Spread a little happiness – because it helps

This is a piece written for management and it’s about caring. I think I read it because I don’t connect those two words and I was curious. Also suspicious. Sure enough, it’s a bit fluffy bunny but it recognises that and says no, come on, this stuff works:

“Countless studies have found that social relationships are the best guarantee of heightened well-being and lowered stress,” [positive psychology expert Shawn] Achor told me, “and both are an antidote for depression and a prescription for high performance.”

While it’s all too common in business for bosses to spot a few employees chatting it up in the halls and instinctively conclude that they’re dodging work, the research proves that the better people feel about workplace relationships, the more effective they become.

When surveying employee engagement all over the world, Gallup routinely asks workers, “Do you have a supervisor or someone at work who cares about you?” While many CEOs have asked Gallup to remove this question with the belief that it’s inherently soft and un-useful, Gallup discovered that people who answered “yes” to it were more productive, contributed more to profits, and were significantly more likely to remain with the firm.

Three Uncommon Ways to Drive Happiness in the Workplace – Mark C Crowley, FastCompany (13 November 2014)

Read the full piece. It’s long and it’s detailed but it’s interesting.

You’re okay, give yourself a break

I do normally run a mile from sites with names like the Positivity Blog you know when something is on your mind, you see it everywhere? This Positivity lot have a rather compelling article about how we should stop beating ourselves up.

I am not happy with my writing and I leave most events wishing I’d done them a lot better but these people say I should lighten up. I disagree with just one thing: they say you should watch half a sitcom every now and again. Do not do this. Watch the whole thing. It’s only 21-30 minutes, how dare we interrupt the narrative flow because of an alarm?

Ugh. Positivity. Double ugh: it might work

I’m British, a writer and a journalist: I recoil at words like positivity and happiness. Only the words, you understand. The actual things, fine, good, great, whatever. But people who go around saying positivity and happiness, I just want them to leave before they start asking for donations on 1-800-BITE-ME.

But.

The Positivity Blog has a shortish piece about the opposite of happy-clappy positivity: it’s about doubt. I’m British, a writer and a journalist: I am all doubt.

All Doubt, All the Time. Henrik Edberg suggests doing this:

First, when your inner doubts bubble up, be quick. Don’t let them spin out of control or grow from a whisper to a stream of discouraging sentences. Instead, talk back to that doubtful part of yourself.

In your mind, say or shout something like: No, no, no, we are not going down that road again.

By doing so you can disrupt the thought pattern and stop that inner self-doubter from taking over.

3 Powerful Steps to Stop Self-Doubt from Holding You Back in Life – Henrik Edberg, Positivity Blog (undated but probably 22 October 2014)

Read the full piece for the other two and a half tips.

“It is usually pretty easy to become a happier person”

Is it bollocks. How’s that deadline coming along? Going to make your next mortgage payment, are we? Oh, let’s turn that frown into a smile!

But I wouldn’t point you at some happiness articles just to snipe about them. Not just to snipe. In among the less bearable parts of The Positivity Blogs feature on 7 Small Habits That Will Steal Your Happiness there is a near-gem:

It is usually pretty easy to become a happier person.

It is also quite easy to rob yourself of your own happiness. To make yourself more miserable and add a big bowl of suffering to your day. It is common thing, people do it every day all over the world.

So today I’d like to combine these two things. I’d like to share 7 happiness stealing habits that I have had quite a bit of trouble with in my own daily life (and I know from all the emails I get that many of you do too).

But I’d also like to add what you can do instead if you find yourself being stuck in one of these destructive habits.

7 Small Habits That Will Steal Your Happiness – Henrik Edberg, Positivity Blog (24 July 2014)

The seven habits are good – and I recognise far too many of them – plus Henrik does offer some solid advice about coping with each of them over on the full article.