Notes from "The Happiness Advantage " (Author : Shawn Achor)
- 69% of high school and college students report that their career decisions depended on chance encounters.
- Armed with positivity, the brain stays open to possibility. Priming your self to expect a favorable outcome actually And codes your brain do you recognize the outcome when it does in fact arise. The people who would claim to be unlucky in life again looked right past opportunity. Expecting positive outcomes actually makes them more likely to arise.
- The best way to kickstart the positive Tetris effect is to make a daily list of the good things on your job, your career, and your life. When you write down a list of three good things that happened that day your brain will be forced to scan the last 24 hours for potential positive things that brought small or large laughs, feelings of accomplishment at work or strength and connection with family. In just five minutes this trains the brain to become more skilled at noticing and focusing on possibilities for growth and seizing opportunities. at the same time because we only can focus on so much at once, it makes brains push out those small annoyances And frustrations that used to loom large into the background and even out of our visual field altogether.
- When our brains constantly scam for and focus on the positive, we profit from three of the most important tools: happiness, gratitude, and optimism
To be more honest it has to be about money we are not saving the dolphins here. This executive had primed his employees for failure. Saving the dolphins was meaningful but your job provides no meaning. He reminded everyone they had jobs not callings. Even a route or routine task can be meaningful if you find a good reason to be invested. You feel productive at the end of the day. You made life easier for a client or customer. You use your skills. You learn from my mistake. You have to find meaning in your job.
Rewrite your job description as a calling description. Highlight the meaning that can be derived from it then I asked them for their own personal goals in life. How can the current tasks be connected to this larger purpose. The more we can align our daily tasks without personal vision, the more likely we are to see work as a calling. Forget about your current job title what would you like customers to call your job title if they described it by the impact you have on their lives.
Spend money, but not on stuff. Spending money on other people call prosocial spending also boosts happiness. Money can’t buy happiness but can only if used to do things as opposed to simply having things.
Exercise the signature strength each time we use a skill, We experience a bust of positivity.4
Exercise meditate rich social relationships
Happy workers have higher levels of productivity
Feeling that we are in control, is one of the greatest drivers of both well-being and performance. Tending plants and careers the importance of control.Limit your focus to small manageable goals and that’s expand your sphere of power.
Given how important control is to our success, some of us feel overwhelmed by too many demands on our time , attention and abilities. The brain has two dueling components - one a knee-jerk like a emotional system (jerk) and a rational cognitive system (thinker).
The thinkers purpose is simple : think then react.
When we are feeling stressed or out-of-control, the jerk tends to take over.When we are under pressure, the body starts to build up too much cortisol. Once the stress has reached a critical point even the smallest setback can trigger an amygdala response hitting the brains panic button. When that happens, the Jerk overpowers the Thinkers defenses. Instead of think then react we go into fight or flight. When small stress is pileup over time as they do in the workplace, it takes a minor annoyance to lose control.
So how do we reclaim control from the jerk? The answer is the Zorro circle. The first goal is Self awareness. The quickest to recover of those who can identify how do you feeling and put those feelings into words. Write it down or talk to a trusted confidant verbalizing the stress and helplessness you are feeling this is the first step toward regaining control.
Then identify which aspects of the situation you have control over and which you don’t.
Identify one small goal that you know you can quickly accomplish. By narrowing the scope of action and focusing energy and efforts the likelihood of success increases. By tackling one small challenge at a time the narrow circle slowly expands outward. We can re-learn that our actions do have a direct effect on our outcomes and that we are largely the masters of our own fates.
I once worked with the head copy writer of an advertising firm. She managed a team of eight people. She was in charge of leading the creative meetings that brainstormed ideas for each client. For her first Zorro circle she set the following goal: to improve only the copy that she herself wrote. Recommitting herself to this manageable goal. Not only helped her focus her energy is on something she could handle the best part was that once her own performance improved his circle of influence did expand. The better her writing God, the harder her team worked to follow her example. The teams improved performance soon raised the bar for other departments.
Cleaning up the subway graffiti helped New York police Reduce crime on subways.
We are mere bundles of habits. If we have to make a conscious choice about every little thing we did all day, we would be overwhelmed by breakfast.
Create daily strokes of effort. The more people perform a particular action, the more connections form between the corresponding neurons. The stronger the link, the faster the message can travel down the pathway. This is how we become skilled at an activity. The first time you try to juggle, the neural pathways involved are unused and so the message Travels slowly. The more time you juggle, the more these pathways get reinforced, so that on the eighth day of practice the electrical currents are firing at a much more rapid pace. This is when you notice the juggling comes easier , requires less concentration, and that you can do it faster .
On not practicing my guitar:
Will power is not the way . Relying on will power to completely change behavior always fails.
The reason will power is so ineffective at sustaining change is that the more we use it, the more worn out it gets.
Group1 was given chocolate chip cookies which they were told not to eat. Group 2 was given cookies but they could eat. Group 3 was given no food at all.
They were then asked to solve some simple puzzles. Groups 2&3 long outlasted Group 1 at persevering at the task.
Why? Because the students who had to use the will power to avoid eating the cookies didn’t have the will power or mental energy left to struggle with the complex puzzle.
No matter how unrelated the tasks were, they all seemed to be tapping the same fuel source
.
Many different forms of self-control draw on a common resource or self control strength, which is quite limited and hence can be depleted readily.
Unfortunately, we face a steady stream of tasks that deplete will power every single day.
Whether it’s avoiding the dessert table, staying focused on a spreadsheet for hours, or sitting still through a three hour meeting, I will power is consistently being put to the test. So it’s no wonder really that we so easily give in to our old habits, do the easiest and most comfortable path as we progress during the day.
20 Second rule
Lowering the barrier by just 20 seconds can help form a new life habit.
Removing batteries for my remote, setting up the guitar in the middle of the living room.
The more effort it takes to obtain Unhealthy food, the less we eat of it.
Remove distractions. Sleep in gym clothes.
Every additional choice people asked to make, Their physical stamina, ability and overall focus drop dramatically. Every innocuous choice depletes our energy a little further. Until we just don’t have enough to continue with the positive habit we are trying to adopt.
Eliminate choices.
The key to reducing choice Is setting and following a few simple rules.
Setting rules in advance can free us from the constant barrage of willpower depleting choices that make a real difference in our lives. Example check email just once per hour, have just one coffee break for morning. Rules are especially helpful during the first few days of a behavior changing venture.
A manager wanted to have positive interaction, he made a simple rule ofThank one of his employees every day.
We need social contact to thrive. There was only one characteristic that distinguish the happiest 10% from everyone else: the strength of the social relationships.Work friendships were overwhelmingly placed above financial gains and individual status. The people we interviewed from good to great companies love what they did largely because they loved who they did it with.
Study show that the more team members are encouraged to socialize and interact face-to-face, the more engage the field, the more energy they have, and the longer they can stay focused.
Even brief encounters can form high-quality connections. One conversation, one email exchange, one moment of connecting can infuse both participants with a greater sense of vitality, giving them a bounce in their steps and greater capacity to act.
Of all the social ties we have at work, the boss/employee relationship call the vertical couple is the single most important social bond you can cultivate at work.
How we support people during good times, more than bad times, affects the quality of relationship. The winning response to good news is both active and constructive: it offers and pull the Astec support as well as specific comments and follow-up questions. Passive responses to good news: “that’s nice “ can be just as harmful as negative ones.
Mutual respect and authenticity.
Gratitude
Reaching for the stars is a recipe for failure. Set goals of moderate difficulty. Setting smaller more manageable goals helps us build our confidence and keeps us committed to the task at hand. “don’t write a book, write a page....”
The strategy of finding and improving small problems has helped businesses flourish. A focus on tiny incremental changes leads to Mammoth results.
Training ourselves to scan the world for the positive can help us re-interpret failures as opportunities for growth.
One way to build rapport, is with iContact rapport strengthens between two people when they lock eyes.
Take an executive who has been writing down a gratitude list each night. In the morning meeting, he speaks more positives And feels compelled to praise the work of one of his reports. this primes the recipients brain with positive emotions and they can work more creatively and efficiently. The confidence to go after bigger goals comes after having achieved a goal however small.
