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Happiness, 1.26 (V) Week 1 Video 12 - Summary

1.26 (V) Week 1 Video 12 - Summary

[MUSIC] Hello, and welcome back. Here we are at the end of the first week. In this video I would like to summarize everything that we have covered this week, and also give you a little bit of a bird's eye picture of what's coming up next week. As I mentioned in one of the early videos, this course will not have the desired effect on your happiness unless you're diligent and you've completed all the videos and the exercises for this course and you're also open-minded. That is your are willing to be open to new ideas and perspectives. So I hope that you have viewed all 11 video lectures thus far. That you've completed all the quizzes embedded in these videos. And that you have started the first exercise, Defining and Incorporating Happiness. If you haven't viewed all previous videos and completed all the embedded quizzes, or you haven't started the first exercise, please pause the video right now and do these things first before we move forward. In fact, I'm going to pause it for you right here. Click on the proceed button only if you've completed viewing all the videos and done all the quizzes and started the first exercise. In an earlier video, I introduced to you the metaphor of the balloon where the size of the balloon represents how happy you are and the holes in the balloon represent the happiness sins, which deflate the balloon. One way to become happier is to patch the holes on the balloon, that is, get rid of the sins. Another way is to inflate the balloon which is where the seven habits of the highly happy come in. The first deadly happiness sin, which we discussed this week is devaluing happiness. How do we devalue happiness? Well, by succumbing to the Fundamental Happiness Paradox. As we saw, we routinely sacrifice happiness for the sake of other goals. Now why do we devalue happiness given that it's so important to us? For three reasons. First, harboring negative beliefs about happiness. Second, not defining happiness in concrete terms. And third, medium maximization. The way to overcome the first deadly happiness sin, is by acquiring and reinforcing the first habit, which is to prioritize but not pursue happiness. As we saw from these studies that Kelly, David, Lauren, and I have run, while it's important to remind ourselves to make happiness enhancing decisions, it is equally important not to chase happiness. When we chase happiness, by comparing how we feel with how we'd ideally like to feel, we end up being less happy. The question is how do you acquire and reinforce the first habit of prioritizing but not pursuing happiness? It is through the first exercise, which is defining and incorporating happiness. The exercise has two components, of course, as the name suggests. As I mentioned, it is better not to equate happiness to sensory pleasure or pride. Not because there's anything morally wrong with these emotions, but because they're not sustainable. For the same reason it is better to equate happiness to something more like abundance. Since findings show, for example, this paper by Danbrun and Ricard and others, that is is this type of happiness that has the best potential to be sustained for long durations. The second component of the exercise has to do with identifying the things, the people or objects or activities that help you experience happiness in the way that you've defined it. Hopefully, as a result of this exercise, you have a good idea of what happiness means to you and what kinds of things leads you to feel happy in the way that you've defined it. Now let me talk a little bit about how defining and incorporating happiness is likely to plug the happiness hole created by the first deadly happiness sin which is devaluing happiness. Remember that one of the reasons why we devalue happiness is because we don't have a concrete, regularly available definition of it. We address this problem by coming up with a personally relevant and concrete definition of happiness, which is the first component of the exercise, of course, defining happiness. Remember also that the reason why we sacrifice happiness for the sake of other goals is because of Medium Maximization. As we saw earlier, we're distracted by things that lead to happiness, which makes us forget all about happiness. So reminding us on a regular basis to prioritize happiness, we are reminding ourselves to refocus on what we ultimately want in life which is not the mediums that lead to happiness, but happiness itself. So in other words, in a sense, we want to go back to being like a child. If you pay close attention to kids, you notice how impressively undistracted from happiness they are. I had the privilege of recognizing this when my son was about four years old. He saw another kid in the neighborhood driving one of these motorized cars and he desperately wanted one for himself. So we ordered the car for him from Amazon. Car soon arrived in a box and my son was totally into the car for all of three days. After that he started playing more with the box in which the car came than with the car itself. Why? Because he was infatuated with this cartoon character called Hamilton the Pig, who apparently used to live in a box, and so he wanted to do the same thing. I remember being quite upset about this. But then I realized, how does it matter to me how my son has fun, so long as he's having fun? I also realized that it's precisely because we are told by others and by society on what to value, value for money, status, beauty, power, etc., that we lose sight of what makes us happy. We should actually be quite instinctive. So, not only did I let my son continue to play with his cardboard box to his heart's content, I actually told myself that I should try and do the same thing. That is, not get distracted from happiness when I'm making my decisions. This brings me to the third and final reason why we devalue happiness. Because of the negative beliefs we harbor about happiness. That happiness makes one lazy, or selfish or that it's fleeting. Hopefully by defining happiness as authentic pride or as love/connection or as abundance, you will realize that this is not true. While sensory pleasure and hubristic pride may be fleeting, authentic pride, love and abundance, certainly abundance aren't. In one sense the attentive remaining weeks of this course is going to be to help you to experience the feeling of abundance on a more regular basis. As I will mention towards the end of this course, getting rid of these seven deadly sins and acquiring these seven habits of the highly happy will make it more likely that you experience this feeling of abundance on a more regular basis, and that I think is a beautiful thing. With that, let me bid you good bye for now. See you bright and early next week when I will be discussing the second deadly happiness sin, which is chasing superiority. The second habit of the highly happy, pursuing flow and the second exercise, which is practicing gratitude. [MUSIC]


1.26 (V) Week 1 Video 12 - Summary

[MUSIC] Hello, and welcome back. Here we are at the end of the first week. In this video I would like to summarize everything that we have covered this week, and also give you a little bit of a bird's eye picture of what's coming up next week. As I mentioned in one of the early videos, this course will not have the desired effect on your happiness unless you're diligent and you've completed all the videos and the exercises for this course and you're also open-minded. That is your are willing to be open to new ideas and perspectives. So I hope that you have viewed all 11 video lectures thus far. That you've completed all the quizzes embedded in these videos. And that you have started the first exercise, Defining and Incorporating Happiness. If you haven't viewed all previous videos and completed all the embedded quizzes, or you haven't started the first exercise, please pause the video right now and do these things first before we move forward. In fact, I'm going to pause it for you right here. Click on the proceed button only if you've completed viewing all the videos and done all the quizzes and started the first exercise. In an earlier video, I introduced to you the metaphor of the balloon where the size of the balloon represents how happy you are and the holes in the balloon represent the happiness sins, which deflate the balloon. One way to become happier is to patch the holes on the balloon, that is, get rid of the sins. Another way is to inflate the balloon which is where the seven habits of the highly happy come in. The first deadly happiness sin, which we discussed this week is devaluing happiness. How do we devalue happiness? Well, by succumbing to the Fundamental Happiness Paradox. As we saw, we routinely sacrifice happiness for the sake of other goals. Now why do we devalue happiness given that it's so important to us? For three reasons. First, harboring negative beliefs about happiness. Second, not defining happiness in concrete terms. And third, medium maximization. The way to overcome the first deadly happiness sin, is by acquiring and reinforcing the first habit, which is to prioritize but not pursue happiness. As we saw from these studies that Kelly, David, Lauren, and I have run, while it's important to remind ourselves to make happiness enhancing decisions, it is equally important not to chase happiness. When we chase happiness, by comparing how we feel with how we'd ideally like to feel, we end up being less happy. The question is how do you acquire and reinforce the first habit of prioritizing but not pursuing happiness? It is through the first exercise, which is defining and incorporating happiness. The exercise has two components, of course, as the name suggests. As I mentioned, it is better not to equate happiness to sensory pleasure or pride. Not because there's anything morally wrong with these emotions, but because they're not sustainable. For the same reason it is better to equate happiness to something more like abundance. Since findings show, for example, this paper by Danbrun and Ricard and others, that is is this type of happiness that has the best potential to be sustained for long durations. The second component of the exercise has to do with identifying the things, the people or objects or activities that help you experience happiness in the way that you've defined it. Hopefully, as a result of this exercise, you have a good idea of what happiness means to you and what kinds of things leads you to feel happy in the way that you've defined it. Now let me talk a little bit about how defining and incorporating happiness is likely to plug the happiness hole created by the first deadly happiness sin which is devaluing happiness. Remember that one of the reasons why we devalue happiness is because we don't have a concrete, regularly available definition of it. We address this problem by coming up with a personally relevant and concrete definition of happiness, which is the first component of the exercise, of course, defining happiness. Remember also that the reason why we sacrifice happiness for the sake of other goals is because of Medium Maximization. As we saw earlier, we're distracted by things that lead to happiness, which makes us forget all about happiness. So reminding us on a regular basis to prioritize happiness, we are reminding ourselves to refocus on what we ultimately want in life which is not the mediums that lead to happiness, but happiness itself. So in other words, in a sense, we want to go back to being like a child. If you pay close attention to kids, you notice how impressively undistracted from happiness they are. I had the privilege of recognizing this when my son was about four years old. He saw another kid in the neighborhood driving one of these motorized cars and he desperately wanted one for himself. So we ordered the car for him from Amazon. Car soon arrived in a box and my son was totally into the car for all of three days. After that he started playing more with the box in which the car came than with the car itself. Why? Because he was infatuated with this cartoon character called Hamilton the Pig, who apparently used to live in a box, and so he wanted to do the same thing. I remember being quite upset about this. But then I realized, how does it matter to me how my son has fun, so long as he's having fun? I also realized that it's precisely because we are told by others and by society on what to value, value for money, status, beauty, power, etc., that we lose sight of what makes us happy. We should actually be quite instinctive. So, not only did I let my son continue to play with his cardboard box to his heart's content, I actually told myself that I should try and do the same thing. That is, not get distracted from happiness when I'm making my decisions. This brings me to the third and final reason why we devalue happiness. Because of the negative beliefs we harbor about happiness. That happiness makes one lazy, or selfish or that it's fleeting. Hopefully by defining happiness as authentic pride or as love/connection or as abundance, you will realize that this is not true. While sensory pleasure and hubristic pride may be fleeting, authentic pride, love and abundance, certainly abundance aren't. In one sense the attentive remaining weeks of this course is going to be to help you to experience the feeling of abundance on a more regular basis. As I will mention towards the end of this course, getting rid of these seven deadly sins and acquiring these seven habits of the highly happy will make it more likely that you experience this feeling of abundance on a more regular basis, and that I think is a beautiful thing. With that, let me bid you good bye for now. See you bright and early next week when I will be discussing the second deadly happiness sin, which is chasing superiority. The second habit of the highly happy, pursuing flow and the second exercise, which is practicing gratitude. [MUSIC]