Wednesday, January 24, 2007

A route to happiness

After seeing so many posts by Abi on happiness, I started browsing through some articles on happiness and even bought a book on happiness ( it was on sale, otherwise I would not have been too happy). Here is an article which is close to my beliefs. Excerpts:
"In 2005, a team of U.S. researchers developed a comprehensive model of sustainable happiness change that integrated the major lines of the subjective well-being literature. The result was a theory which proposed that up to 50 per cent of one’s happiness was rooted in a genetically determined set-point, 10 per cent was related to circumstantial factors (nation of residence, demographics, culture, income, etc), and the remaining 40 per cent was determined by intentional activities such as pursuing goals, looking at things optimistically, and being physically active. The keys to sustainable happiness change rest in these activities, and the first direct empirical validation for the theory is my favourite article from the past 3 years.
....
“In other words, our data suggest that effort and hard work offer the most promising route to happiness. In contrast, simply altering one’s superficial circumstances (assuming they are already reasonably good) may have little lasting effect on well-being. (p.82-83).” "
I usually enjoy my evening coffeee better if did some work that day.

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