Life After 50, Fill It with Happiness

What is A Happy Life?

Let’s try to understand what is a happy life.

We experience happiness at three levels and they are defined in the following manner:

1.    Pleasant life

We have a pleasant life when we are able to fulfil our desires. For example, having a good vacation whenever we want, enjoying drinks with family and friends, going out for a drive, celebrating festivals, participating in parties with friends and family etc. Pleasant life happens when you have fun and frolic either by yourself, or in the company of your near and dear ones. Pleasant life is the most basic form of happiness, sometimes also referred to as hedonic happiness.

2.    Good life

When we are able to elevate ourselves from just fulfilling desires with things of worldly pleasure, either for self or for very close circle, to contributing to the lives of community and the society at large with a higher sense of purpose, we begin to live a good life. Martin Seligman, widely regarded as the father of positive psychology came up with the concept of PERMA that can enable us to live a good life. PERMA is an acronym where

P is positive emotion

It is about life satisfaction, love, romance, sex, kindness, care, compassion, fun, celebration etc. We need to fill our lives with as much positive emotions as we possibly can. We have to ensure that negative experiences and emotions are limited to a very small part compared to positive ones.

E is engagement.

Engagement means getting so involved in our activity that we lose the sense of time. The time stops for us. We are so engrossed that 4 or 5 hours may pass and we don’t seem to realize it. And once we finish our activity, instead of getting drained, we actually feel rejuvenated. In the artistic world we see the likes of Hari Prasad Chowrasia or Zakir Hussain, in sports Vishwanathan Anand, who would spend several hours practicing or performing, go into a sort of trance, never feeling exhausted.

A significant research on engagement has been done by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, author of Flow. According to Mihaly we all can reach the state of flow in any task we do if we can find balance between the challenges present in the task and the required skillset for execution of the task. If the challenge is too high and our skillset is too low, then we are likely to get frightened and quickly give up. On the other hand, if the challenge is too low, and our skillset is too high, then we would get bored too easily and again give up. Achieving state of flow requires balance.

According to some surveys more than 80% of the employees are not engaged with their work. I believe this phenomenon is all pervasive and most people including the seniors are not engaged in what they do.

R is relationship.

How happy we are in our life is directly proportional to the quantity and quality of relationships we have. There have been some important studies that confirm that the those who had the most successful life also had good number of very close friends. It has been found that successful people in any organization have at least three friends who are also their colleagues. As we age, we rely more and more on such friends for our well being. These relationships need to be very personal, face to face, rather than through Facebook.

M is meaning and purpose.

When we work for causes larger than ourselves, our life acquires meaning and purpose. We find such people in every walk of life whose purpose and meaning for life is beyond their self. Many of the recent of Padma awardees have been exemplary people who worked for the larger good of mankind. At a time when we are gripped with corona virus there are many people who have come forward selflessly helping poor with food and other essentials. The nurses and doctors are working on the frontline, endangering their own lives, while they try to save lives of others. Their life has acquired meaning and purpose.

A is accomplishment.

We all have our own aspirations since our childhood, though these aspirations keep changing as we grow. When we are able to fulfil our aspirations, we have a sense of accomplishment which makes us feel happy. Throughout our lives we have many such accomplishments. They get stored in our memory system. The more the number of accomplishments, the more positive experiences that get stored in the memory system, giving us a sense of happiness in our life.

We begin to live a good life when we are able to incorporate PERMA in our day to day living. Good life, sometimes also called eudemonic life, is an elevated form of happiness. It goes beyond hedonic happiness and looks at life holistically. It is not just fulfilment of desires. It is an all encompassing well being.

3.    Meaningful life

The ultimate form of happiness is achieved when we begin to live a meaningful life. Meaningful life is a good life plus something more. In meaningful life we first do a self analysis and look at our character strengths. Psychologists are of the view that it is easier to multiply our strengths manifold than to make up for our weaknesses. Biggest achievers always play to their strengths, and outsource their weaker areas.

Martin Seligman has identified 24 areas of our character strengths. We can do a character self evaluation for free on his website www.authentichappiness.org. There is a questionnaire of 250 questions and we need to answer them all in order to figure out our character strengths. When I took my own test, my character strengths were found to be 1. creative thinking, 2. original ideas, and 3. ingenuity. In my case all three character strengths were closely related.

Once we have identified the character strengths, we need to apply them to our work for larger good than ourselves. We need to apply them for the sake of our community or the society at large. Money ceases to be a motivating factor. Measure of our success is how many lives we are able to impact positively. Once we have put to work our character strengths for the larger good, we would have found the calling in our life.

Japanese Concept of Happiness: Ikigai

Okinawa is a small town in Japan that has the highest concentration of centenarians of all the regions in the world. The people in Okinawa not only live longer, they also stay healthy for longer. Age related chronic illnesses like coronary and pulmonary malfunction, blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, and cirrhosis are rare. Above everything else, people of Okinawa also score very high in their happiness index. Reason for exceptional longevity, health and happiness of the inhabitants of Okinawa? It is Ikigai.

Ikigai simply translated means “reason to be”. There’s a similar often repeated phrase among the French, “raison d’etre”. Another way of defining Ikigai is “life on purpose”.

It is said every individual in Okinawa has his / her own Ikigai, a reason to live. Ikigai is always specific to an individual. Each individual must find his / her own Ikigai. Finding one’s Ikigai requires patience and deep thinking. It may take several years to figure out what one’s Ikigai is.

How do we find our Ikigai?

To find our Ikigai, first we have to know what do we love and then figure out what are we good at. If we are able to find a commonality, then that becomes our passion.

Next, we find out what the world needs. If we find a common ground between what we love and what the world needs, then that becomes our mission.

Once we know what the world needs, we try finding out what we can be paid for. If there’s commonality between what the world needs and what we can be paid for, then that becomes our vocation.

And if we can find common area between what we are good at and what we can be paid for, that becomes our profession.

Only if we can find something common between what we love, what we are good at, what the world needs, and what we can be paid for, then we would have found our Ikigai.

Finding our Ikigai needs years of search in our within. The search has to start many years before our retirement dates. Probably the most ideal time to start searching for our Ikigai is in our late 40s or early 50s.

In Okinawa, everyone finds his / her Ikigai, and no one ever retires. With Ikigai one finds the purpose to live for.

Like the inhabitants of Okinawa, if we too are able to find our own Ikigai and thus our purpose to live for, we would find our life well worth living for.

Danish Concept of Happiness; Hygge

Recently I came across a Danish term Hygge. Put simply, Hygge means coziness and comfort, but in real life it has profound meaning. Hygge is about enjoying little things of life and avoiding the stress that big things may bring. Such small things may include ensuring that the entire family has dinner together, having nice savoury hot chocolate by the side of fireplace at home, being by oneself and reading in a dedicated corner at home, removing the clutter and donating the extra stuff to the needy. Danes have only essential stuff at home and they do not buy anything that they don't really need. Since the difference in earnings between highly paid and not so well paid is so small in Denmark, Danes choose their profession and work based on their skills, passion and purpose, rather than on the salary that comes with the job. This leads to mindfulness in whatever the Danes do. Mindfulness not only leads to much higher levels of productivity, but also to a state of flow which in turn leads to happiness. No wonder Denmark consistently ranks as one of the happiest nations in the world.

Is There an Indian Way to Happiness?

Sadly the answer to the above question is a clear NO. When I did my research, I found that most of the research related to happiness in India was at best philosophical. There was no scientific basis. We Indians seem to live in perpetual state of unhappiness. When I looked at world happiness Index, India’s performance is abysmal. Worse, India’s ranking has kept deteriorating since 2013 onwards. This is how India’s ranking stands:

           2019 -          140th

           2018 -          133rd

           2017 -         122nd

           2016 -          118th

           2015 -          117th

           2013 -          111th

World happiness ranking takes into account various criteria, including real GDP per capita, social support, healthy life expectancy, freedom to make life choices, generosity, and perceptions of corruption.

Many European nations and Australia and New Zealand have made it a goal that they will not only strive to improve their GDP, they will also strive to raise the level of happiness of their people. India would do well to emulate some of the human and social aspects of the happiest nations in the world. The happiest nations in the world are Finland, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, and Netherlands.

Money Can Buy Happiness

Whoever said money can’t buy happiness was wrong. Money does buy happiness. Try remaining happy when you are in financial mess!

Money provides us security and life satisfaction. How much money do we need below which we may live stressful life depends upon the environment we live in. Delhi and Mumbai may have very different threshold compared to Guwahati or Bhopal. Financial threshold for happiness is also dependent on the social set up we have been brought up in. I believe it is easier to be happy with lower financial threshold in south India than it is possible in north India.

However, beyond a certain point, money ceases to give us any extra happiness. Even big lottery winners have reported within three months getting back to the same happiness level that they had prior to winning the lottery. Financial security seems to bring a lot more happiness than consumption.

Money spent on stuff seems to bring only fleeting happiness. You buy a new car; the pleasure wears off within a few months. On the other hand, money spent on buying experiences brings more lasting happiness. A savory dinner with loved ones, a trek or hiking trip with friends leave lasting happy memories on our minds.

It is often said that today’s generation will never be able to earn the kind of money that our generation did. On the other hand, today’s generation is likely to be much happier than we were. This is because the young people of today are much less likely to be working 80 hours a week. They are very conscious of their personal time. They like to hang around with their friends in a beer bar or play some sport rather than stay late in the office. They believe in essentialism and do not accumulate stuff, as they like to be free and mobile.

Stop Mind Wandering Through Meditation

Many of us suffer from mind wandering all the time. We keep ruminating about past, or we are constantly frightened with imaginations about our future. Such mental chatter, many a time, takes away 90% of our time. We devote no more than 10% of our time to being in the present. Mental chatter follows us like a ghost, whether we are in the midst of an important meeting, or trying to sleep in the night. The chatter takes place at an unconscious level, leading to immense stress and lack of focus. A battle takes place between the unconscious and the conscious minds. Unless, we learn how to control the mental chatter, it is the unconscious mind that wins. Our life is then filled with anxiety and worry, health begins to decline, and success in job and career gets very difficult.

How do we remove this incessant mental chatter and be in peace with ourselves? Michael Singer, former head of WebMD and author of “Surrender Experiment” too was plagued with his mind wandering to resentful past and frightful future. His subconscious mind simply refused to stop. The more his conscious mind tried to stop his unconscious mind, the more unconscious mind seemed to trouble him. Michael Singer developed a technique for handling mental chatter of the unconscious mind. When ever unconscious mind got busy with mental chatter, his conscious mind would become aware of the chatter and allow it to come in. The conscious mind would then tell the unconscious mind that its stories are false and should quieten down. Every time the unconscious mind would get active with the chatter, the conscious mind would repeat the process of becoming aware and quietening down the chatter.

Combine the above strategy with mindfulness where ever you are. Just being in the moment would take away much of the pain caused by rumination. If the mind wanders, instead of fighting with it and forcing it to stop, just become conscious of it and bring your mind to the present moment.

Practice Gratitude and Forgiveness

It is often said practicing gratitude and forgiveness helps us feel inner joy. Gratitude is feeling grateful for acts of kindness others have done to us, acknowledging and appreciating them. When we express our gratitude, we feel good by remembering good things done to us. Psychologists even recommend writing and maintaining gratitude journal. For example, everyday before we go to sleep, we can remember 3 incidents during the day that made us feel good and write them down in the journal. Remembering and writing down those beautiful moments of the day helps us relive those moments, thus magnifying the positive feelings many times over.

Gratitude arises out of something good we have received from others. Forgiveness on the other hand arises out of something hurtful someone else has done to us. Forgiveness is a lot harder to practice than gratitude. If we can forgive and forget others for the hurt they caused to us, it is great. If we can not forgive, least that we can do to ourselves is to get the toxic feeling out of us. Carrying on with resentment within us is detrimental to our health and happiness. In this situation, we may not forgive but letting go the feelings of resentment or revenge is perfectly within our control. This way we secure our personal happiness.

Get Over the Negative Bias of Brain

Our brain works as Velcro for bad experiences, and as Teflon for good experiences. Bad experiences stick. They are immediately stored in our long term memory system. Good experiences on the other hand just pass through and rarely do they leave any imprint on the brain.

Psychologists are of the view that it takes at least five positive experiences for every one negative experience just to level up. So our brain needs to register very large number of good experiences to make our lives happy.

There are ways of countering negative bias of brain to make our lives happier. One way is to recognize patterns in our everyday lives, when do we become happy, what events trigger that feeling. Once patterns are understood, we should try to have more of such events. This will mean more such happy occasions to be registered. Second way is to recognize and be aware whenever happy moments take place. Then we consciously try and prolong those happy moments even if it means only for 10 or 15 seconds more. The longer such happy moments are, the more stickily they will register in our brain. Third way to increase the number of positive experiences is journaling on the happy moments of the day. When you write down such positive experiences, you actually reenact those moments in your mind and they are accordingly registered in the long term memory system in our brain.

Eat Plant Based Diets to Remove Toxicity

Good food leads to good health, which in turn leads to happiness. Dan Buettner, who on behalf of National Geography, conducted research on the happiest people around the world, says that the happiest people live on plant based diets. They avoid processed food, and rely on fresh fruits and vegetables, plucked from their own garden or bought from the local market. Although some of them consume fish, most avoid any meat and sometimes even animal derived products. They avoid sugar in any form as it leads to diabetes. Diabetes becomes the root cause for other forms of diseases related to kidney, heart, and blood pressure.

Nutritionists recommend avoiding white flour as it contains, besides sugar, gluten that affects pancreas functioning adversely. They also recommend using good fat like avocados and olive oil to fight against cholesterol. We need to build immunity in our body to fight against viruses and bacteria by eating green leafy vegetables and carrot that contain vitamin A, and citrus fruits for vitamin C. We also need to expose ourselves to sunlight at least for 20 minutes every day to naturally build vitamin D3.

There seems a direct correlation between inflammation and depression. So doctors recommend anti inflammatory diet to achieve happiness. Any food that is processed and refined is inflammatory in nature. Raw food as produced by the nature is anti inflammatory.

Personally I have also been taking 1000 mg fish oil capsules for many years as fish oil is known to have positive effects on our brain. 

Keep Moving Your Body

The longest living and the happiest people on Earth keep moving. They do not observe any formal exercise regime. They do not go to the gym at fixed hours to do exercise. However, they keep moving every 20 minutes or so. Indian climatic conditions may not allow us to move every 20 minutes, particularly outdoors. However, we can make modifications in our lifestyles in our homes and offices. Ilchee Lee, a South Korean philosopher recommends doing one-minute exercise every one hour. He suggests walking on all four limbs, like an animal, for a minute every hour within our home. This simple exercise helps circulate blood throughout our body and brain. We may like to read a book or watch television while standing. In many modern offices employees prefer to work standing, keeping their desktop on elevated table. When I move on metro, instead of taking escalators for reaching the platform, I walk on the stairs. Similarly, in condominiums, I take stairs instead of lift, if I have to go up to third floor. Sometimes I do crunches or pushups inside my apartment. I wake up early and go for 30 minutes walk within my condominium complex. You get the idea. Just move.

CONCLUSION

Contrary to popular belief that happiness is dependent upon our circumstances, it is a skillset that can be learned. I have seen people whose life is filled with adversities, yet they train their mind to stay positive and be happy. They have a growth mindset. They think adverse circumstances are transient and they will go away. They do not give up on their goals and dreams. When they are confronted with adverse situation, they take a step back, and then deal with it consciously. Brain scientists and positive psychologists have developed techniques that we all can follow and be happy, whatever age we are in, whatever circumstances we fall into. A very large number among us live a pleasant life, one of hedonic happiness, wherein we are focused on fulfilling our desires. For our own sake and for the sake of the community, we need to achieve eudemonic  happiness by contributing to the wellbeing of others. This way our legacy will live forever, long after we are gone.