I'm
• 17:45
  Speaker 4: going to stagnate, right and yet, but no, we're not
• 17:50
  Speaker 4: satisfied with being done.
• 17:52
  Speaker 3: We want that next goal to achieve.
• 17:54
  Speaker 4: And so this is actually a good thing, I think
• 17:56
  Speaker 4: for human progress and advancement.
• 17:59
  Speaker 3: But maybe it's not so good.
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: For Isn't there interesting There's so many things that initially
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: are adaptive to some degree and then they become maladaptive when.
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: There's more run like yes, bugger and salt. The neurobiology
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: of preference.
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: Let's let's focus on on on your work, because you
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: you've published noodles and noodles and noodles of publications around happiness.
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: You've written several books on happiness and and we'll explore
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: your latest one.
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: And but but what what.
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: What are some of the variables are some of the things,
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: actions that people can take that that play a role
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: in their happiness.
• 18:43
  Speaker 4: And is there well there's hundreds, Well, there's hundreds, right.
• 18:48
  Speaker 4: So there's so many things you can do, each of
• 18:51
  Speaker 4: us can do to be happier today.
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 18:53
  Speaker 4: So you can meditate, you can write a gratitude letter,
• 18:56
  Speaker 4: you can go exercise, you can follow some kind of
• 19:00
  Speaker 4: goal that you're exploring. You can forgive someone in your life,
• 19:03
  Speaker 4: you can savor your cup of tea. You know, there's
• 19:06
  Speaker 4: so many thing you can do in active kindness for someone.
• 19:10
  Speaker 4: What I'm finding maybe there's a hierarchy. I kind of
• 19:13
  Speaker 4: maybe don't want to use that term, but maybe that's
• 19:15
  Speaker 4: what it is. That what I concluded after decades of research.
• 19:20
  Speaker 4: So my lab pioneered what we call happiness interventions, right,
• 19:23
  Speaker 4: which are basically like clinical trials, but instead of testing
• 19:26
  Speaker 4: a vaccine or a medication, right, we're testing a happiness practice.
• 19:30
  Speaker 3: And we mostly.
• 19:32
  Speaker 4: Focus on three kinds of interventions. Gratitude interventions, right, we
• 19:35
  Speaker 4: asked you to write gratitude letters or count their blessings.
• 19:38
  Speaker 4: Kindness interventions we ask people to do acts of kindness
• 19:41
  Speaker 4: that they don't normally do for other people, as opposed
• 19:44
  Speaker 4: to for themselves, and we also started doing research on
• 19:47
  Speaker 4: what we asked people just to have more social interactions.
• 19:50
  Speaker 4: Just be social, go out there, be social, be extroverted,
• 19:53
  Speaker 4: you have a conversation. And what hit me a few
• 19:56
  Speaker 4: years ago is that almost all of these inter mentions
• 20:00
  Speaker 4: that we've been doing that work to make us happier.
• 20:04
  Speaker 4: The reason they work is that make us feel more
• 20:07
  Speaker 4: connected to others, and they make us feel more loved
• 20:10
  Speaker 4: by others. Right, So when I write a gratitude letter
• 20:13
  Speaker 4: to my best friend, it makes me feel more loved
• 20:15
  Speaker 4: by her, right. And when I do an act of
• 20:18
  Speaker 4: kindness for a colleague, right, it makes me feel closer
• 20:21
  Speaker 4: to the colleagues.
• 20:22
  Speaker 3: So I really that's the hierarchy.
• 20:24
  Speaker 4: I guess I would say anything that makes you feel
• 20:26
  Speaker 4: connected and loved seems to be.
• 20:29
  Speaker 3: The more important.
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: Now.
• 20:31
  Speaker 3: You can argue when you meditate.
• 20:33
  Speaker 4: Or you go running, and then that's not about connection
• 20:37
  Speaker 4: and feeling loved, you know.
• 20:38
  Speaker 3: So there are some exceptions.
• 20:40
  Speaker 4: I could still argue sometimes that you still feel connected
• 20:43
  Speaker 4: sometimes to others when you're exercising, et cetera. But anyway,
• 20:47
  Speaker 4: most of it is about feeling connected and loved. And
• 20:49
  Speaker 4: so that's why more recently my lab has been studying conversations.
• 20:55
  Speaker 4: It's sort of like how to because it turns out
• 20:58
  Speaker 4: and actually your podcast or so maybe you know this
• 21:01
  Speaker 4: although you do it for a living, so maybe if
• 21:03
  Speaker 4: you do it for a job, maybe it's different. But
• 21:05
  Speaker 4: like if I were to give you by number one
• 21:07
  Speaker 4: happiness tip, right, like what or give your listeners? This
• 21:10
  Speaker 4: is my number one happiness tip. If you're going to
• 21:13
  Speaker 4: do one thing today to be happier, what should you do?
• 21:17
  Speaker 4: I would say, go and have a conversation with someone,
• 21:21
  Speaker 4: say at least a fifteen minute conversation. It could be
• 21:23
  Speaker 4: with a barista in your coffee shop. It could be
• 21:25
  Speaker 4: with your partner, it could be with your child, it
• 21:28
  Speaker 4: could be with almost anyone.
• 21:29
  Speaker 3: Now. Of course, sometimes conversations don't go well right.
• 21:32
  Speaker 4: They can be versive or upsetting, But on average, research
• 21:36
  Speaker 4: shows you feel happier after a conversation than before, especially
• 21:42
  Speaker 4: if it's deeper conversations. So it's not just small So
• 21:45
  Speaker 4: we're also studying how to make the conversation go deeper,
• 21:49
  Speaker 4: asking questions of the other person, sharing more of yourself,
• 21:54
  Speaker 4: truly listening, showing curiosity. That's how you really make the
• 21:58
  Speaker 4: other person feel loved In the conversation and feel connected
• 22:00
  Speaker 4: to you. It's not just talking about and.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: It's all of this because the human brain is fundamentally
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: a social organ.
• 22:09
  Speaker 4: I mean, you certainly can argue, right, this is how
• 22:11
  Speaker 4: humans survived, Right, We're hardwired to seek out, you know,
• 22:15
  Speaker 4: social behavior, social bonds because we survived, right. We need
• 22:20
  Speaker 4: that pride, We need to mate with someone to reproduce,
• 22:23
  Speaker 4: We need to try an alliance to help us.
• 22:25
  Speaker 3: And so we are very very attuned.
• 22:27
  Speaker 4: And when those social bonds are ripped, or when we're
• 22:30
  Speaker 4: stigmatized and we're thrown out of the group, right, we're
• 22:33
  Speaker 4: more lonely.
• 22:34
  Speaker 3: You know.
• 22:34
  Speaker 4: Loneliness is basically a signal to us that we need
• 22:37
  Speaker 4: to repair our social bonds. And it's very aversive, right
• 22:41
  Speaker 4: because in the past, in our ancestral past, you could argue,
• 22:44
  Speaker 4: we would have died, right if we were lonely, you know,
• 22:47
  Speaker 4: and now it feels like a death right almost, even
• 22:51
  Speaker 4: if it's not a real death.
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: So, yeah, I love the way you phrased loneliness there,
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: that it's a signal that we need to repair our
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: social bonds. Yeah, because generally, you know, you're away from
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: the tribe or you've had an argument with someone, and
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: that's that's what makes you feel lonely in the brain's
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: like this, this shit ain't good. Being on yourself by
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: yourself ain't good. I want to dive into gratitude. And
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: the reason I want to dive into gratitude is thirty
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: thirty years ago, I was in India and I was
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: backpacking around India and a little holy village called Puri
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: and met a beggar who had leprosy and ella fantasis
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: or his foods like the size of an and he
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: had left and it was really really confronting, and I
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: gave him a little bit of money and had to
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: chat with him, and and he went away. It was
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: like a home made rickety go kart. And I went
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: to walk away, and I remember this to this day.
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: Something in my brain just clicked and said, don't walk away.
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: Just stand here and watch this guy until you can
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: no longer see him, and never ever forget this guy.
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: And whenever you're feeling sorry for yourself, just remember him.
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: And and because of him, I've done a gratitude ritual
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: every year. He's been the trigger for me to think,
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: while I'm so grateful that that I have my health,
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: because I've seen something with that and I really instilled it.
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: So and for me, there's a there's a little bit
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: of gratitude that that is that that kind of helps
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: you to go, actually, my situation here is really not
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: that bad and it could be a shitload worse. And
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: for me there's that it's almost like, you know, there's
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: there's this upwards social comparison in social media that that
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: that really makes people unhappy.
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: For me, I've been thinking about this.
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: Is there a component of gratitude that's that that when
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: you see things like that is almost like a downward
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: social comparison is like I'm a shitload better than I
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: could be, even if my circumstances on grit. Is there
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: anything in that Do you think that's independent of the
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: connection part of gratitude?
• 25:10
  Speaker 4: Okay, there absolutely is, although it all really has to
• 25:12
  Speaker 4: do with connection, right because all about us and other people.
• 25:15
  Speaker 3: There absolutely is.
• 25:16
  Speaker 4: But I want to add a caveat you know, my
• 25:19
  Speaker 4: dissertation research was actually about social mediawers and what I
• 25:22
  Speaker 4: found is that basically because I thought exactly what you said,
• 25:27
  Speaker 4: that sort of the secret and one of the secrets
• 25:29
  Speaker 4: to happiness is to compare downwards so you can see
• 25:32
  Speaker 4: how much how much worse your life could have been. Right,
• 25:35
  Speaker 4: And by the way, that definitely works sometimes with gratitude exercises,
• 25:39
  Speaker 4: you say, and I have my own stories, you're the
• 25:42
  Speaker 4: story you told is very powerful.
• 25:44
  Speaker 3: And yet it's not it's not.
• 25:46
  Speaker 4: Really a good recommendation, right to be like, to be happier,
• 25:50
  Speaker 4: just look, you know, sort of look at the people
• 25:53
  Speaker 4: who are doing worse than you. And when you look
• 25:55
  Speaker 4: at people who are naturally happy and unhappy, what we found,
• 25:59
  Speaker 4: that's what we thought was gonna happen. Actually, people who
• 26:02
  Speaker 4: are happy just don't tend to compare themselves as much
• 26:05
  Speaker 4: to others at all. It's not that they don't notice it,
• 26:08
  Speaker 4: but they're not like it's the unhappy people who are
• 26:10
  Speaker 4: constantly comparing. They're like people who are lower people are higher.
• 26:14
  Speaker 4: They're just very a tune to social comparison. It just
• 26:16
  Speaker 4: turns out being a tune to social comparison can be toxic, right,
• 26:20
  Speaker 4: So ruminating about social comparison can be toxic. And so
• 26:23
  Speaker 4: happier people just they don't tend to compare. They tend
• 26:26
  Speaker 4: to use their own kind of standards, you know. But
• 26:28
  Speaker 4: having said that, what you say is very powerful that
• 26:32
  Speaker 4: once in a while we do have to remind ourselves
• 26:34
  Speaker 4: that things could be a lot worse. I'm just saying
• 26:37
  Speaker 4: it's not a recipe for happiness to be like, well,
• 26:39
  Speaker 4: there are people who are much poorer than I am,
• 26:41
  Speaker 4: so so you know, good for me, right, But I
• 26:45
  Speaker 4: have a story that's sort of similar to you, a
• 26:47
  Speaker 4: little bit similar to yours, but different is that when
• 26:49
  Speaker 4: I had my first child, who was about three years old,
• 26:52
  Speaker 4: two or three years old, and I put her in
• 26:53
  Speaker 4: a preschool and which was just a block away, and
• 26:58
  Speaker 4: she would just scream and scream when I would drop
• 27:00
  Speaker 4: her off, you know, I would leave and she would
• 27:02
  Speaker 4: just scream, and it was so awful. And none of
• 27:04
  Speaker 4: the other kids would would scream. They would say, by mommy, right,
• 27:08
  Speaker 4: and they'd be fine except for mine, right, And it
• 27:10
  Speaker 4: was so awful and it was so upsetting. It's my
• 27:12
  Speaker 4: first child. Right after that, it gets easier, right. And
• 27:15
  Speaker 4: then I remember a few times walking home and I'm
• 27:18
  Speaker 4: just like crying and there's a kid on my block
• 27:21
  Speaker 4: who's severely autistic, really disabled and also disabled, and I
• 27:26
  Speaker 4: remember I would run into him. He would sort of
• 27:28
  Speaker 4: walk around the block and he was like maybe a
• 27:30
  Speaker 4: teenager and it would.
• 27:32
  Speaker 3: Hit me, right, it would hit me like what am I?
• 27:34
  Speaker 3: Why am I crying?
• 27:35
  Speaker 4: You know, like, you know, my situation is so much better. Yes,
• 27:39
  Speaker 4: she's having a trouble, you know, adjusting preschool, like things
• 27:42
  Speaker 4: could be so much worse. She's healthy. So it's a
• 27:46
  Speaker 4: similar kind of thing. So it does work sometimes to
• 27:48
  Speaker 4: kind of jolt you, jolt you out of sort of
• 27:52
  Speaker 4: your own misery maybe, but I think it's not a
• 27:56
  Speaker 4: long term say, you know, long term solution is really
• 28:00
  Speaker 4: all right.
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: So one other thing that I do, there's a little
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: comparison to stuff that you have been through before. So
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: when I was in the military, I went through ten
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: days of combat survival and resistance to interrogation training, which
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: was horrible. And we were in the middle in the UK,
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: in the middle of the winter. We had no sleeping
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: bags and we were thrashed physically every day, and I
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: remember every night trying to get to sleep and being
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: so cold and so uncomfortable. And now every single night
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: when I lie down in bed, I say to myself, Hi,
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: friggin awesome is a mattress and a pillow?
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: Right?
• 28:38
  Speaker 3: So beautiful? You still have that because most people.
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: And I forced myself to remember, Right, it's an actual
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: habit that I have to go. This is frigging awesome,
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: because I think we just take things for granted.
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: You know, the more we have it, the more we
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: take it for granted.
• 28:58
  Speaker 4: And gratitude is basically the opposite granted. Right, It's basically saying, no,
• 29:03
  Speaker 4: I'm grateful. I have a friend who spend a lot
• 29:05
  Speaker 4: of time in developing countries and they often remind me.
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: They're like, we have indoor plumbing.
• 29:10
  Speaker 4: Isn't it amazing to go and turn the water on
• 29:13
  Speaker 4: and water comes out?
• 29:15
  Speaker 3: Or an electricity that's reliable, you know.
• 29:18
  Speaker 4: So yeah, and it's just most of us have a
• 29:20
  Speaker 4: hard time like remembering that every day. So actually, I
• 29:24
  Speaker 4: applaud you for having that practice every day, or the
• 29:28
  Speaker 4: or the beggar that you met, right, to remind yourself,
• 29:31
  Speaker 4: because we forget, we take for granted.
• 29:32
  Speaker 3: And yeah, so that's what gratitude is. Gratitude is a.
• 29:36
  Speaker 4: Practice where you intentionally try to not take for granted.
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and you just hit something on the neil that
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: I've been thinking a lot about, which is combining gratitude
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: with awe.
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: And so occasionally I'll.
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: Turn the water on and I'll go, fucking hell o
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: coldes that shit running water and exactly what you said,
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: I'll turn a light on. I'll go, that's freaking Ama,
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: really ridiculously amazing.
• 30:03
  Speaker 3: I love his experiences.
• 30:05
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I have the same thing with like, uh, like
• 30:08
  Speaker 4: there are people who take out the tri I'm so
• 30:10
  Speaker 4: grateful for the people who.
• 30:11
  Speaker 3: Take out are right. Imagine how amazing that is.
• 30:15
  Speaker 4: And then we don't have to worry, you know, we
• 30:17
  Speaker 4: just kind of put in the shoot and and and or.
• 30:20
  Speaker 4: Another example I have is like I remember once I
• 30:23
  Speaker 4: was crossing the Brooklyn Bridge in New York City, and
• 30:26
  Speaker 4: I was just odd by this bridge and how many
• 30:29
  Speaker 4: people came together to build this bridge, like the construction
• 30:34
  Speaker 4: workers and the architects and the engineers and all of that,
• 30:37
  Speaker 4: and and it's it's and I'm so grateful and like
• 30:40
  Speaker 4: thank you all. And you know, and some people are
• 30:43
  Speaker 4: better Dallay Lama often talks about that. It's like when
• 30:46
  Speaker 4: you think about everything, the computer, the glass of water,
• 30:50
  Speaker 4: like how many people actually had to come together to
• 30:52
  Speaker 4: bring you that book on your table, you know, that
• 30:55
  Speaker 4: banana you're eating whatever to make that happen. So to
• 30:59
  Speaker 4: continually be great, all is very hard for most of us.
• 31:02
  Speaker 4: But let's let's try.
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: As anybody looked into what's going on in the brain
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: during moments of gratitude. And you also talked about about
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: seaver rings, So take ticketos in any order you want,
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: like other distinct pathways that are activated in the brain
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: when we're doing these sorts of things.
• 31:24
  Speaker 3: You know, I only know of one study, and I
• 31:25
  Speaker 3: actually don't remember. It was Naomi at U c l A.
• 31:31
  Speaker 2: And she's the one who.
• 31:32
  Speaker 4: Found like social pain, right, but she also did a
• 31:35
  Speaker 4: study of gratitude. I don't know if she really ever
• 31:37
  Speaker 4: found something that was very unique to gratitude. So I
• 31:42
  Speaker 4: think we're just more studies. And I need to look
• 31:44
  Speaker 4: up that study to confirm. But I think we just
• 31:47
  Speaker 4: need more studies. Uh yeah, just just look at what's
• 31:50
  Speaker 4: happening in the brain. I think that's very useful.
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: And so you talked about a couple of other things
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: that you you just rattled off, and I do want
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: to explore some of them kind of yes, So what's
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: going on with acts of kindness and why do they
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: seem to impact our happiness?
• 32:12
  Speaker 4: Well, I want to get back to again, getting back
• 32:14
  Speaker 4: to connect Yeah, social connections feel loved, you know. In
• 32:18
  Speaker 4: my book How to Feel Loved, one mindset we talk
• 32:21
  Speaker 4: about is called the open heart mindset, which is that
• 32:23
  Speaker 4: to feel loved, you need to make other people feel loved,
• 32:26
  Speaker 4: which is directing kind of an open heart towards them.
• 32:28
  Speaker 4: And so kindness is probably the main factor there, sort
• 32:32
  Speaker 4: of being kind, compassionate toward others, believing in other people,
• 32:36
  Speaker 4: you know, wanting other people to be happy. Right, And
• 32:40
  Speaker 4: so that's actually one way I like to think about it.
• 32:42
  Speaker 4: I want you to be well, I want you to
• 32:44
  Speaker 4: be happy. Like that's really, you know, what what open
• 32:47
  Speaker 4: heart and kindness is about. And so we've done quite
• 32:49
  Speaker 4: a few studies where we randomly assign people to you know,
• 32:53
  Speaker 4: say for the next month, say every Monday, we want
• 32:57
  Speaker 4: you to do three acts of kindness for other people
• 33:00
  Speaker 4: that you don't normally do. And then we have various
• 33:03
  Speaker 4: comparison conditions. And my favorite comparison condition is every Monday,
• 33:08
  Speaker 4: you do three acts of kindness for yourself that you
• 33:11
  Speaker 4: don't normally do. So that could be self care, it
• 33:13
  Speaker 4: could be something self indulgent like take a nap, have
• 33:16
  Speaker 4: a piece of chocolate, you know, yeah, you know, not
• 33:19
  Speaker 4: social things, but just kind of things for yourself. And
• 33:22
  Speaker 4: what we find is that people become happier, feel more
• 33:24
  Speaker 4: connected when they do.
• 33:25
  Speaker 3: Acts of kindness for others.
• 33:26
  Speaker 4: You know, for lots of reasons, right, it feels good
• 33:28
  Speaker 4: to be kind other people you know like you more,
• 33:31
  Speaker 4: they reciprocate, they smile. We also have done You've asked
• 33:36
  Speaker 4: a lot of a number of questions about the brain.
• 33:39
  Speaker 3: Well, I've partnered with a with a.
• 33:42
  Speaker 4: Collaborat named Steve Cole who founded the field, a field
• 33:45
  Speaker 4: called social gal So this is a big RNA g
• 33:49
  Speaker 4: and expression and how that gets under the skin because
• 33:52
  Speaker 4: of social behavior. So basically we do these studies where
• 33:55
  Speaker 4: we ask people to do acts of kindness for others
• 33:57
  Speaker 4: or for themselves, and then we collect blood from them
• 34:00
  Speaker 4: before and after. The intervention is a month long intervention.
• 34:05
  Speaker 4: And what we found in now like three or four studies,
• 34:08
  Speaker 4: is it people who are three studies, people who do
• 34:10
  Speaker 4: acts of kindness for others show changes in their RNA
• 34:14
  Speaker 4: gene expression that are associated with a stronger immuniate.
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: While basically.
• 34:23
  Speaker 4: As opposed to people who do acts of kindness for themselves. Now,
• 34:26
  Speaker 4: it feels good to do something for yourself, but it
• 34:28
  Speaker 4: doesn't seem to get under the skin in the way
• 34:31
  Speaker 4: that doing acts of kindness for others. And you can
• 34:33
  Speaker 4: imagine again by adaptive right to help.
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: I was going to say, is this driven by evolutionary biology?
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: Even it's gotta be right everything, Yeah, And talking about biology,
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: and so I call myself a psychophysiologist, and I say
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: to people, be interesting to get your take on this statement.
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: I say to people, anybody who tells you that you
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: can optimize mental health just with thinking skills is completely
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: bot check create because of the very strong two way
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: interaction between psychology and biology. Right that everybody knows that
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: if you're depressed, it affects your biology, But my god,
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: does your physiology or biology affect your psychology. And when
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: we think about exercise and all the neurotransmitters that are
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: released and the mild kinds that are released that have
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: actions throughout your body from contracting muscle, we think of
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: vinomin D. That's actually quite an effect of antidepressant. Or actually,
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: I'm beginning to think it's not such that exercise, good
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: food and vinomin D and other things are antidepressants. I
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: think the absence of them are depressants because they are
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: fundamentally changing our biological environment.
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: What's your thoughts on that?
• 35:57
  Speaker 3: I absolutely agree with you.
• 35:58
  Speaker 4: Yeah, And the body there is more of an emphasis,
• 35:59
  Speaker 4: by the way, if you go to a therapist now
• 36:01
  Speaker 4: you know, well it depends where I guess, but there's
• 36:03
  Speaker 4: more of an emphasis on the body. And like somatic
• 36:06
  Speaker 4: therapy is becoming very popular, at least in California where
• 36:10
  Speaker 4: I live, you know where you know now the therapists
• 36:13
  Speaker 4: are not only asking you what you're thinking, but they're
• 36:15
  Speaker 4: asking you, like, what are you feeling in your body
• 36:17
  Speaker 4: right now? And of course there's always been, I think,
• 36:20
  Speaker 4: an importance of things like exercise and diet and self care.
• 36:25
  Speaker 4: But I do disagree though with the quote you made. Again,
• 36:29
  Speaker 4: things are always more nuanced, right. So it's of course
• 36:32
  Speaker 4: how you think matters.
• 36:33
  Speaker 3: I mean, of course it matters. It's just that it's
• 36:35
  Speaker 3: not the only thing.
• 36:36
  Speaker 4: You know, how you think matters, how you feel matters,
• 36:39
  Speaker 4: what you're doing with your body, matters, what you put
• 36:41
  Speaker 4: into your body. They all matter, right. I can't put
• 36:44
  Speaker 4: a number on what's sort of more important when. But
• 36:47
  Speaker 4: it's just that we don't want to overemphasize. For a
• 36:49
  Speaker 4: long time, we've overemphasized like cognitive behavioral therapy. Right, overemphasize
• 36:53
  Speaker 4: I think thinking, but it's very it's important and it
• 36:57
  Speaker 4: works by the way, you know. And if we only
• 36:59
  Speaker 4: own emphasize what's going on with the body and not
• 37:02
  Speaker 4: with the head, you know, that's that's going to be wrongs.
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: To Rennie Jagcart for us all, didn't they there's sole
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: idea of dualism. But I mean in the inn the
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: experiments that you do, like to talk our listeners story,
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: how you design an experiment around happiness to control for
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: confounding factors, you know, whether it's biological factors such as
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: exercise or other factors that could do it gives us
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: a sense of just part of researcher think.
• 37:37
  Speaker 4: Sure, well, since I already mentioned the kindness experiment, I
• 37:39
  Speaker 4: can kind of start with that one. Well, again, that
• 37:43
  Speaker 4: we control for confounding factors by making it a true experiment, right,
• 37:47
  Speaker 4: we do what are called randomized control trials.
• 37:50
  Speaker 3: So so if I randomly if I have let's say, three.
• 37:53
  Speaker 4: Hundred people, and I randomly assign a hundred of them,
• 37:57
  Speaker 4: so that means that you have an equal chance of
• 37:59
  Speaker 4: being an any of the conditions.
• 38:01
  Speaker 3: Right, So it's random assignment.
• 38:02
  Speaker 4: I randomly assigned one hundred people out of the three
• 38:04
  Speaker 4: hundred to do acts of kindness for others. I randomly
• 38:08
  Speaker 4: assigned one hundred people. I tell them, you do acts
• 38:10
  Speaker 4: of kindness for yourself.
• 38:12
  Speaker 3: And then I randomly signed.
• 38:13
  Speaker 4: One hundred people to keep a dry diary, sort of
• 38:15
  Speaker 4: a control condition. Keep a diary of what you're doing
• 38:17
  Speaker 4: every week. So it's sort of a neutral something neutral.
• 38:20
  Speaker 4: So because it's random assiviety, it controls for everything, right,
• 38:23
  Speaker 4: so it doesn't matter. Maybe they're so some people say,
• 38:26
  Speaker 4: what if you have more people who are you know,
• 38:29
  Speaker 4: extroverted in the condition that's kind, or what if people
• 38:33
  Speaker 4: are healthier in the in the condition that's you know,
• 38:36
  Speaker 4: kind to others? What if you have people who are
• 38:38
  Speaker 4: older or richer, And that's not going to happen because
• 38:42
  Speaker 4: that's why you have random assignments. So then you don't
• 38:44
  Speaker 4: have any confounds you know now in correlational or longitunal research.
• 38:49
  Speaker 4: So for example, let's say I wanted to know, Let's
• 38:51
  Speaker 4: say ask people how kind are you?
• 38:53
  Speaker 3: Every day?
• 38:53
  Speaker 4: Can you sort of write a diary of how kind
• 38:56
  Speaker 4: you are to others and other people? I say, and
• 38:58
  Speaker 4: I ask everyone to write a diary of how kind
• 39:00
  Speaker 4: of they are to themselves or others. And I find oh,
• 39:03
  Speaker 4: people who are kinder to others in their diaries, right,
• 39:07
  Speaker 4: are happier. Well then, because it's the correlation. I don't
• 39:11
  Speaker 4: know what's responsible for it. Maybe people who are kinder
• 39:13
  Speaker 4: to others are just happier to begin with. Maybe they're older,
• 39:16
  Speaker 4: maybe they're wiser, maybe they're healthier, maybe they're richer. Right,
• 39:20
  Speaker 4: So that's why we do experiments. So that's how my
• 39:22
  Speaker 4: mind thinks is in terms of experiment.
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: And now you did mention their extra version, and you
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: remind me I did want to ask you about personality,
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: and you know, there's many different personality types, but I
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: think the Big five is the one that's probably most
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: respected by psychologists.
• 39:42
  Speaker 2: I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, But do you.
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: Things like extraversion, openness, conscientiousness that did they have an
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: impact on happiness?
• 39:54
  Speaker 3: Absolutely?
• 39:55
  Speaker 4: So, yeah, the Big five definitely the acronymus ocean right,
• 39:58
  Speaker 4: oh C yeah, yeah, and very high correlations with happiness. Right, So,
• 40:04
  Speaker 4: happier people are more likely to be extroverted, less likely
• 40:07
  Speaker 4: to be neurotic. And there's smaller correlations but still correlations
• 40:11
  Speaker 4: with agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness. So yeah, but again these
• 40:17
  Speaker 4: are correlations. And so some people think, for example, there's
• 40:21
  Speaker 4: a common genetic factor or by factor, I mean lots
• 40:25
  Speaker 4: of genes, right, so it's shared both by happiness and
• 40:29
  Speaker 4: people who are sort of.
• 40:30
  Speaker 3: Extroverted or not not neurotic.
• 40:33
  Speaker 4: Right, So it could be some kind of a third
• 40:35
  Speaker 4: factor that's responsible for them. But yeah, absolutely, personality matter.
• 40:39
  Speaker 1: Okay, and let's talk about you said personality.
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: Can you can people.
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: Personalize happiness strategies, like there's some things.
• 40:49
  Speaker 2: That work better for some types of.
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: Individuals or some particular cultures are.
• 40:56
  Speaker 4: Yeah, absolutely, yeah, absolutely, there's a I talk a lot
• 40:59
  Speaker 4: about in my first book, The Health Happiness. That's when
• 41:02
  Speaker 4: I first raised the idea fit you know, so you
• 41:05
  Speaker 4: have to sort of find the strategy that fits you
• 41:09
  Speaker 4: and also how to do it. So I think gratitude
• 41:12
  Speaker 4: is a fairly universally good strategy, you know. But some
• 41:15
  Speaker 4: people are artistics, so they might create like a gratitude
• 41:18
  Speaker 4: collage or draw what they're grateful for, right. Other people
• 41:22
  Speaker 4: like to talk, and they might talk to a friend
• 41:24
  Speaker 4: about what they're grateful for. Other people like to write,
• 41:26
  Speaker 4: you know, and so and so yeah, absolutely, I think
• 41:30
  Speaker 4: these strategies all can be kind of customized. Yeah, to
• 41:35
  Speaker 4: be like the perfect strategy for that particular person.
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: Helped me through a day in the life of a
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: person that is cultivating happiness versus somebody who is cultivating
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: unhappiness or eroding their own happiness. Like what what what
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: is that day in the life look like for those
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: people from a daily practice, Like, let's talk about getting
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: up in the morning through the day, what are things
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: that you could let your throughout the day if you
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: want a day in the life of a happy individual? Sure?
• 42:10
  Speaker 4: Sure, okay, great question. So this is really what my
• 42:13
  Speaker 4: new book, How to Feel Loved is about. It's sort
• 42:15
  Speaker 4: of like the key to happiness is feeling loved, so
• 42:18
  Speaker 4: whatever or feeling connected that whatever you can.
• 42:20
  Speaker 3: Do during the day.
• 42:21
  Speaker 4: I already mentioned having conversations, right, whatever you can do
• 42:24
  Speaker 4: during the day to feel more loved, but also to
• 42:27
  Speaker 4: make the first step is to make other people feel loved. Right,
• 42:30
  Speaker 4: So what can I do all throughout the day to
• 42:32
  Speaker 4: make other people feel loved?
• 42:33
  Speaker 3: And what what's the first step?
• 42:35
  Speaker 4: Showing curiosity in other people, right and truly listening to
• 42:40
  Speaker 4: other people. That's the first step. And by the way,
• 42:43
  Speaker 4: it's not that common. When was the last time that
• 42:46
  Speaker 4: someone was so curious in what you had to say
• 42:50
  Speaker 4: right in your story that they just couldn't wait for
• 42:53
  Speaker 4: you to finish your story? Right there, they're leaning in, right,
• 42:55
  Speaker 4: and they're like their eyes were bright.
• 42:57
  Speaker 3: Like it is so compelling.
• 43:00
  Speaker 4: We all want to be known, right, we want to
• 43:02
  Speaker 4: be heard, we want to be seen. And it's not
• 43:04
  Speaker 4: I mean, as a podcaster, like you know how to
• 43:06
  Speaker 4: show curiosity in others and you can't fake it, by
• 43:08
  Speaker 4: the way, like it has to be real curiosity. So
• 43:10
  Speaker 4: the first step, this is the day of the someone
• 43:13
  Speaker 4: who wants to be happy, who wants to feel loved,
• 43:15
  Speaker 4: making other people feel feel loved, show curiosity in other people.
• 43:19
  Speaker 4: And then once they start talking, so you ask them questions, right,
• 43:22
  Speaker 4: ask them questions, ask them deep questions, I mean, start smart,
• 43:27
  Speaker 4: small obviously you know pacing is important. And then when
• 43:30
  Speaker 4: they answer, truly listen to them. Right, So what does
• 43:34
  Speaker 4: that mean listening? Again, you probably know how to listen.
• 43:37
  Speaker 4: Most of us are not good listeners. I'm not a
• 43:39
  Speaker 4: very good listener. I'm more of a talker. So most
• 43:42
  Speaker 4: of us, what we say in the book How to
• 43:44
  Speaker 4: Feel Loved, we mostly listen to respond instead of right,
• 43:49
  Speaker 4: we're rehearsing.
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: That you're interrupting, right if you're not physically inter exactly.
• 43:56
  Speaker 4: So there's a sort of inner chatter in our mind.
• 43:58
  Speaker 4: So we're not really listening hundred percent. So we say,
• 44:02
  Speaker 4: don't listen to respond, listen to learn, Listen like there's
• 44:05
  Speaker 4: going to be a test on it tomorrow, right, so
• 44:09
  Speaker 4: we're listening.
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: I like that and they and I like the curiosity,
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: like to be curious. What's the emotion that this person
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: is experiencing right now?
• 44:17
  Speaker 3: You know, that sort of stuff exactly, like what is
• 44:19
  Speaker 3: their inner life? Actually?
• 44:20
  Speaker 4: I was thinking about you know, some people, it's often
• 44:22
  Speaker 4: the stereotype is often older people, but it could be anyone.
• 44:25
  Speaker 4: And they'll give you all they go on and on
• 44:26
  Speaker 4: about their day, right, and they'll tell you about why
• 44:29
  Speaker 4: I ran this errand and then this happened, and I
• 44:31
  Speaker 4: couldn't find a parking place, and I went on a trip,
• 44:35
  Speaker 4: and you know, right, and they're they're giving all these
• 44:36
  Speaker 4: details about their life. And often it's boring, right because
• 44:40
  Speaker 4: you don't want to hear about all these details. But
• 44:41
  Speaker 4: it makes you realize that like we all kind of want,
• 44:45
  Speaker 4: like we want other people to know about our inner life,
• 44:48
  Speaker 4: about the details of our inner life, and so like
• 44:51
  Speaker 4: when you fall in love, often people are very interested
• 44:53
  Speaker 4: in every little detail about each other, right, which is
• 44:55
  Speaker 4: so compelling, right because usually no one cares about your details.
• 45:01
  Speaker 3: They don't want to know that your flight is late, whatever,
• 45:03
  Speaker 3: it's not, it's not that interesting.
• 45:05
  Speaker 4: But anyway, but if you if you actually show curiosity
• 45:08
  Speaker 4: in another person's day, you know, in there, in what
• 45:11
  Speaker 4: they're feeling, in what they're thinking, and how things are going,
• 45:14
  Speaker 4: that is so compelling. It's very powerful, and that's how
• 45:17
  Speaker 4: you make other people feel loved. And then that helps
• 45:19
  Speaker 4: them open up and tell you more, tell you more
• 45:23
  Speaker 4: about it. Because we all have these walls around us, right,
• 45:25
  Speaker 4: So when you have walls around you, you can't really
• 45:28
  Speaker 4: feel connected and loved because you're not really showing your
• 45:31
  Speaker 4: full self to others. And everyone has walls around us.
• 45:35
  Speaker 4: And so anyway we help other people open up, and
• 45:37
  Speaker 4: then the idea is then they will reciprocate, because reciprocity
• 45:40
  Speaker 4: is a very powerful rule.
• 45:43
  Speaker 3: Of social behavior and evolutionarily speaking, too, right, we reciprocate.
• 45:47
  Speaker 4: And so if I make you feel loved by showing
• 45:50
  Speaker 4: curiosity and listening when you share, hopefully you will reciprocate
• 45:54
  Speaker 4: and you will show curiosity in me, and then I'll
• 45:57
  Speaker 4: start sharing more of myself, like be a little bit
• 45:59
  Speaker 4: more vulner right, And that's how you feel connected, is
• 46:02
  Speaker 4: by showing a little bit of that vulnerability. We don't
• 46:05
  Speaker 4: feel connected when we're just impressing each other, right, which
• 46:08
  Speaker 4: is what mostly we're doing when we go through the day.
• 46:10
  Speaker 4: We're mostly trying to impress everyone, right. We want people
• 46:13
  Speaker 4: to know that we're kind and interesting and smart and funny. Right,
• 46:17
  Speaker 4: So that might succeed at impressing, but it doesn't succeed
• 46:20
  Speaker 4: in making us really feel connected, you know, or.
• 46:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that connection.
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: I ran a corporate workshop yesterday for a bunch of
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: pretty senior executives and one thing I do that I
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: do quite often when I'm working with teams, leadership teams
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: is get everybody around in a circle and ask them
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: to talk about the most difficult experience of their life emotionally.
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: And it's obviously very emotional, but the connection that people
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: feel afterwards and how they say that cheese that deeper connection.
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: It's just it's tremendous. Particularly, I think when you see
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: somebody experiencing a deep emotion and you see other people
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: murder that emotion.
• 47:13
  Speaker 2: I'm just thinking, are going bango?
• 47:16
  Speaker 3: Is that amazing?
• 47:17
  Speaker 4: And when you think about like our polarized society, you know,
• 47:20
  Speaker 4: and people are just.
• 47:21
  Speaker 3: Like hating each other.
• 47:23
  Speaker 4: And imagine like really sharing, you know, with someone who
• 47:26
  Speaker 4: maybe you really disagree with, but then you see each
• 47:29
  Speaker 4: other as human, right, and you have that connection. And
• 47:32
  Speaker 4: I'm also curiosity in listening, right, really listening to other
• 47:35
  Speaker 4: people and.
• 47:36
  Speaker 3: Be curious, like why do you believe in that?
• 47:39
  Speaker 4: Or imagine in the middle of an argument with your
• 47:41
  Speaker 4: spouse they're really angry at you, and you and you
• 47:44
  Speaker 4: and you stop with curiosity and you're like.
• 47:46
  Speaker 3: Wow, why are they so angry? That's really interesting? Right,
• 47:50
  Speaker 3: So it's hard to do.
• 47:52
  Speaker 4: It's hard to do, but I recommend everyone to show
• 47:54
  Speaker 4: more curiosity in listening and to share more, you know.
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: And anything else that people could do this day in
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: the life of a happy.
• 48:02
  Speaker 3: Person, right, Well, definitely have conversations.
• 48:06
  Speaker 4: Well, here's another thing that I would add, as I
• 48:08
  Speaker 4: call this the multiplicity mindset in my book, see people
• 48:13
  Speaker 4: as complex, Right, we all have strength and weaknesses. We're
• 48:16
  Speaker 4: all like a quilt of positive and negative qualities, right,
• 48:20
  Speaker 4: and we know this, but we don't think about it
• 48:22
  Speaker 4: that much because we tend to be judgmental.
• 48:24
  Speaker 3: Right, So I'm generous at times.
• 48:27
  Speaker 4: But you know what, sometimes I'm selfish and sometimes I'm loyal,
• 48:31
  Speaker 4: and sometimes I'm narcissistic, and I'll freely acknowledge that.
• 48:35
  Speaker 3: And you know what we all are. We all are
• 48:37
  Speaker 3: like that's a lot, right, And so when you see
• 48:40
  Speaker 3: that in others and.
• 48:41
  Speaker 4: In yourself, that you are more forgiving, that you're more
• 48:44
  Speaker 4: accepting that you see people in all of their messy complexity,
• 48:48
  Speaker 4: And I think that really helps us to feel love,
• 48:51
  Speaker 4: to accept others, right, and not just sort of be judgmental. Again,
• 48:55
  Speaker 4: evolutionary theory. I think maybe it's served us well to
• 48:58
  Speaker 4: be judgmental because we want to know who's our friends.
• 49:00
  Speaker 4: Was our faue, right, But yet seeing people in their
• 49:03
  Speaker 4: complexity and messiness, I think they're hugely useful.
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: I actually think that you know, we we kind of
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: are all running a personalized hallucination of reality.
• 49:16
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: Our brain is just a filter through hard we view
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: the world, and all of our experiences, particularly emotional experiences,
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: ship that filter and it's unique.
• 49:27
  Speaker 2: And when when you when when you kind of get
• 49:30
  Speaker 2: to grips with that. You can't not be curious, can you.
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: He's like, oh what, Oh, maybe that's why that's fascinating.
• 49:43
  Speaker 3: Well, here's an example.
• 49:44
  Speaker 4: A friend of mine was telling about a guy who
• 49:46
  Speaker 4: said something pretty awful about another friend, a female friend.
• 49:49
  Speaker 3: She's like, can you believe this guy said that? She
• 49:51
  Speaker 3: showed me the text, and.
• 49:53
  Speaker 4: My first reaction was like, oh my god, yeah, horrible, right,
• 49:56
  Speaker 4: But my second reaction was really curiosity.
• 49:59
  Speaker 3: And it was like and I could see the little boy.
• 50:02
  Speaker 4: Inside of him who was maybe rejected when he was
• 50:05
  Speaker 4: younger by women and so sure, and so I was like, oh,
• 50:10
  Speaker 4: I no, but it doesn't excuse it doesn't condone it,
• 50:13
  Speaker 4: it doesn't justify it, but it's really yeah, it really
• 50:17
  Speaker 4: helps to see people in that wider legs.
• 50:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think was it was it?
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: I think it might have been Gandhi said, if you
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: if you want to be understood, for seek to understand, right,
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: it's just not.
• 50:33
  Speaker 4: If you can find that quote, send that to me,
• 50:34
  Speaker 4: because that's that's really relevant. You know till by work,
• 50:38
  Speaker 4: you know, and how to feel loved, like if you
• 50:40
  Speaker 4: want to feel loved, first make the other person feel
• 50:42
  Speaker 4: loved if you can, if you can find that guy.
• 50:45
  Speaker 2: I will take it out. I'm pretty sure. I'm pretty
• 50:47
  Speaker 2: sure it was it was Gandhy. So how's your view?
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: So you've read, you've written several books. You've don't know
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: how research on this high has or has it. I'm
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: guessing it has. How has your view of happiness changed
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: over the years, And if it has changed, is it
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: just being subtle or was there something that you dug
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: into that would created a fundamental shift?
• 51:15
  Speaker 3: Not not a huge change.
• 51:16
  Speaker 4: I mean I already mentioned the connection piece has become
• 51:19
  Speaker 4: much more you know, important.
• 51:21
  Speaker 3: I see that as a more important piece. I see
• 51:24
  Speaker 3: the personalization of happiest strategies as a more important piece.
• 51:27
  Speaker 3: And I guess one view.
• 51:28
  Speaker 4: One thing I would say is, I mean research is
• 51:32
  Speaker 4: so important, and I think I like to base my
• 51:34
  Speaker 4: behavior on research when I can. Like, if you're about
• 51:36
  Speaker 4: to have surgery, right, you want to know that surgery
• 51:38
  Speaker 4: A is better on average the surgery B. Right, But
• 51:44
  Speaker 4: it's all about averages, right, So the surgery A versus
• 51:47
  Speaker 4: surgery BE. On average, you know A works better, but
• 51:50
  Speaker 4: maybe for me B is going to work better, right,
• 51:52
  Speaker 4: And although I don't know that. So and same thing
• 51:55
  Speaker 4: with gratitude and kindness and even conversations that you know,
• 51:59
  Speaker 4: just remember.
• 52:00
  Speaker 3: I guess that's one one thing that I've changed my
• 52:02
  Speaker 3: mind about sort of.
• 52:03
  Speaker 4: Remember the research findings are about averages, and usually that's
• 52:07
  Speaker 4: that's very significant and you should follow them. But sometimes
• 52:11
  Speaker 4: you know that average doesn't apply to you because well,
• 52:14
  Speaker 4: we all think that we're not we're not averaged.
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: I think that's that's hugely important. I remember doing my
• 52:21
  Speaker 1: first Masters thirty odd years ago. It was in exercise science,
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: and we were getting people to run to exhaustion on
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: either a low glycemic index carbohydrate diet or a high
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: glycemic index carbohydrate diet. And the researched, on average, they
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: did better on log glycemic when it was distant, but
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: some people were completely polar opposites. And I don't think
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: that's presented enough in the research. You know, you see
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: the averages, but it's like, what's the individual variation behind it,
• 52:54
  Speaker 1: because it can be huge kind and the opposite or.
• 52:58
  Speaker 4: Like, right, salt is associated with high blood pressure and
• 53:02
  Speaker 4: many people, but for lots of people it have absolutely
• 53:05
  Speaker 4: no impact on their blood pressure. Yeah, so yeah, I
• 53:08
  Speaker 4: think it's good to keep that in mind.
• 53:09
  Speaker 3: If I know nothing.
• 53:10
  Speaker 4: I'm still going to look at the average effect, right,
• 53:13
  Speaker 4: that's still very useful in research. And by the way,
• 53:16
  Speaker 4: the more research we do, the more we can look
• 53:18
  Speaker 4: at what are called moderators, right, which are these like.
• 53:21
  Speaker 3: On average, writing gratitude letters.
• 53:23
  Speaker 4: Works better, but if you're an extrovert, or if you're
• 53:25
  Speaker 4: a young female, you know, maybe it works better in
• 53:29
  Speaker 4: this condition. Right, So we're learning more and more, you know,
• 53:32
  Speaker 4: with more.
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: If you had a bottomless pit of money and resources
• 53:38
  Speaker 1: to conduct the ultimate experiment on happiness, have you thought
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: about what that would look like?
• 53:46
  Speaker 4: Yes, And it's actually going on right now, or we're
• 53:48
  Speaker 4: starting it's called the Happiest Mega Study, and we're basically
• 53:51
  Speaker 4: testing all the interventions like meditation, like gratitude, like kindness,
• 53:56
  Speaker 4: that we think are the most powerful interventions from research.
• 54:00
  Speaker 4: We're testing them among many, many, many people across many
• 54:04
  Speaker 4: many cultures and countries.
• 54:06
  Speaker 3: And we actually need money to run that study.
• 54:09
  Speaker 4: And so that's really what we need to do, is
• 54:11
  Speaker 4: to kind of replicate and see where you know, maybe
• 54:14
  Speaker 4: the effects are going to own.
• 54:15
  Speaker 3: Maybe they're going to be.
• 54:16
  Speaker 4: Higher in this country but not this country, right, or
• 54:19
  Speaker 4: with men but not women. And we need to have
• 54:21
  Speaker 4: all huge sample.
• 54:22
  Speaker 3: Sizes, So that's what that's what I would do. So
• 54:25
  Speaker 3: find us a bucket of value.
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: Are you crowdfunding it or are you just trying to
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: get well?
• 54:30
  Speaker 3: I think you know I'm not. I'm not running it.
• 54:32
  Speaker 3: I'm part of it.
• 54:33
  Speaker 4: I think they're using all kinds of strategies but to
• 54:37
  Speaker 4: find Yeah, but crowdfunding I think is.
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: H Yeah, because a lot of people interested.
• 54:41
  Speaker 2: Is that right?
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: So so what's your what's your hope plans for the
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: future in terms of research other than this study?
• 54:50
  Speaker 2: Like what what what gets you excited? I know, I
• 54:52
  Speaker 2: know you've got to go in in a minute.
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: So maybe that's our last question about what do you
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: get excited about in this area?
• 55:00
  Speaker 4: Well, yeah, again, I think doing that giant study I
• 55:03
  Speaker 4: think is extremely exciting.
• 55:04
  Speaker 3: I really want to know what the answer is.
• 55:07
  Speaker 4: But really, as I said, I'm most excited right now
• 55:10
  Speaker 4: about studying conversations and what makes conversations go well. And
• 55:15
  Speaker 4: that's that has a lot of implications as I said,
• 55:18
  Speaker 4: for polarization, but also for people who are lonely, right,
• 55:22
  Speaker 4: and how do we help people who are lonely be
• 55:24
  Speaker 4: less lowly, which is really difficult challenge, you know, a
• 55:27
  Speaker 4: lot of people tried and failed, so so yeah, we'll see,
• 55:32
  Speaker 4: We'll see where we get there.
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: Sonia, this this has been awesome, a turtive force of
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: happiness research.
• 55:37
  Speaker 2: So where can.
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: People go to find out more about you, to buy
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: your books, to sign up to your newsletter?
• 55:43
  Speaker 2: On what other resources?
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: Great?
• 55:46
  Speaker 3: I think there's to two websites.
• 55:49
  Speaker 4: How to Feel Loved dot com is the easiest to
• 55:51
  Speaker 4: remember how to feel and if you can tell your
• 55:53
  Speaker 4: listeners how to feel loved dot com. And then my
• 55:57
  Speaker 4: website also has the newsletters which is ONNYO Lubumirski dot com.
• 56:01
  Speaker 3: Just harder to spell.
• 56:02
  Speaker 4: But you know, if people google Sonya with a j happiness,
• 56:07
  Speaker 4: they should be able to find me.
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: So we put all those links into the show notes
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: so people can can actually find them.
• 56:13
  Speaker 2: So I know you've got a run.
• 56:15
  Speaker 1: Thank you for your time, Thank you for your expertise
• 56:18
  Speaker 1: and your life's work on behalf.
• 56:19
  Speaker 2: Of the world because it's important. Ship.
• 56:22
  Speaker 3: Thank you, Thank you for your really great questions. I
• 56:25
  Speaker 3: loved answering.
• 56:26
  Speaker 4: Because I often get the same questions over and over again,
• 56:28
  Speaker 4: but these are really interesting questions.
• 56:30
  Speaker 3: So pleasure to be here. Have a great thank you