The secret to success and happiness! And it’s based on science.
What makes those that are so successful unique? What do they do that others don’t? Do you want the secret to success?
Shawn Achor has been featured by Oprah Winfrey, and he spent years at Harvard studying the psychology of happiness. Specifically, he examined the outliers from happiness data; those that had achieved a level of happiness we can only dream of. So exactly what did he find?
Interestingly, Shawn’s research showed that success didn’t bring happiness, but happiness brought success!
His research examined how to move people from average to great. The good news is that there are things you can do to be happier. Not only will that, being happy will make you more successful.
Studies show that you only experience a brief feeling of happiness after achieving a goal, before you find yourself looking for another. So if you tend to say to yourself, I’ll be happy when……? It might be time to reconsider your approach.
Happiness brings success, not the other way around.
It’s well known that intelligence isn’t the strongest predictor of life success. The major contributing factors are optimism, social connection and the way you perceive stress. If you increase your level of these, success rates rise considerably.
So it’s time to start seeing problems as challenges. So when a change in your life occurs, consider it a challenge. Just changing this perspective can dramatically reduce stress levels.
Are you stressed at work and home? Feel like there are not enough hours in the day? When you feel stressed do you tend to cancel plans with friends to spend more time getting stuff done?
Is that what the outliers did?
No. The super happy tended to increase their social engagement in the middle of stress. Social support is an important predictor of success and this is also true if you provide it to others.
So to sum up. Start seeing problems as challenges, increase your social engagement and focus on improving optimism.. and along the way you should get one step closer to success.
Want help with how to increase optimism or changing your perspective when you hit a hurdle, contact us?