The Key to Joy

“A thing of beauty is a Joy forever.” - John Keats

It is said that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. The way we look at the world determines our relationship to it. Our struggle then is not to change the world, but to love it. To see the beauty of life’s expression in all things, great and small. Even our pain has a beauty in it. For it is our pain that connects us most deeply.  

For me one of the most beautiful things in life is the magnificence of a golden dawn. The rising Sun casting its light over the world, welcoming a new day full of possibilities for creation and connection. When I greet the dawn I do so with gratitude in my heart for what has been and hope for what is to come. There is a word from the Lakota tradition used to greet the dawn that for me perfectly expresses the essence of my emotional state at these times. Wani Wachiyelo! I want to live! It expresses a deep desire to welcome the new day with one's whole being. With the full force of life’s energy. 

Morning positive psychology practices such as this can have a powerful effect on how one’s day unfolds. They help to ground us, set positive intentions and create a positive outlook. Help us to focus on the beauty of life that surrounds us. 

The modern field of Positive Psychology was founded in 1998 by Martin Seligman. It’s focus is on enhancing well-being, resilience and achievement rather than fixing illness. Seligman’s books Authentic Happiness published in 2000 and Flourish published in 2011 are two seminal texts in the field. In recent years the modality of Positive Psychology Coaching has gained much popularity as a way to enable optimal human functioning. In Flourish Seligman introduces a model for well-being and flourishing known as the PERMA model.

Positive Emotions

Positive emotions are the result of biochemistry that impacts our state. Our thinking affects this biochemistry, but so too does our biology. And our biological constraints go far broader than we often think, which is why it is so important to surrender to our biology if we are to really enable ourselves to connect consistently to positive emotional states. These biological constraints include our basic need for:

• Sleep
• Nutrition / Hydration
• Social support
• Exercise
• Breathwork (to regulate our nervous system)
• Access to nature

When these needs are met we can open ourselves to other activities that further fuel our positive emotions, such as meaningful work, intellectual and creative pursuits and our relationships to the world around us. 

Of course our thinking is also key. Positive Psychology suggests that the attitudes we take to the past, present and future is most important. It recommends looking at the past with an attitude of gratitude, to the future with an attitude of hope, and to the present with an attitude to endure whatever arises. Indeed gratitude practices in particular are one of the key tools offered to clients by Coaches who work in this modality. Gratitude helps to calm us down and there is also plenty of research showing that people with a regular gratitude practice report greater levels of flow in their life. So what might it look like? It can take many forms, but very simply 5 mins a day where one focuses on 3 things that one is grateful for and allows oneself to really feel into the sense of gratitude has shown to be effective. What’s important is not only to be grateful for the big things, but, to also remember to be grateful for the little things. Like the wind on your face, or having fresh water to drink. Personally, I like to habit stack my gratitude practice with brushing my teeth in the morning. I focus on one thing I’m grateful for, one person I’m grateful for, and then come back to gratitude for myself. 

Another practice commonly used in Positive Psychology is cognitive reframing. Again there are many versions of this and many contexts in which it can help. One of these involves dealing with anxiety when it arises. In fact, cognitive reframing has been shown to be more effective than breath-work for the alleviation of anxiety. So how does it work? Well the first thing to note is that the signal for anxiety in the body is the same as the signal for excitement. It involves the release of cortisol and norepinephrine. How we label it is the key. So the next time you feel yourself beginning to feel anxious, simply say to yourself out loud - I am excited! I am excited! I am excited! Not to be believed, but to be experienced. However, numerous studies have shown this simple cognitive reframe to be a highly effective strategy in dealing with anxiety. 

Engagement

This is the same idea as Flow states. It’s a process of being so focused on the task at hand that you enter into a state of being that is effortless, selfless, timeless and rich. A state where you connect your passion with a purpose greater than yourself and through which all aspects of your performance, both physical and mental, go through the roof. The Psychological research on Flow goes all the way back to Abraham Maslow and more recently Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi who is known as the Godfather of Flow. A number of triggers have been identified both at an individual level and a group level that are important for being able to access the state. These include:

• Focused Attention
• Deep Embodiment
• Challenge / Skills ratio
• Immediate Feedback
• Clear Goals
• Autonomy
• High Consequences

Flow is associated with the pursuit of mastery in a given field. It is often referred to as the source code of intrinsic human motivation given how addictive the biochemistry associated with the state can be. People with more Flow in their life report being happier and more productive. In fact a study by McKinsey found that executives who reported being in Flow were 5 times more productive than their steady state colleagues. Flow also jacks up creativity and learning. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in the US carried out an experiment where they induced Flow in novice snipers. The result was a 240% increase in learning times. Flow research has massive implications for how we live, work and achieve high performance in what is an increasingly distracted world. 

Relationships

We are social animals and we have a deep need for acceptance and belonging. Longitudinal research looking at societies who live the longest have consistently identified the importance of community to health and well-being. The depth of our interactions with family, friends and the wider community has a significant impact on our well-being, resilience and our achievement. By giving and receiving help we bring Oxytocin into our system. Oxytocin is the social bonding hormone aka the love hormone. It helps reduce stress and binds us closer together. Deep touch is also important for the release of Oxytocin, again something we get from our close relationships. The family therapist Virginia Satir spoke frequently of the importance of touch. She is famously quoted as saying 4 hugs a day for survival, 8 for maintenance and 12 for growth. 

While human relationships are an immense source of nourishment for us, they can also be toxic and at times deadly. This is where culture becomes key in the promotion of communities within which people can flourish. Most important in this respect is the establishment of Psychological safety. In fact, research at Google has found that Psychological safety is the most important factor when it comes to high performing teams. Psychological safety is the basis of Trust and it can only be brought about through genuine Respect for all individuals within the community so that a space is created that values diversity and allows the wisdom within the system to emerge. This does not mean the elimination of conflict, quite the opposite. Where Trust and Respect exist, conflict can be held and then becomes the pursuit of truth.   

When it comes to strengthening our relationships there are three areas that are crucial to focus on.

1. Active Involvement: Being engaged in meaningful activities regularly together with each other.
2. Interdependence: Bringing our unique talents in service of others while benefiting from their unique talents in return. Ideally this involves win/win outcomes and a fair exchange of value. 
3. Intimacy: Deepening the levels of mutual trust, respect and love within our relationships.  

Of course the most important relationship of all is the one we have with ourselves. This internal relationship is then reflected in our external relationships. So practices of self reflection that help increase our levels of self awareness and responsibility for how we are in relationships are also crucial. Coaching is one of the powerful tools that can help in this respect. 

Meaning

Meaning is all about how we relate to what we do in life. What is the meaning of life? To live! To what end? That is a crucial question for each to discover for themselves. Many religious traditions talk about the importance of finding your purpose (something transformational and beyond yourself) and then dedicating yourself fully to that and that alone. A path of discipline and responsibility where you sink into ever greater intimacy with yourself and the unique expression of life that you are and through this bring forth your creativity and light into the world to share with all. 

Humans are meaning machines. We are constantly creating meaning and making up stories about the world around us. Often the meaning we create can lead to positive emotions and a sense of empowerment. However, the opposite is also true. The stories we tell about ourselves and the world can also lead to a sense of hopelessness and disempowerment. To leverage our ability to create meaning that is empowering it is important to realise that we are the creators of this meaning. This means holding the idea that what we attach great meaning to also has no meaning whatsoever associated with it other than what we chose to give it. When we can flexibility and fluidly move between everything and nothing, we free ourselves from the constraints of past meanings that no longer serve. This may be meaning we’ve created ourselves, or meaning that has been simply handed down to us by the culture that we have unconsciously accepted. 

One practice I offer my own clients in the respect, relates to bringing greater awareness to their state and how their thinking impacts it. Then learning how to change their thinking in order to change the state. Consider this, at any moment one is either in a powerful positive state or one is in a disempowered negative state. The first thing I ask my clients is to notice what state they may be in at any given moment, particularly when faced with a challenging situation. Next to know that their thinking has got them there. And that this thinking is untrue (all reason is a lie, it's just bullshit we tell ourselves to justify our behaviour). So if the thinking is untrue, what might be true? That’s when I ask them to call up the opposite of the belief or thought process they were following. So if the opposite is true, what evidence can they find for this in their life? This is another form of cognitive reframing that unlocks the individual from the lens through which they were viewing the world and the thinking associated with it and offers a new lens and a new perspective all designed to shift them out of the disempowered state and into a powerful state. 

Achievement

Achievement encompasses success or winning. However, it is also about our ability to expand and grow in progressive ways that enable us to further develop our strengths and skills, both practically and emotionally.

Having clear goals is important for a sense of achievement and something Coaches are very familiar with helping their clients to develop. Equally important, is our openness to feedback and our relationship with failure. It’s important to really view feedback as the gift that it is, allowing us to adjust and adapt our behaviours for greater impact. Not to get defensive when it is offered, but, to welcome it. And it’s important we see failure in a positive light too. Simply another step on the journey to our success, another form of feedback from the world. 

Seligman has advised that within each of the five elements of the PERMA model, three characteristics need to be understood and met:

1. All elements are equally important to each other.
2. Each element needs to contribute to overall happiness and well-being.
3. Each element needs to be measured and considered independently from the others.

The PERMA model provides a great framework for Coaches to work with their clients to support them to flourish and find happiness in their lives. Beyond the PERMA model there is a special key to Joy I also share with my clients. 

So much of how we chose to live our lives is the result of a need to fit in with the culture that surrounds us. And while this can often bring joy and happiness, it can also be a source of deep sorrow and misery where it involves the denial of our true self. The struggle we face to love the world, is a mirror of the struggle we face to love ourselves. A struggle to accept ourselves unconditionally, even when society refuses to do so. To simply allow ourselves to be. The key to Joy I offer here is Disobedience! 

Aluba Fenix is an Executive Coach working at Google supporting Sales Leadership Development. His mission is to help people upgrade their levels of well-being and performance. To discover more about his work visit Vivid Imagination.