Where to find the happiness
You Don't Find Happiness, You Create It | Katarina Blom | TEDxGöteborg
[Music]
hello everyone I would like us to begin
with a short exercise so can everybody
place their hands like this reach out
your hands
thank you and I will count to three and
when I say three I want you to clap your
hands okay one two three so I did this
to show you that we don't always do as
other people tell us to do we rather do
as other people do and this is important
when it comes to creating well-being in
ourselves and in others I'm a
psychologist and I train organizations
teams and individuals in creating
happiness and well-being and a couple of
years back I co-authored a book on the
science of happiness but when the book
was published I was actually in the
middle of a life crisis I've just broken
up with the person who I thought I'd
spend my life with I had no place to
live and no job and I think this is a
very common human experience we all face
problems we end up in crisis sometimes
and we struggle but at the same time I
think most of us we long for that other
kind of life that entails meaning and
connection and happiness but it's kind
of difficult to live this life to always
be there in this happy place and today I
want to show you why your brain is not
always on your side when it comes to
creating happiness but also what we can
do to counter this and it's not going to
be by just positive thinking
this takes positive action because
happiness is a skill we all can train
and work on I want this to start here
how it's not just about positive
thinking
so let's begin with this have you ever
found yourself in a situation where
you're really worried about something
and you kept worrying even though you
knew that worrying won't change the
situation or help the situation in any
way and nevertheless you just kept on
worrying hands up right we're all doing
this and if we could have total mind
power and just switched over to these
happy thoughts
we just have done that and get on with
our lives but that doesn't really happen
does it and did you know that about half
of the time that you've been listening
to this speech your mind has probably
been wandering off thinking about other
things according to a study by Daniel
Gilbert and Matthew Killingsworth our
minds wander forty-six point nine
percent of the time we spend awake so
our thoughts are automatic they have a
life of their own and to create
happiness by just control positive
thinking I think it's hard it's not even
possible impossible and I think it's
time that we start talking more about
this how can we take positive action
actually making the change in our lives
because if I would ask you to keep your
focus on your breath
don't think about anything else for five
minutes I doubt that anyone in this room
would be able to do that but if I would
ask you to please raise your hand like
this for five minutes I think we all
would be better able to achieve this so
it's really difficult to control our
thoughts and we have a better chance at
controlling our actions our behavior
therefore well-being is better built by
positive action and not positive
thinking also we tend to look at
ourselves as if we're these objects
rational beings and that perceived
situations in this objective manner and
we process information almost like a
computer I just take information in but
in reality very far from objective and
that's actually a good thing because if
we would truly be able to process and
perceive reality in all its nuanced
complexity we would be rather lost it
would be an overwhelming experience so
therefore our brain have evolved several
cognitive biases that helps us
categorize and prioritize and sort
information making it more easy for us
to navigate but these cognitive biases
this sorting and prioritizing is really
affecting how we perceive life how we
perceive different situations and I'd
like us to explore this further in a
little thought experiments so I invite
you all to think back at the last time
that you had a evaluated conversation
with your boss or manager and I'm quite
sure that you got to hear a lot of good
things things like how you contribute to
the workplace but I'm also quite sure
that you got to hear something that you
can improve with yourself with your
performance and once you leave this
conversation what do you think that your
brain thinks is the most prioritized
information all the things that you do
really good or the one thing that you
should be improving well if you're
somewhat like me it would definitely be
the latter and this doesn't really have
anything to do with how my brain works
this is actually a pattern that's been
shown among people for example
serious are marbella is a professor at
Harvard Business School she did a diary
study where she got to read people's
Diaries
to explore how they experience everyday
life and she saw a pattern that the
negative effect of a setback was more
than twice as strong as the positive
effects of a success and the same thing
goes with money that we feel way worse
about losing an amount of money than we
feel happy about gaining the same amount
and if you would receive a compliment
from a co-worker and then a complaint
from another co-worker these two
comments don't neutralize each other the
complaint would definitely leave a
stronger emotional mark so now we need
to ask ourselves why why do we carry
this emotional asymmetry why do we have
this preparedness to experience
unpleasant and negative emotions and to
understand that we need to understand
the context the environment where our
brain has been evolving for so many
years today several studies say that we
have evolved a negativity bias which
helps our attention to be drawn to
unpleasant or possibly threatening
information and this was really good
back then and there
when we were at the Savannah fighting
for survival every day but today here
and now this definitely affects how we
perceive our life how we perceive our
relations our workplace our own
performance and ourselves so to simplify
this a bit one could almost say that
your brain is concerned that you survive
throughout this day it's less concerned
that you're a happy survivor so by now
we can understand that it's not strange
that all of us sometimes feel anxious or
tense are we worried in one sense we
were built for this but most of us we
long for this other kind of life with
the meaning and the connection and the
happiness and I'm not sure that we can
have
one thing without the other but there
are definitely things and ways how we
can cultivate happiness and build
well-being but this comes with good news
and bad the good news is that happiness
it's not something you find outside of
yourself and it's not something you have
or don't have it's a skill that we all
can work on but the problem is that we
just don't do it
and this definitely applies for myself
this is the worst part of having written
a book on happiness because whenever I'm
having a bad day there's always someone
who can do like having to read your own
book Katerina you should know better so
I've learned that not even experts on
happiness and knows how to turn
knowledge into action and this is one of
the reasons why me and a friend have we
started a psychological gym where
organizations and the teams and
individuals could come and train these
skills in order to create more happiness
and well-being because we want to make
psychological training as common as
physical training because today we know
so many things about how to eat properly
and how to exercise to sustain a
physical health but what would be the
psychological version of a green
smoothie or of doing 50 situps
is there really such a thing and I would
say yes definitely there's a lot of
different exercises and things we can do
building healthy habits for ourselves
and I would like to present an example
of this so once you finish listening to
this pitch when you're leaving this room
later tonight I'd like you to bring out
your smartphone and takes a kind
appreciative gratitude text to someone
that you care for and maybe you can just
notice how that fits and this is a good
example of an exercise that I often do
with leaders and teams and just a couple
of weeks back I did this at a two-day
leader
conference and later I found out that
one of the participants had texted his
wife writing I love you very very very
much which made the wife think what are
you doing at that Leadership Conference
and it just tests texting one person at
one time it won't change the world in
any way but turning this into a healthy
habit over time can have a large impact
and to dedicate this habit to caring for
your relationships might be one of the
most powerful actions that you can take
when it comes to happiness so this might
be the green smoothie that you've all
been waiting for according to several
studies having functioning relationships
is as important if not even more
important as exercising well and having
a good diet and this can even help us
live longer in a study from Harvard
University which began already back in
1938 researchers followed over 700
people to understand what it is that
makes us flourish as people so they
followed these participants for decades
and in 2012 the results came the
researchers found that happiness doesn't
come from wealth it doesn't come from
fame or working hard
it comes from relationships and it's not
about the number of friends that you
have or whether or not you're in a
committed relationship with a partner
they found that it's the quality of the
relationship that counts
being able to be vulnerable listening
and sharing what's close to your heart
that's what matters and by now we know
that forming good healthy habits when it
comes to physical training or having a
good diet it takes dedication it takes
commitment
and I think we should approach
psychological habits in the same way and
especially when it comes to
relationships so by now we know that the
brain has this tendency to highlight the
negative and that this is really tricky
to revoke just by positive thinking it
takes positive action but some actions
are more powerful than others when it
comes to happiness and investing your
time and heart into the relationships
around you no matter if it's at work or
with neighbors or with family or friends
this might be one of the most powerful
things that you can do for yourself and
I'd like us to do this one more time so
can everyone reach out their hands and
I'm gonna count to three and when I say
three I want you to clap your hands okay
one two three yay great so we learn by
watching others behavior you've just
seen me do this two times and already so
many people change their behavior so the
more you can turn this talk into action
by being more understanding and caring
not just towards others but also towards
yourself I think that others will follow
your example and do as you do and the
people outside of this building they
won't know what just happened they won't
know what changed but we know that it
was here in this talk that everything
started thank you
you
