the quest for happiness

The Quest for Happiness

ESMT Annual Forum 2014 Corporation 2050

Shirish Pandit Berlin, July 03, 2014

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Acknowledgements

• Swami Paramahansa Yogananda

• Swami Chinmayananda

• Shubhraji

• …and Google Images

July 03, 2014 ESMT ANNUAL FORUM 2014: CORPORATION 2050, Session “The Quest for Happiness” (@shirish_pandit) 1

• Jonathan Haidt: The Happiness Hypothesis

• Sonja Lyubomirsky: The How of Happiness

• Nic Marks: The Happy Planet Index

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Happiness is hard to put into words. Yet it is the feeling that we all aspire to experience. This aspiration pushes us on to a quest of happiness … and poses a series of questions

• Happiness:

− is a state of feeling joy, exhilaration, etc.

− results from attaining/possessing something

− varies from contentedness to bliss


• Some first thoughts:

− Why conditional upon externalities?

− Possible to drive it fully intrinsically?

− Why not long-lasting feeling?

− Can happiness become monotonous?

− If we crave for the happy feeling – yet, once we have it, it starts diminishing in value – what exactly are we after?

Happiness: concept and relevance

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The ultimate destination of this quest is the state of “bliss”. Experiences of happiness are key milestones on this journey

• Bliss (Ānanda)

− a state of serenity that is beyond the perceptions of

duality (Body, Mind, Intellect)

− the source of peace, wisdom, courage and faith in spite

of the ever-changing experiences of joy / sorrow

− experiencing bliss is among the key objectives of

spirituality / meditation / Yoga


• Mastering the art of being happy under all circumstances is an important step in attaining bliss


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Happiness has a range of benefits. Individuals, corporations and states – all can benefit from, and contribute towards generating, a happier society

• Tangible benefits:

− Better physical & mental health, greater longevity, lower propensity towards drugs / depression, etc.

− Stronger relationships with family, friends and at the workplace

− Direct, positive correlation with income

• More profound benefits:

− Closely linked with finding and fulfilling the “purpose of our lives”, helps to overcome fear of meaninglessness of life

− Feeling is contagious and creates positive spiral (e.g. a country moving on in the World Cup vs. a war-torn region)

− Better thoughts, emotions, attitudes => more fruitful actions

• Drivers of happiness can wilfully be controlled / influenced, at:

− Individual level

− Corporate level

− National level



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The progress principle and adaptation principle help explain why individual happiness, even upon attaining long sought goals, is transient


Progress Principle

• Pleasure comes from making progress towards goals than from achieving them (this is not football )

• What we feel along the journey is happiness, what we feel at the destination is more of relief

• It’s the journey that counts, not (just) the destination

− Journey: pre-goal attainment positive affect

− Destination: post-goal attainment positive affect

Adaptation Principle

• Happiness is felt, if the current situation is perceived to be better than the one that we have adapted to

• We are highly sensitive to changes in conditions, not to absolute levels

• We adapt to the new conditions over time:

− Lottery winners: upfront joy, diminishes over time

− Paraplegics: upfront loss, normalizes over time

Individual level happiness

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The “happiness formula” developed by Lyubomirsky, Sheldon, Schkade, and Seligman gives us helpful insights into the drivers of happiness


H = S + C + V

“Conditions” or circumstances in life. E.g. health, wealth, beauty, marital status, geographic location, etc. C

V “Voluntary Activities”: These are the ‘happiness strategies’ that we have the choice of pursuing

“Set Point”: Baseline level of happiness that we are born with. Those with lower S will have to work harder to achieve/maintain happiness S

External factors

Happiness does depend upon external, controllable factors!


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Among the external factors affecting happiness, the activities we voluntarily choose to indulge in, play a decisive role


Source: Sonja Lyubomirsky, “The How of Happiness – A Scientific Approach to Getting the Life You Want."


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CONDITIONS have a lower impact on our happiness, because we adapt to them over time


CONDITIONS that we adapt easily to

• Amount of wealth (lottery winners)

• State of health (paraplegics)

• Level of beauty

• Marital status

• Job promotions / career status

• City / region / country of residence

Source: Sonja Lyubomirsky, “The How of Happiness"

CONDITIONS that are hard to adapt to

• Level of noise

• Amount of commuting

• Degree of (lack of) control

• Level of shame / (lack of) self-esteem

• Inter-personal conflict

Source: Jonathan Haidt, “The Happiness Hypothesis"


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Voluntary activities can provide longer lasting happiness, if they allow us to experience “flow” and give us gratification


• Express gratitude

• Cultivate optimism

• Avoid overthinking and social comparison

• Practise acts of kindness

• Nurture social relationships

• Develop strategies for coping

• Learn to forgive

• Increase flow experiences

• Savor life's joys

• Commit to your goals

• Practise religion and spirituality

• Take care of your body

Examples and tips…

Source: Sonja Lyubomirsky, “The How of Happiness"

Which type of activities to undertake?

• Those that allow you to “be in the zone”, “in flow”

− Challenging, yet closely matched to one’s abilities

− Clear challenge as a task, own skills, quick feedback

• Those that give gratification, as they are

− engaging, draw on strengths, allow us to lose self-consciousness, extend ourselves

− not pleasure-focused (fade quickly, urge for more)

• Those that introduce variety and spice

− Variety is the natural enemy of adaptation

• Know your own strengths (online tests available)

Source: Jonathan Haidt, “The Happiness Hypothesis"


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Reflection exercise: What concrete steps would you undertake to increase happiness at the (a) personal, and (b) company/department level, if you are in a position to do so?

• …

• …

• …

• …

• …

• …


Activities at PERSONAL level

Activities at COMPANY level

• …

• …

• …

• …

• …

• …

Company level happiness

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The “wealth” of countries is often measured in terms of their Gross National Product – a metric that fails to capture the numerous, softer aspects of life


Source: JFK Library; Transcript of Robert F. Kennedy’s remarks at the University of Kansas, March 18, 1968; own emphasis added

“[…] Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play.

It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials.

It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country.

It measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile.

And it can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.”

National level happiness

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Countries like Bhutan assess performance on 33 indicators across 9 domains to come up with a Gross National Happiness (GNH) Index


Source: GNH Survey Findings 2010, The Centre for Bhutan Studies

Domain (with number of indicators surveyed)

Psychological wellbeing (4)

Health (4)

Time use (2)

Education (4)

Cultural diversity and resilience (4)

Good Governance (4)

Community vitality (4)

Ecological diversity and resilience (4)

Living standards (3)

Total indicators across 9 domains 33


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The team at SecondMuse, a strategy and innovation firm in Berlin, has adapted the Bhutan GNH Index model to create a Gross Corporate Happiness (GCH) index


Source: www.secondmuse.com/gch/index.html


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The New Economics Foundation (NEF) has developed the Happy Planet Index (HPI), and applied similar principles to the Well-being at Work Survey


• The HPI is essentially a measure of efficiency, comparing on a country basis the output in terms of “Happy Life Years” to the input in terms of amount of resources consumed

• It does not yet address other fundamental issues like poor infrastructure, human rights abuses, etc., but the composition of the index is evolving with time

Source: http://www.neweconomics.org/


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Summary


• By understanding the drivers of happiness at the individual level, companies can promote and environment and support initiatives that enhance the happiness of their workforce

− Doing so will result in higher productivity, creativity, innovation, and better health of the workforce

Take responsibility, become happier, and make the world a happier place ! ! !

• Happiness – whether short-lived or sustained, is a feeling all humans aspire to experience. Ancient wisdom can be, and is being, combined with modern research to crack the secrets to happiness

• The components and their weightings in the Happiness Formula H = S + C + V give important guidelines for us to take responsibility for influencing our level of Happiness

− Among these, the choice of voluntary activities that provide a gratifying, “flow” experience, is crucial

• Measures like GNP, which focus only on the economic output of nations, are being challenged by those like the Gross National Happiness (GNH) Index, the Happy Planet Index (HPI), etc.

− Such approaches are being applied in corporate settings for evaluating the Gross Corporate Happiness (GCH) Index

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Links and further references

• http://www.happinesshypothesis.com/ … Jonathan Haidt’s book

• http://www.neweconomics.org/ … Nic Marks’ initiative on the Happy Planet Index

• https://www.happinessatworksurvey.com/

• http://happiness-survey.com/survey/ … Oxford Happiness Survey


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