1. Be Happy
By Andrea Groenewald
May 13, 2011
Revera Inc.

2. Wish #1: Wealth or Happiness
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Wealth Happiness

3. Wish #2: Success or Happiness
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Success Happiness

4. Wish #3: Fame or Happiness
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Fame Happiness

5. Wish #4: Status or Happiness
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Status Happiness

6. Wish #5: Attractiveness or Happiness
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Attractiveness Happiness

7. Wish #6: Sex or Happiness
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Sex Happiness

8. Wish #7: Health or Happiness
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Health Happiness

9. Wish #8: Enlightenment or Happiness
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Enlightenment Happiness

10. Wish #9: Authenticity or Happiness
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Authenticity Happiness

11. Wish #10: Love or Happiness
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Love Happiness

12. Study conducted in 2003
(Diener&Oishi)
Researchers interviewed 9,000 people
on the importance of happiness
against values such as health, wealth &
attractiveness. Happiness came
first, even beating out heaven by 13%.

13. Happiness is a Universally accepted
Goal!

14. In other research we learn that
Happiness leads to:
Higher Income
Superior work outcomes including
increased productivity & higher quality of
work
More satisfying and longer marriages

15. Happiness also Leads To:
More friends, stronger social support &
richer social interactions
More energy, increased activity and flow
Better physical health including a bolstered
immune system, lowered stress levels &
less pain
Longer life
Even inspires people to want to serve &
benefit other

16. What makes us Happy?
• Self Knowledge & Acceptance
• Having a Purpose for your Life
• Being part of Something Bigger than Yourself
• Living according to your Core Values
(Authenticity)
• Healthy Relationships (Love)
• Laughter – Norman Cousins, 1977
• Thankfulness & Gratitude

17. Barriers To Happiness
1. Spoiled Child Syndrome
2. Mental Filter &Overgeneralizing
3. Unrealistic Expectations
4. Taking things Personally
5. Reacting to people & situations rather
than responding
6. All or Nothing Viewpoint

18. Happiness in the Workplace
Five Alarm Bulletin:
The Workplace has Changed!

19. Landscape of the (new) Workplace
• On average, workers will spend 90,000
hours over the course of their life, working
• Due to current economic realities, workers
are expected to have higher productivity
and output, with less resources
• Stress is at an all time high
• Clinical depression & anxiety is costing
Companies & Government billions of
dollars

20. Predictors of Happiness in the
Workplace
How much you Enjoy your job
Feeling your work has a Purpose - Ms.
Emily Groenewald
Confidence in your ability to do your job
Matching of Personal Values with
Corporate Values
Trust in your Employer & Direct Reports
Recognition&Appreciation for your work

21. More Predictors of Happiness in the
Workplace
Your ability to Manage Stress – 80% of
physical illnesses are caused by stress
Your ability to Manage your Thoughts
and Attitudes

22. Managing Stress
 Satisfiers
 Relaxation Techniques
 Coping with Uncertainty – WW II study
 Distinguishing between what you can
change and what needs to be managed
 Stop Labelling – SrikumerRao

23. Great minds manage their Thoughts
“A man is what he thinks
about all day long.”
~Emerson~

24. “We become what we
think about”
~Earl Nightengale~

25. “The greatest discovery of my
generation is that a human
being can alter his life by
altering his attitude of
mind” ~William James~

26. Conclusion: We can change the
way we feel and experience life &
work by changing the way we
think!

27. What if we could create our own
Happiness?

28. “I am the happiest man alive. I
have that in me that can convert
poverty to riches, adversity to
prosperity, and I am more
vulnerable than Achilles; fortune
hath not one place to hit me.”
~Sir Thomas Brown~

29. We can Synthesize our own Happiness
• Experience Simulator in Prefrontal Cortex
(Ice Cream Flavours/Lottery)
• The Impact Bias, “the tendency to
overestimate the hedonic impact of
future events.” (Purchases)

30. Synthesized Happiness
Harvard’s, Dan Gilbert’s Research using
the “Free Choice Paradigm.”
• Monet Prints
• Monet Prints with amnesia patients
They change their hedonic
reaction, not just perception or
rationalization!

31. Examples of Synthesized Happiness
“I don’t have one minute regret. It
was a glorious experience.”
Moreese Beckham – Upon release of 37
years confined to a Louisiana Prison for
a crime he was exonerated from based
on DNA evidence

32. “I believe it turned out for the best.”
Harry S. Langerman – turned down a
MacDonald’s Franchise because his brother
wouldn’t lend him the $3,000 stating, “You
idiot, no one eats hamburgers.” Two
months later, Ray Crock bought the
franchise and became the wealthiest man
in America.

33. “I’m happier than I would have
been with the Beatles.”
Pete Best, original drummer for the
Beatles who was ‘abandoned’ by
them without any notice.

34. “I’ve been able to enjoy love and
relationships at a deeper level than
ever before.”
Shania Twain – After the double
betrayal of her music producer &
husband having an affair with her
best friend & confident

35. “I am the happiest man alive. I
have that in me that can convert
poverty to riches, adversity to
prosperity, and I am more
vulnerable than Achilles; fortune
hath not one place to hit me.”
~Sir Thomas Brown~

36. “There is nothing good or bad, but
thinking makes it so.”
~William Shakespeare~

37. I don’t wholeheartedly agree with
Shakepeare’s quote but we can see
from the research that how and what
we think about, especially as we
rehearse or create scenarios in our
minds, clearly affects our mood, our
stress levels, our attitudes and will
ultimately affect our behaviour.