Happiness Momentum

Much of what keeps me engaged with happiness is the explosive growth in publications about it. For me, to read about happiness is to move in that direction. I don’t buy the set-point theory of personality. That’s the one that posits that a person is basically a certain degree of pessimistic or optimistic, and on average that’s where they will be their whole life.

I was deeply unhappy -- with good cause -- many years ago. I took that experience, learned from it, and have been moving ever since into places I never dreamed possible. Perhaps the ferocious winds of misconduct blew me out of a set-point?

I have different tools to keep the momentum going, but (being UU) my favorite is reading. And oh my heavens. There has been an onslaught of publications in this area the last few years. It seems a floodgate has opened.

Converging Disciplines

The opening floodgates seem to be a convergence of three areas: neuroscience, psychology and religion (particularly Buddhism). The last is my best window, since I’ve been practicing and reading about Buddhism for years, but I jump into the other two when I can understand them.

My favorites are the highly reputable publications, such as Scientific American and the New York Times, plus blogs. The publications I give wide-berth to are the self-help variety – the overly simplistic, this-is-the-panacea books and now blogs too of this ilk. One must learn how to distinguish blogs.

Here’s a good recent example of the kind of publication I am talking about:

Craig Lambert, "The Science of Happiness: Psychology explores humans at their best." Harvard Magazine

And here is a favorite blog, vetted by a reputable publisher, in this case O’Reilly:

Mind Hacks

Happy reading.