Five small practices that lead to happiness

A positive psychology advocate discusses strategies for building happier habits in competitive environments.

As kids, we learn tricks for how long we should take to brush our teeth—the time it takes to sing “Happy Birthday” twice through. We’re taught reminders for the time it takes to wash our hands—another two rounds of the birthday song. But we aren’t taught how to dedicate time to building habits that lead to happiness. As it turns out, developing those tools might not take as much time as you’d think.

Shawn Achor, New York Times bestselling author of “The Happiness Advantage,” is seeking to change that. Sitting down with Firm Ombud and Global Leader of Colleague Care Gretchen Scheidler in a session acknowledging World Mental Health Day on October 10, the positive psychology advocate asked our colleagues, “What if we dedicated a few minutes each day to habits in happiness, just as we do to brushing our teeth every morning?”

The answer to this question came from Shawn’s time at Harvard—not as a student (though he did graduate there), but from his next eight years spent living in the dorms as a counselor to students.

During this time, he assessed the students’ wellbeing only to discover that the majority were suffering from debilitating depression. Concerned, Shawn dedicated himself to exploring whether it was possible to enhance levels of happiness and success, regardless of genetic predispositions and environmental circumstances.

He told our colleagues, “Positive psychology focuses on studying the ‘outliers.’ Our research showed that individuals who performed above the curve were developing habits and incorporating mindset shifts that broke the tyranny of genes and environment over their levels of happiness, success, creativity, and longevity.”

Here are a few habits and practices Shawn described that can lead to more happiness and better outcomes.

1. Make happiness, not success, the goal

Shawn shared the dangers of always aiming for “the next, best thing,” be it the next promotion or an elusive end-of-year rating. Achieving those goals, he said, generally doesn’t leave people feeling as happy as they’d expect.

He told colleagues, “Happiness is the precursor to our potential, not just the result of it. It’s the means to seeing our capability as human beings.”

He went on to explain that a series of studies revealed that each time you achieve success, it changes the goal post of what success looks like and raises the bar. He said, “This isn’t to argue that we should forget about success and pursue happiness. Rather, it is to argue that when the brain is at its most positive, we achieve the highest levels of output in our lives.”

He added, “Increasing optimism, social connection, and a sense of meaning or purpose significantly enhances every known educational and business outcome in our lives, as well as many health outcomes.”

The business case for happiness

It turns out, people perform better when they’re happy (notably, not the other way around).

Doctors who were in a positive mood before making a diagnosis showed almost three times more intelligence and creativity than doctors in a neutral state; they also made accurate diagnoses 19 percent faster
Optimistic salespeople outsell their pessimistic counterparts by 56 percent
People on average live 7.5 years longer when their mindsets are set to optimistic over neutral

2. Step away from the “self-help” approach to happiness

Shawn emphasized that we need to move away from the idea that happiness can be achieved alone, through “self-help.” Instead, the greatest predictor of long-term success and happiness is actually social connection.

“When you look at a hill and you believe you are alone in both viewing it and climbing it, your brain perceives the hill as 20-30 percent steeper, making you less likely to take action,” Shawn told colleagues. “However, when you stand next to someone who is also going to climb the hill with you, your brain perceives the hill as 20-30 percent less steep.”

He continued, “Our challenges seem more or less daunting depending on whether we feel alone or supported. When we do things together, we create meaningful social bonds, even in a hyper-competitive environment.”

3. Write down three things that you’re grateful for

Gratitude can be a 45-second daily practice. Shawn recommended taking that much time daily to write down three things you are grateful for.

“It doesn’t matter exactly what you are grateful for; it matters what you are ‘scanning,’” Shawn explains. “There is a part of your brain that scans the world for incoming threats, which you can also train to scan for positive aspects. The goal is to activate the area of the brain that detects threats, recalibrating it to recognize positive events from the past 24 hours.”

To assist this scanning process, instead of writing down general things you’re grateful for, challenge yourself to think more deeply and be more specific. Shawn discovered that, over time, this practice allows your brain to focus on the positive rather than instinctively scanning for threats.

4. Take a 15-minute walk four times a week

A short, brisk walk has shown to drastically improved happiness levels. Fifteen minutes may sound insignificant, but Shawn said, “The small behaviors we often dismiss as ineffective in places where we have clinical levels of depression are actually found to produce the most change—equivalent to and sometimes better than the strongest tier of medications we have.”

When you start habitually walking, it can lead to a feedback loop that creates constellations of positive habits that act as a buffer to future depression.

5. Praise others