Inspired Living: Happiness
Inspired Living: Happiness
My dear friend and fellow Feng Shui Practitioner, Caroline, sent me a video clip of Shawn Achor, a Harvard professor who teaches a new class called The Science of Positive Psychology. When it was first offered, they were surprised to find 1,000 students (1 out of every 7 students at Harvard) signed up for the class. They realized the students were hungry for some positive thinking!
I have attached a link to video clip about his study at the end of this blog. I have watched it three times and with each viewing have gleaned a new bit of precious information.
One of the things I realized was, that no matter how book smart I am (Harvard is my alma mater after all), I realize that I have been waiting for someone or something outside of me to make me happy. That someone would be my Prince of course, who would whisk me off to his castle and spend the rest of his days saving me from vicious dragons, chivalrously opening carriage doors and leaving beautiful ball gowns on the chaise in my private sitting room. I’ve been waiting a looooooooong time for that Prince. I’m thinking he may have gotten lost in Jersey!
Quick show of hands… how many single women (and men) hate it when someone says to them that you have to be happy FIRST before the great love of your life can show up? I always thought the happiness would come WITH the great love! This magnificent presentation from Shawn Achor explained to me, in a practical & scientific way, WHY being happy first is the key to… well, being happy! I highly encourage the video, but do keep reading for my big A-ha moment!
Mr. Achor’s experiment shows that if you think of something that makes you happy BEFORE you go in for an interview, start a task, put together blocks, or make medical diagnoses, you increase your success rate up to 50% than if you remained neutral or even prepared for a medical diagnosis by reading medical journals.
What does this mean to me? If you don’t already know, I was an actress for many, many years in The Big Apple and the City of Angels and I still audition once in a while for a local commercial or TV show here in The Mile High City. Last month I went in for a commercial audition and was pacing in the lobby with anxiety, while one woman who looked just like me was in the room with the producers and three others waited to go in right after me. I decided to try a Harvard inspired experiment on myself. I visualized for about a minute, happy moments in my life, before I was called in for my fifteen seconds to wow the producers with my unique talents.
What I discovered was incredible!! Being happy before an audition, a date, an interview, task, job, game or anything you do, puts you in a state of NOT NEEDING the job, the date, the win or anything else to MAKE you happy. So you don’t need anything from anybody and what you end up having is something to actually GIVE! I tapped into a level of creativity in my improvisational audition that surprised even me. I left the audition wondering, “Where did that come from?!”
Just think: what if you went on that date already happy, already full, already feeling whole? You wouldn’t need Mr. So-and-So to make you happy, so you wouldn’t need anything from him and you could just share your amazing self with him and receive his expression of himself, without all the pressure of having to make each other happy!
Are you having an A-ha moment like I did? Are the heavens opening up and the choir of angels singing, “AHHHHHHHH,” with golden rays of light streaming down on your beaming face? I hope so!
I left the audition in a state of euphoria. I didn’t get the commercial, but I got something so much more valuable than a $2,000 paycheck. What a glorious new awareness. I do it all the time now. Even if I’m having a crappy week, I simply remember a time in my life when I was happy (because no matter how crappy life can be we all have at least one happy moment we can remember). That memory of happiness changes my state of being. It actually makes me feel happy in the moment, allowing magic to happen. Even on the phone with the airlines!!
So while this really doesn’t have anything to do with Feng Shui per se, it has everything to do with Inspired Living. I hope it has encouraged a little opening into what life can be with just a few minutes of remembered happiness.
Love in, Peace out!
Nicolette
If you’d like, click this link to watch Mr. Achor’s twenty-minute presentation on his study of Happiness at Harvard. SHAWN ACHOR HAPPINESS STUDY AT HARVARD
PS: Please enjoy the contemporary version of the fairytale, The Frog and The Princess:
“Once upon a time, in a land far away, a beautiful, independent, self-assured princess happened upon a frog as she sat, contemplating ecological issues on the shores of an unpolluted pond in a verdant meadow near her castle. A frog hopped into the princess’ lap and said, “Elegant Lady, I was once a handsome prince, until an evil witch cast a spell upon me. One kiss from you, however, and I will turn back into the dapper, young prince that I am and then, my sweet, we can marry and set up housekeeping in your castle with my mother, where you can satisfy my needs, prepare and serve my meals, clean my clothes, bear my children, and forever feel grateful and happy doing so.”
That night as the princess dined sumptuously on lightly sautéed frog legs seasoned in a white wine and onion cream sauce, she chuckled and thought to herself, “I don’t f***ing think so!”
