The best-kept secrets are in open view. The tools we need to understand happiness and to learn how to be happy have been with us for thousands of years. We have unlearned them and swapped them for a

1. The keys to happiness v.3
by @BromMindfulness

2. Before we can understand
happiness, we first need to
discover what it is that is
stopping us from being happy
This little presentation will try to explain this.

3. First a bit of history

4. 1,500 million years ago,
we shared a common ancestor
with trees.

5. We are more similar than we may think.
Even now, 1,500 million years later, we share
60% of our genes with bananas.

6. 320 million years ago, humans and reptiles also
shared a common ancestor.
This is a picture of a distant cousin.

7. We share 98% of our genes with our closest relatives –
Chimps.
Our common ancestor lived 7 or 8 million years ago.
Chimps and humans are closer
genetically than Indian and African
elephants.

8. Since then humans (homo-sapiens) have evolved
Human beings as we are now, have been
largely the same genetically for 200,000 years

9. But why does this stop us from
being happy?
The problem is, that although we live entirely
different lives to our distant ancestors, to this
day, we share many characteristics with them.
We have not evolved to live in the world that
we have created!
It is these ancestral characteristics that can make
life so difficult for us.

10. We are primeval hunter
gatherers that recently shared
nature with our distant relatives but
now live in a crazy, artificial, high-
tech world.

11. We simply aren’t compatible with
the world that we have created

12. The main incompatibility is with our
brains

13. A simple model of the brain
splits it in three
• The basal ganglia (similar to a reptilian
brain) deal with instinctual responses like
fight or flight and responding directly to pain
or shock.
• The limbic system (similar to a Chimp
brain) manages emotions such as anger,
fear and anxiety.
• The neocortex (the distinctly human brain)
is where our higher functions such as logical
thought and speech reside.

14. At a very simple level these brain functions can
be compared to the brain functions of our
distant cousins; reptiles and chimps.
Basal ganglia - in black - (reptiles):
• Fight and flight
• Instinctual responses
Limbic system – in white - (chimps):
• Anger
• Fear
• Anxiety
Neocortex – in blue – (humans):
• Higher brain functions

15. Our brains are equipped for a far
more dangerous natural
environment

16. When we encounter a new situation, we search our
memory to find something similar. This is known as
memory association. If we find an association with
something stressful, our brains release fight or flight
hormones to prepare us to combat the danger.
This creates anxiety and stress.

17. As many of our ‘bad’ experiences
get repeated, we are often left with
the following scenario.
Unhappiness
Situation
Bad
Association
Stress
Hormones
Anxiety

18. The only point in this cycle where we have
control, is in how we view our memories.
Unhappiness
Situation
Bad
Association
Stress
Hormones
Anxiety

19. Happiness
Situation
Not a bad
Association
No
Stress
Hormones
No
Anxiety
The only point in this cycle where we have
control, is in how we view our memories.

20. Bad Association = Unhappiness
Unhappiness
Situation
Bad
Association
Stress
Hormones
Anxiety

21. Happiness
Situation
Not a bad
Association
No
Stress
Hormones
No
Anxiety
Not a bad Association = Happiness

22. Association (Conditioning)
Once we have
learned that certain
things are ‘bad’, our
ancestral defence
mechanism swings
into action whenever
we encounter a
similar experience.
Experience Badness
Commuting 10
Work 8
Her/His Parents 10
Monthly Sales Meeting 10
Sunday Afternoons 1
Traffic Jams 9
Holidays 1
Tax Returns 10
Coffee 2
Association of memories with events is also known as
conditioning.
We become conditioned to associate bad experiences with new
events and so many new experiences become bad ones.

23. So how do I stop feeling like this?
• Anxiety and stress doesn’t happen because of
how we deal with events. It happens because of
how we remember events which then affects
our response to future similar events.
• It is the level of scariness and significance of
an event that determines how we react to
anything similar in future.
• If we can intervene in the way we condition
ourselves by storing memories as bad events,
then our future experiences will be less
stressful.

24. • Left alone, our brains and bodies can
respond to events as if they are life-or-
death.
• The vast majority of the time, the ‘bad’
things we worry about are simply not life-
or-death problems.
• What we need to do is to make our ‘bad’
experiences less significant by putting
them into perspective. Then our minds will
not view them as dangerous in the same
way that an attack by a wild animal would
be, and we will not spend our lives
swimming in stress hormones.

25. The key to happiness is how we view
what has happened to us in the past
Fortunately, there are some ancient tools that have
been passed down to us that can help us to
put it all in perspective

26. Tool No. 1- Gratitude
Being grateful for what
we have, increases the
significance of the good
things in our lives, which
then reduces the
significance of the bad
ones.
This helps us to put
everything in
perspective.

27. - Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, Emperor of Rome
AD 161-180 - from his book - Meditations.
“But I don’t have anything to be
grateful for!”
If you think like this, here is a quotation that may help:
“Each morning when you arise, think what a
precious privilege it is to live, to breathe, to enjoy,
to love.”

28. Here are some things that almost
all of us can be grateful for:
• We have shelter, water and food
• Someone cares about us or even loves us
• We have people we can care for and love
• There is a wonderful natural world that we can all
experience even if it is just the sun, the moon and
the stars from a prison yard!
• We all have freedom of thought
• And most of us have much more than that!

29. Tool No. 2 - Forgiveness
When we harbour grudges
or resentments, we build
up the negative significance
of the events that caused
them. This then conditions
us to respond to any future
similar events with stress.
Forgiving frees us of this.

30. Forgiveness is a difficult thing
to do for many people
• Forgiveness is not about letting bad people get
away with doing bad things
• Forgiveness is about releasing the negative
emotions which make us feel like victims
• Forgiveness also gives the perpetrators a
chance to reconsider and change their ways
which is of course what we actually want. Isn’t it?

31. Tool No. 3 - Meditation
If we find the time to sit quietly and still our racing
minds, we can experience the present moment as it
is, without the baggage of our worries, and find our
way back from the despair and distress of negative
past events.

32. Happiness from stress.
Is it possible?
• These ancient tools; Meditation, Forgiveness
and Gratitude have stood the test of time in
many cultures throughout the world.
• People throughout history, religious and secular,
have used, and continue to use them, to navigate
through the darkness and confusion of the insane
world we have created for ourselves.
• They are a helping hand from our recent
ancestors that solves a problem created by our
distant ancestors. We should take this helping
hand if we want to live a sane life in a crazy world.