Did you know: People who rate in the upper reaches of happiness on psychological tests develop about 50% more antibodies than average in response to flu vaccines.
Did you know: A Dutch study of elderly patients showed that upbeat mental states reduced an individual’s risk of death by half over a nine-year period.
Did you know: Countless studies show that people who are asked to list the things for which they are grateful, report a sense of well-being that is nearly 3x that of people who are asked to list the things that cause them anguish.
To say that our sense of happiness, or more precisely well-being, has an impact on our quality of life…is an obvious and dramatic understatement.
For nearly 100 years, biologists, psychologists, neuroscientists and the like…have been studying negative emotion. They’ve been studying anger, aggression, anxiety and depression. But it’s only been the last 3 decades where science has begun to focus on the positive.
And I find the resultant information to be fascinating and irrefutable.
Dr. Richard Davidson at the University of Wisconsin is one of the preeminent scholars in this field, and he says that there are four ‘constituents’ of well-being that neuroscience has been able to study, measure and predict.
He cites these 4 constituents as traits that can be measured in certain brain centers, and proven to be plastic.
Now…what do I mean by plastic?
I’m talking again about the concept of neuro-plasticity. In simple terms, the ability of our brains to rewire themselves.
Dr. Davidson cites the four constituents of well-being as:
1. Resilience – the capacity to recover from adversity.
2. Optimism & Outlook – the ability to see the good in the world.
3. Mindfulness & Attention – a wandering mind is an unhappy mind.
4. Generosity – being kind to others activates the circuits in our brain which sustain positive emotion. (And they do it in a way that produce change that can last more than any other phenomena that neuroscience has studied.)
Very often, these emails are random. Based on a thought that I’ve had the previous day, or a story that I wanted to share…and relate to the process.
But I picked up a book over the weekend that all about the science of our well-being…so I thought I’d share some of it with all of you.
There is too much information and too many thoughts for one email, albeit this should be a ‘double up’ since I missed yesterday. So I’ve decided to spread out some of my thoughts over the week.
But I will leave you with one quick anecdote about neuro-plasticity.
Last night my son left me a voicemail, and at the end of it he said, “I hope you have a great day Dad.”
Now that may seem like a simple statement that should only be interpreted as kindness/thoughtfulness. But when you think about it…where did he get this? He’s 8.
Without pondering the possibilities, I’ll just tell you where he got it. He got it from a ritual we started around February 1st of this year.
As part of our drive to school…I literally force my sons to repeat certain phrases (sometimes it ain’t easy). First of which is “I’m going to have a great day today.”
This message is starting to sink in. His brain is creating neural connections. It is strengthening the circuits of positive thought.
And where can that lead? To places of unsurpassed personal power and well-being. Places that I’d like to write about in the coming days, or even weeks.
Because this not only has consequences on ourselves…but to all those around us. All those we influence. All those we impact. Whether through parenthood, job interaction or just being a member of the community.
Thank you for the notes yesterday.
