In Search of Happiness

• "37% of a sample of 49 super-rich people were less happy than the national average. In another study, there was no difference between the happiness level of 22 lottery winners and comparison samples of average people or paraplegics." (Oliver James, Children Before Cash, "The Guardian," May 17, 2003) Does this strike you as odd? Why?

• "Compared to 1957, we are now "the doubly affluent society"—with double what money buys. We have twice as many cars per person. We eat out two and a half times as often. In the late 1950s, few Americans had dishwashers, clothes dryers, or air conditioning; today, most do." If more money makes us happier, then you'd think people today should be happier than they were then. But are they? No. Compared to people in the 1950's, statistics find us less happy, with three times the number of teen suicides and many more depressed people. (Wealth, Well-Being and the New American Dream, by David G. Myers ( www.newdream.org ).

• People who strive most for wealth tend to be less happy than others. Those who strive for "intimacy, personal growth, and contribution to the community" have a better quality of life. (From the research of Psychologist Richard Ryan, Tim Kasser, and the earlier findings of H.W. Perkins.)

"Joy is not in things! It is in us!" (Benjamin Franklin) 

Keys to Happiness
(According to Recent Scientific Studies)

Help _______ (Bringing happiness to others makes us happy.)

Happiness is a by-product of an effort to make someone else happy. (Gretta Brooker Palmer)

"True as a means of destroying slavery, it was like an attempt to bail out the ocean with a teaspoon, but the thought that there was one less slave, and one more freeman -- having myself been a slave, and a fugitive slave -- brought to my heart unspeakable joy." (Frederick Douglass of the Underground Railroad)

Attitude _________ (Count your blessings and be grateful.)

Pursue Quality _____________ (With family and friends.)

”There is no hope of joy except in human relations.” (Pilot and Novelist Antoine de Saint-Exupery)

Pardon Those Who _________ You (Don’t hold grudges.)

''You have the capacity to choose what you think about. If you choose to think about past hurts, you will continue to feel bad. While it's true you can't change the effect past influences had on you once, you can change the effect they have on you now.'' (Gary McKay, Ph.D.)

Immerse Yourself in ___________ (Work and/or play.)

''…When Men are employ'd they are best contented. For on the Days they work'd they were good-natur'd and cheerful; and with the consciousness of having done a good Day's work they spent the Evenings jollily; but on the idle Days they were mutinous and quarrelsome, finding fault with their Pork, the Bread, etc., and in continual ill-humor….'' (Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, p. 165)

To love what you do and feel that it matters, how could anything be more fun? (Katharine Graham)

Envy _______ (Stop trying to keep up with the Joneses.)

Religion ________