Layer 512 . . . Meditating on Happiness, The Hedonism Archetype, The Nihilism Archetype, and The Happiness Archetype

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How To Become Happier

Now where was I? Oh yes - happiness. Or rather - how to become happier.

In Layer 509 I said I was reading a new book by Tal Ben-Shahar, which is called 'Happier'.

http://oxzen.blogspot.com/2012/01/layer-509-happier-rat-racers-top-of.html

Here's a few more quotes from the section on the Rat-Race Archetype.

The reason why we see so many rat racers around is that our culture reinforces the belief [that 'one big break' will finally make us happy]. 

We learn to focus on the next goal rather than on our present experience and chase the ever-elusive future our entire lives. We are not rewarded for enjoying the journey itself but for the successful completion of a journey. Society rewards results, not processes; arrivals, not journeys.

Once we arrive at our destination, once we attain our goal, we mistake the relief we feel for happiness . . . the negation of stress or anxiety. The absence of pain is but a momentary relief from an essentially negative experience.

The Hedonism Archetype

A hedonist seeks pleasure and avoids pain. She goes about satisfying her desires, giving little or no thought to future consequences. If drugs produce a pleasant experience, she takes them; if she finds work difficult, she avoids it.

The hedonist errs in equating effort with pain and pleasure with happiness.Without a long-term purpose, devoid of challenge, life ceases to feel meaningful to us; we cannot find happiness if we exclusively seek pleasure and avoid pain.

Mihaly Csikszentmihalji, whose work focuses on peak performance and peak experience, claims that, "the best moments usually occur when a person's body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile." A struggle-free, hedonistic existence is not a prescription for happiness.

The Nihilism Archetype

A nihilist is a person who has given up on happiness, who has become resigned to the belief that life has no meaning. This person captures the state of being chained to the past - their past failures to attain happiness.

Such attachment to past failures has been described by Martin Seligman as "learned helplessness". Such thinking leads to despair. 

The rat racer, the hedonist, and the nihilist are all, in their own ways, guilty of a fallacy - an inaccurate reading of reality, of the true nature of happiness and what it takes to lead a fulfilling life. 

The rat racer suffers from the "arrival fallacy" - the false belief that reaching a valued destination can sustain happiness. 

The hedonist suffers from the "floating moment fallacy" - the false belief that happiness can be sustained by an ongoing experience of momentary pleasures that are detached from a future purpose. 

Nihilism is also a fallacy, a misreading of reality - the false belief that no matter what one does, one cannot attain happiness. This last fallacy stems from the inability to see a synthesis between arrivals and floating moments, some third option that may provide a way out of one's unhappy predicament. 

The Happiness Archetype

Instead of asking "Should I be happy now or in the future?" we should ask, "How can I be happy now and in the future?"

Students who truly love learning, for instance, derive present benefit from the pleasure they take in discovering new ideas, and future benefit from the ways in which those ideas will prepare them for their careers. 

To expect constant happiness, though, is to set ourselves up for failure and disappointment. 

The rat racer's illusion is that reaching some future destination will bring him lasting happiness; he does not recognise the significance of the journey. The hedonist's illusion is that only the journey is important. The nihilist, having given up on both the destination and the journey, is disillusioned with life. The rat racer becomes a slave to the future; the hedonist, a slave to the moment; the nihilist, a slave to the past. 

Attaining lasting happiness requires that we enjoy the journey on the way towards a destination we deem valuable. 

Meditating on Happiness

Research . . . reveals the profound effects of regular meditation. Make meditation a ritual. Set aside between ten minutes and an hour each day for meditation. Whenever you feel stressed or upset or when you simply want to enjoy a moment of calm or joy, you can take a few deep breaths and experience a surge of positive emotions. 

Is that really so? Or is it a surge of positive feelings? Does the distinction matter? Should we continue to reflect on this potentially important issue?


My son tells me he has no time for all this 'self-help' stuff. He's dismissive of the whole genre - positive psychology and all. Never having been a reader of self-help books myself I'm sympathetic to his point of view, but on the other hand the whole 'happiness' movement is obviously in the zeitgeist, and it's a subject worthy of study - if only to critique what various psychologists and self-help gurus are saying, and to reach sounder opinions ourselves.

I've no idea where this is going with Tal Ben-Shahar, but I'll carry on with the journey and report back in future blogs.


Website: http://www.talbenshahar.com/

Bringing Happiness to Life

"You will find a whole range of online courses, books, live lectures and workshops, as well as products through which I create a bridge between the Ivory Tower and Main Street — translating the rigorous research conducted in universities into accessible material that most people can apply in their personal and professional lives."

Tal consults and lectures around the world to executives in multi-national corporations, Fortune 500 companies, educational institutions, and the general public. Topics include leadership, education, ethics, happiness, self-esteem, resilience, goal setting, and mindfulness. He is the author of the international best sellers Happier and Being Happy, which have been translated into 25 languages.

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Layer 275 . . . Positive Psychology, Maslow, and Individual Journeys

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A few remarks on "positive psychology" - thoughts which have been fermenting and distilling  in Oxzen's spirit refinery for quite a while. It's time for a tasting.

Firstly, "positive psychology" isn't even psychology. It's bleeding common sense, as far as it goes. You don't have to be a trained psychologist in order to understand it or practice it. Millions of Buddhists, for example, have been practitioners for millenia.

Abraham Maslow, who was a psychologist by trade, is usually referred to as the "father" of positive psychology. Since Maslow wrote about a hierarchy of human needs and described what he saw as "self-actualised" or fully evolved human beings (see Layer 20), a great many of his fellow practitioners have grabbed on to what he said and made a great deal of money out of it, using the label "positive psychology". Whereas, in fact, Maslow's insights actually amount to a philosophy of human development and human behaviour, and aren't a prescription for treating psychological disturbance and disorder.

Maslow understood that once our basic needs for safety, food, shelter and human relationships have been taken care of then healthy human beings are motivated by a quest for social, emotional and spiritual development. The driving forces beyond safety, sustenance and sex are the need to have and to receive what Buddhists call lovingkindness, along with sustainable feelings of joy and pleasure which occur through giving and receiving lovingkindness. These aren't terms used by Maslow, but it's clear to me, at least, that this is a useful way of paraphrasing what he said.

Beyond the positive feelings that occur through positive human contacts there is another level of joy and wellbeing which is gained through contact with nature, and feelings of awe and wonder that enter our beings when we feel a connection with the divine, and a sense that we're in fact connected with everybody and everything that exists. In other words, when we experience an enlightened sense of understanding that we're all part of everything and we depend for our existence on our place in the universal flux - beyond our individual egos; beyond our individual striving for power or riches or status; beyond even a concern for our own self-preservation.

At this level we appreciate just how precious an individual life can be, and we feel motivated to help others to walk a path towards greater enlightenment and wellbeing. Ultimately each of us has to make that journey through our own efforts, but we can all help one another along the way. Through our connectedness in a spirit of lovingkindness we can reduce levels of loneliness, misery and sickness, and promote universal wellbeing. The answers to life's challenges are not "out there", not in a God or gods, not in material wealth, and not in individual power or status. The answers lie within each of us, and in reaching higher states of enlightened living, and in promoting those states in others. Not only do we not need power or wealth or status in order to become a fully evolved human being - those things more often than not hold people back from attaining any degree of enlightenment.

Ignorance is what holds us back, and lack of insight. Many of the richest and most famous and powerful people are unbelievably ignorant. They may also be some of the loneliest and unhappiest. The possession of comfort, popularity, safety and oppulence is no guarantee of wellbeing, let alone happiness. Time spent on pursuing wealth and status is time that's unavailable for pursuing spiritual intelligence and enlightenment. If we have no time for reflection and meditation then we are doomed to remain mired in ignorance and poor in spirit.

Education could play a massive role in overcoming ignorance and spiritual impoverishment, but unfortunately the schools and colleges in most industrialised nations have been turned into mere results factories with their managers primed to believe that their aim is to prepare pupils for the world of work.

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This little spiel, this minor rant against "positive psychology", was sparked by a recent article in the New Statesman -  by Anna Minton, called "Smile now, cry later."

http://www.newstatesman.com/health/2010/03/positive-psychology-happiness

Britain has bought in to America’s positive thinking and is heavily pushing the “science of happiness” – but does it work?

Maslow moved to Brandeis University, Massachusetts, in 1951 and three years later published Motivation and Personality, which rejected the determinism of both the psychoanalytic and the behaviourist approaches to psychology, taking dynamic and successful figures as its model, rather than those with negative pathology.

Maslow referred to humanism as a "third force" behind these two schools of thought, and became known internationally as the founding father and leader of this emergent branch of psychology.

I'd urge readers to have a look at this article, and ignore some of its superficiality to just take note of its comments on Martin Seligman, his stupid formula, and the comments on Richard Layard. We should also take note of how Layard and others are promoting the idea of "happiness lessons" in schools, which may amount to not much more than promoting "learned optimism" and a capacity to see a glass as half full instead of (or as well as) half empty.

As I was saying . . . bleeding common sense. A century of psycho-analysis, psychological quackery, ECT, etc, has done nothing for the promotion of human wellbeing. Our only hope is to show our children what the best of humanity is capable of (Layer 20), and to provide the conditions in which they can begin their individual journeys towards self-discovery, self-actualisation, wellbeing, lovingkindess, spiritual intelligence and enlightenment.

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Talking of Individual Journeys . . .

Two of the people I'm very impressed with at the moment are David Haye, the world champion boxer, and Emma Thompson, Oscar-winning actress and screenwriter.

Not since the heyday of Muhammed Ali have I heard a boxer speak with such intelligence and lucidity. Yesterday was a Haye day, with the man himself speaking on Radio 4 about his fight this evening. You rarely hear anyone speaking as well as DH does, let alone a boxer.

Emma T was this week's guest on Desert Island Discs, and was also on TV promoting her latest film, Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang. She's also a wonderfully intelligent and lucid speaker, and also has a superb, subtle sense of humour, just like her late father, the sublime Eric Thompson, who died tragically young following a stroke in his late 40's. The Magic Roundabout wasn't exactly his creation, but the words he spoke, in his incredibly listenable voice,  were entirely his own. Brian, Dougal, Dylan, Florence, Mr McHenry, Ermintrude, Mr Rusty, Zebidee - Eric did them all.-

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2010/mar/28/emma-thompson-kenneth-branagh

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/celebritynews/7530122/Emma-Thompson-says-work-saved-her-from-going-under-in-her-battle-with-depression.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emma_Thompson

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfNUdhFIVHA&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zCGjSoZzkY&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMZ_cQYOzkQ&feature=related


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This says it all:

Only drug dealers will benefit from this absurd ban on mephedrone

Prohibition will drive supply underground, endanger users and make it tougher to wean addicts off harder drugs

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/apr/01/drug-dealers-profit-illegal-mephedrone-ban

As its last measure the present parliament will approve its silliest. It will "ban" a recently discovered party drug called mephedrone. MPs will declare next week that, while they may have been venal, spendthrift and corrupt, at least their final act will have protected thousands of young innocents from the devil. They will have well and truly banned something. They will feel much better, and go off whistling into the night.

Another government advisor has quit in protest against the government's handling of this issue:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8601315.stm

Eric Carlin said we need to get to the root causes of why young people use drugs. Indeed we do.And it's something to do with lack of a decent education, spiritual intelligence, and unbalanced human beings.

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Carly Simon was on the radio, talking about her heritage track, which turned out to be Cat Stevens'  "How Can I Tell You?"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsk5MJeV5Qc

http://www.lyricsfreak.com/c/cat+stevens/how+can+i+tell+you_20028195.html

Interesting that she described the love she feels for her grandchildren as "an adrenaline rush" which occurs every time she sees them. I've never seen the words "love" and "adrenaline" linked in this way before, but it makes sense. If people feel a craving for "love" then it may well be because of the heightened sense of aliveness, wellbeing and joy they get from increased levels of adrenaline. After all, it's the drug of choice for people who are addicted to "falling in love".
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Layer 68 Zen, Tao, the Olympics, Warfare and the Zone.

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There was a superb documentary on TV recently about the planning and construction of the Great Wall of China. First there was the programme about two guys riding motorbikes right across Mongolia, and then this very informative look at how the Chinese determined to prevent the Mongols from attacking and plundering Beijing and the rest of China.

It’s interesting how chains of thought originate. Thinking about the Chinese approach to warfare sent me off on a quick skim in my copy of an ancient book, Sun Tzu’s Art of War. You can read what Wikipedia says about the book at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_War , but I think I’ll try to add something to the entry since it fails to emphasise the book’s roots in Taoist thought and practice. It also fails to emphasise the book’s relevance to our overall attitude and approach to life in general, even though it mentions its applicability to business and sporting environments.

In general we in the West are ignorant of Taoist thought and practice, and its importance as philosophy and spiritual guidance. We also fail to recognise that Zen developed out of not only Chinese Buddhism but also ancient Chinese Taoist thinking and beliefs. In essence Zen and Tao are identical.

Wikipedia tells us that Sun Tzu “taught that strategy was not planning in the sense of working through a to-do list, but rather that it requires quick and appropriate responses to changing conditions. Planning works in a controlled environment, but in a competitive environment, competing plans collide, creating unexpected situations.”

The essence of Zen and Taoist thought is that in order to prepare oneself for living well we need to train ourselves, through meditation and other practices, to focus our minds at all times in the present, so that we can respond “quickly and appropriately” (i.e. spontaneously) to whatever “unexpected situations” we may find ourselves in. By all means allow yourself to dream and your mind to wander, to imagine and to create, and reflect on past experiences, but the time to do that is during ‘meditation’ or during conversation with friends. But don’t engage with the world unless your mind is focused and very much in the present.

In order to combat those who would exploit us or do us harm, and in order to protect and nurture those for whom we are responsible, as would a Samurai, for example, we need to be fully aware and living in the moment, with our minds, our instincts and our intuitive faculties clear, calm and ready to respond with speed and precision. This is what people taking part in sports have come to call being “in the zone”.

It’s also what the “positive psychology” movement calls “Flow”.
[ See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology) ]
“Flow is the mental state of operation in which the person is fully immersed in what he or she is doing by a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and success in the process of the activity. Proposed by positive psychologist Mihály Csíkszentmihályi, the concept has been widely referenced across a variety of fields. Colloquial terms for this or similar mental states include: to be on the ball, in the zone, or in the groove.”

Wikipedia continues with the following:

Components of flow

Csíkszentmihályi identifies the following as accompanying an experience of flow:

* Clear goals (expectations and rules are discernible and goals are attainable and align appropriately with one's skill set and abilities).
* Concentrating and focusing, a high degree of concentration on a limited field of attention (a person engaged in the activity will have the opportunity to focus and to delve deeply into it).
* A loss of the feeling of self-consciousness, the merging of action and awareness.
* Distorted sense of time, one's subjective experience of time is altered.
* Direct and immediate feedback (successes and failures in the course of the activity are apparent, so that behavior can be adjusted as needed).
* Balance between ability level and challenge (the activity is neither too easy nor too difficult).
* A sense of personal control over the situation or activity.
* The activity is intrinsically rewarding, so there is an effortlessness of action.
* People become absorbed in their activity, and focus of awareness is narrowed down to the activity itself, action awareness merging.

Not all are needed for flow to be experienced.”

Wikipedia then adds:

"Religion and spirituality

Csíkszentmihályi may have been the first to describe this concept in Western psychology, but as he himself readily acknowledges he was most certainly not the first to quantify the concept of Flow or develop applications based on the concept.

For millennia, practitioners of Eastern religions such as Buddhism and Taoism have honed the discipline of overcoming the duality of self and object as a central feature of spiritual development. Eastern spiritual practitioners have developed a very thorough and holistic set of theories around overcoming duality of self and object, tested and refined through spiritual practice instead of the systematic rigor and controls of modern science.
The phrase "being at one with things" is a metaphor of Csíkszentmihályi's Flow concept. Practitioners of the varied schools of Zen Buddhism apply concepts similar to Flow to aid their mastery of art forms, including, in the case of Japanese Zen Buddhism, Aikido, Kendo and Ikebana."

In any kind of sport being “in the zone” is what ultimately matters, assuming one has already developed to a high level the skills one needs to employ in the endeavor. In cricket a batsman can’t hope to prosper unless he’s “in the zone”, and everything “flows”. A bowler can only be successful if he’s “in the zone”.

And it’s the same in life. It’s important to be driven by passion, but it’s crucial to be able to direct one’s passion and one’s instincts from a basis of quiet, calm and confident awareness of whatever situation we may find ourselves in. Gung-ho aggression will probably lead you directly into your own little Valley of Death, especially against a smart opponent, whilst the heat of the moment is not the time to be asking ourselves “what should I do here?”, either.

Instincts will basically cause us to react with “fight, flight or freeze”, and are pretty useless when what’s required is consistent application of effort and engagement in a continuing process.

Ultimately one may decide to retreat, for instance, but it’s not the same as fleeing in panic. The 33rd hexagram in the I Ching is called Retreat, and the Wilhelm translation has this to say about it:

“Retreat is not to be confused with flight. Flight means saving oneself under any circumstances, whereas retreat is a sign of strength. We must be careful not to miss the right moment while we are in full possession of power and position. Then we shall be able to interpret the signs of the time before it is too late and to prepare for provisional retreat instead of being drawn into a desperate life-and-death struggle. Thus we do not simple abandon the field to the opponent; we make it difficult for him to advance by showing perseverance in single acts of resistance. In this way we prepare, while retreating, for the counter-movement. Understanding the laws of a constructive retreat of this sort is not easy. The meaning that lies hidden in such a time is important.”

http://www2.unipr.it/~deyoung/I_Ching_Wilhelm_Translation.html

It’s not difficult to see how Sun Tzu, Lao Tzu, the Tao Te Ching, the I Ching, the Art of War, Zen and ‘positive psychology’ are connected. Neither should it be difficult to see how all of these apply to everyday life. But do we offer these insights to our pupils in schools and colleges? And if so, where’s it happening? Not in the National Curriculum, that’s for sure.
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