Happy Surveying Quotes

It is proved by surveys that happiness does not come from love, wealth, or power but the pursuit of attainable goals.

She was a young person of many theories; her imagination was remarkably active. It had been her fortune to possess a finer mind than most of the persons among whom her lot was cast; to have a larger perception of surrounding facts, and to care for knowledge that was tinged with the unfamiliar...It may be affirmed without delay that She was probably very liable to the sin of self-esteem; she often surveyed with complacency the field of her own nature; she was in the habit of taking for granted, on scanty evidence, that she was right; impulsively, she often admired herself...Every now and then she found out she was wrong, and then she treated herself to a week of passionate humility. After this she held her head higher than ever again; for it was of no use, she had an unquenchable desire to think well of herself. She had a theory that it was only on this condition that life was worth living; that one should be one of the best, should be conscious of a fine organization, should move in the realm of light, of natural wisdom, of happy impulse, of inspiration gracefully chronic.

I’d be more than happy to let you survey my physical perfection in its entirety. But only if I get to see you, too.” To her shocked silence, he replied, “It’s only fair. Tit for tat.” “How is that fair? You've seen countless tits.

It is one of the defects of modern higher education that it has become too much a training in the acquisition of certain kinds of skill, and too little an enlargement of the mind and heart by an impartial survey of the world.

Ye friends to truth, ye statesmen who survey The rich man's joys encrease, the poor's decay, 'Tis yours to judge, how wide the limits stand Between a splendid and a happy land.

One morning I fell to sketching a face: what sort of a face it was to be, I did not care or know. I took a soft black pencil, gave it a broad point, and worked away. Soon I had traced on the paper a broad and prominent forehead and a square lower outline of visage: that contour gave me pleasure; my fingers proceeded actively to fill it with features. Strongly-marked horizontal eyebrows must be traced under that brow; then followed, naturally, a well-defined nose, with a straight ridge and full nostrils; then a flexible-looking mouth, by no means narrow; then a firm chin, with a decided cleft down the middle of it: of course, some black whiskers were wanted, and some jetty hair, tufted on the temples, and waved above the forehead. Now for the eyes: I had left them to the last, because they required the most careful working. I drew them large; I shaped them well: the eyelashes I traced long and sombre; the irids lustrous and large. "Good! but not quite the thing," I thought, as I surveyed the effect: "they want more force and spirit;" and I wrought the shades blacker, that the lights might flash more brilliantly--a happy touch or two secured success. There, I had a friend's face under my gaze; and what did it signify that those young ladies turned their backs on me? I looked at it; I smiled at the speaking likeness: I was absorbed and content. Is that a portrait of some one you know?" asked Eliza, who had approached me unnoticed. I responded that it was merely a fancy head, and hurried it beneath the other sheets. Of course, I lied: it was, in fact, a very faithful representation of Mr. Rochester. But what was that to her, or to any one but myself? Georgiana also advanced to look. The other drawings pleased her much, but she called that 'an ugly man.

In the twentieth century per capita GDP was perhaps the supreme yardstick for evaluating national success. From this perspective, Singapore, each of whose citizens produces on average $56,000 worth of goods and services a year, is a more successful country than Costa Rica, whose citizens produce only $14,000 a year. But nowadays thinkers, politicians and even economists are calling to supplement or even replace GDP with GDH – gross domestic happiness. After all, what do people want? They don’t want to produce. They want to be happy. Production is important because it provides the material basis for happiness. But it is only the means, not the end. In one survey after another Costa Ricans report far higher levels of life satisfaction than Singaporeans. Would you rather be a highly productive but dissatisfied Singaporean, or a less productive but satisfied Costa Rican?

It's like lifting off in an airplane: you're on the ground, on the ground, on the ground... and then you're up, riding on a magical cushion of air and prince of all you survey. That makes me happy, because it's what I was made to do.

Whoever thou art that, not content with a moderate condition, imaginest happiness in royal magnificence, and dreamest that command or riches can feed the appetite of novelty with perpetual gratifications, survey the Pyramids, and confess thy folly!

A 2003 World Value Survey (worldvaluessurvey.com) found that the happiest people in the world have a tight sense of community and strong family bonds. After basic needs are met (security, shelter, health, food), our happiness quotient is most significantly impacted by the quality of our relationships with our partners, our family, our friends, our spirituality, and ourselves.

One of the findings of the landmark Social Capital Community Benchmark Survey of almost thirty thousand Americans, published in 2000, was that those who give contributions of time or money are 42 percent more likely to be happy than those who don’t give.

The sad part is that a place’s popularity can actually destroy the elements that contribute to happiness. The more we flock to high-status cities for the good life—money, opportunity, novelty—the more crowded, expensive, polluted, and congested those places become. The result? Surveys show that rich, high-status states in the United States are among the least happy in the country.

Only after something is done do we truly realise it cannot be undone. Never had a night seemed to me so ill-omened; never had a celebration seemed to me so unjust, so cruel. The music drifting on the breeze sounded like an incantation that conjured me like a demon. I felt excluded from the joy of these people as they laughed and danced. I thought about the terrible waste my life had become … How? How could I have come so close to happiness and not had the courage to seize it with both hands? What terrible sin had I committed that I was forced to watch love seep though my fingers like blood from a wound? What is love when all it can do is survey the damage? What are its myths and legends, its victories and its miracles if a lover is not prepared to rise above, to brave the thunderbolt, to renounce eternal happiness for one kiss, one embrace, one moment with his beloved? Regret coursed through my veins like a poisonous sap, swelled my heart with loathsome fury. I hated myself, this useless burden abandoned by the roadside.

We Americans often say that marriage is hard work. I'm not sure that the Hmong would understand this notion. Life is hard work, of course, and work is very hard work -- I'm quite certain they would agree with those statements - but how does marriage become hard work? Marriage becomes hard work once you have poured the entirety of your life's expectations for happiness into the hands of one mere person. Keeping that going is hard work. A recent survey of young American women found that what women are seeking these days in a husband - more than anything else - is a man who will "inspire" them, which is, by any measure, a tall order. As a point of comparison, young women of the same age, surveyed back in the 1920s, were more likely to choose a partner based on qualities such as "decency" or "honesty," or his ability to provide for a family. But that's not enough anymore. Now we want to be INSPIRED by our spouses! Daily! Step to it, honey!

I feel that buzz of happiness, that sense of having found the right words and put them in a line. It's like lifting off in an airplane: you're on the ground, on the ground, on the ground... and then you're up, riding on a magical cushion of air and prince of all you survey.

The issue of false consciousness is a genuinely difficult problem that has no definite solution. We should not approve of an unequal and brutal society because surveys show that people are happy. But who has the right to tell those oppressed women or starving landless peasants that they shouldn’t be happy, if they think they are? Does anyone have the right to make those people feel miserable by telling them the ‘truth’? There are no easy answers to these questions, but they definitely tell us that we cannot rely on ‘subjective’ happiness surveys to decide how well people are doing.

Liberals are more likely to see people as victims of circumstance and oppression, and doubt whether individuals can climb without governmental help. My own analysis using 2005 survey data from Syracuse University shows that about 90 percent of conservatives agree that “While people may begin with different opportunities, hard work and perseverance can usually overcome those disadvantages.” Liberals — even upper-income liberals — are a third less likely to say this.

A memory is least accurate when most reflected upon, and most accurate when least pondered. Together, those two facts make eyewitness testimony basically worthless. This isn’t what most people believe. Psychologists Dan Simons and Christopher Chabris published a study in 2011 revealing that 63 percent of those surveyed in the United States believe memory works like a video camera, and another 48 percent believe memories are permanent. An additional 37 percent said that eyewitness testimony was reliable enough to be the only evidence necessary to convict someone accused of a crime. Those are seriously shocking facts to a psychologist or a neuroscientist, because none of those things is true. You don’t record everything you see, nor do you notice everything that comes into your mind. The only things that make it past the ears and eyes are those things to which you attend. Memories are not recordings. The moment your first kiss was over, the memory of it began to decay. Each time you recall it, the event is reformed in your mind anew and differently, influenced by your current condition and by all the wisdom you’ve acquired since and all the erroneous details you’ve added.

But one of the main reasons why Denmark does so well in international happiness surveys is the welfare state, as it reduces uncertainty, worries and stress in the population. You can say that Denmark is the happiest country in the world or you can say that Denmark is the least unhappy country in the world. The welfare state is really good (not perfect, but good) at reducing extreme unhappiness. Universal and free health care, free university education and relatively generous unemployment benefits go a long way towards reducing unhappiness.

What pleasure is there in seeing new lands? Or in surveying cities and spots of interest? All your bustle is useless. Do you ask why such flight does not help you? It is because you flee along with yourself. You must lay aside the burdens of the mind; until you do this, no place will satisfy you. [...] The person you are matters more than the place to which you go.

They, they, they. That was the problem with people like Joyce. They talked about the richness of their multicultural heritage and it sounded real good, until you noticed that they avoided black people. It wasn't a matter of conscious choice, necessarily, just a matter of gravitational pull, the way integration always worked, a one-way street. The minority assimilated into the dominant culture, not the other way around. Only white culture could be neutral and objective. Only white culture could be nonracial, willing to adopt the occasional exotic into its ranks. Only white culture had individuals. And we, the half-breeds and the college-degreed, take a survey of the situation and think to ourselves, Why should we get lumped in with the losers if we don't want to? We become only so grateful to lose ourselves in the crowd, America's happy, faceless marketplace; and we're never so outraged as when a cabbie drives past us or the woman in the elevator clutches her purse, not so much because we're bothered by the fact that such indignities are what less fortunate coloreds have to put up with every single day of their lives-- although that's what we tell ourselves-- but because we're wearing a Brooks Brothers suit and speak impeccable English and yet have somehow been mistaken for an ordinary nigger. Don't know who I am? I'm an individual!

These general surveys have found that the sense of happiness is higher in countries that ensure their inhabitants’ basic resources, greater security, autonomy, and freedom, as well as sufficient educational opportunities and access to information. People are manifestly happier in countries where personal freedoms are guaranteed and democracy secure. This is only to be expected: citizens are happier in a climate of peace. Regardless of economic conditions, those who live under military rule are unhappier.

But isn’t a life based on seeking personal happiness by nature self-centered, even self-indulgent? Not necessarily. In fact, survey after survey has shown that it is unhappy people who tend to be most self-focused and are often socially withdrawn, brooding, and even antagonistic. Happy people, in contrast, are generally found to be more sociable, flexible, and creative and are able to tolerate life’s daily frustrations more easily than unhappy people. And, most important, they are found to be more loving and forgiving than unhappy people.

Nope. You didn’t miss much.” “Somehow, I find that hard to believe.” Thalia raised her shoulders in an attempt to sit up, but settled back down with a groan. Clarke gently placed a rolled-up blanket behind her. “Thanks,” she muttered and surveyed Clarke for a moment before she spoke again. “Okay, what’s wrong?” Clarke gave her a bemused smile. “Nothing! I’m just so happy you’re feeling better.” “Please. You can’t hide anything from me. You know I always manage to get your secrets out of you,” Thalia deadpanned. “You can start by telling me where you found the medicine.” “Octavia

Life Contains Inevitable Difficulties Life is not only short, but difficult. There are times of great joy, love, triumph, and delight, moments when we are beside ourselves with happiness. But there are also times of inevitable sorrow: of sickness and loss, of grief and despair. There are also incomprehensible amounts of unnecessary sorrow: of senseless oppression and torment, slaughter and suffering. None of us escapes life unscathed. It is crucial to recognize this and not gloss over the inevitable difficulties of life, because “If a way to the Better there be, it exacts a full look at the Worst.” This is why religious scholar Jacob Needleman concluded, from his survey of world religions: The perception of the suffering inherent in the human condition, the perception of man’s inhumanity to man: this moment of awareness has been spoken of in all traditions as a tremendous moment. It is a tremendous moment because it is the recognition of suffering—both ours and the world’s—which gives birth to both compassion and the urge to awaken. These motives propel us to spiritual practice and thereby eventually allow us to escape suffering and to relieve the suffering of others. Our

According to American sociologist Kristin Park, who has reviewed most of the surveys carried out on child-free men and women in the last twenty years, the primary and most frequently cited reason for their decision (in 79 percent of surveys) is freedom. These people prized their emotional and financial autonomy, their freedom of movement, and their ability to take advantage of every opportunity for personal fulfillment. The second reason, mentioned in 62 percent of surveys, is marital happiness. After that came professional and financial considerations, fear of overpopulation, and lack of interest or a dislike of children.

Add to this the species of government which prevails over nine tenths of the globe, which is despotism: a government, as Locke justly observes, altogether "vile and miserable," and "more to be deprecated than anarchy itself."(2*) Certainly every man who takes a dispassionate survey of this picture will feel himself inclined to pause respecting the necessity of the havoc which is thus made of his species, and to question whether the established methods for protecting mankind against the caprices of each other are the best that can be devised. He will be at a loss which of the two to pronounce most worthy of regret, the misery that is inflicted, or the depravity by which it is produced. If this be the unalterable allotment of our nature, the eminence of our rational faculties must be considered as rather an abortion than a substantial benefit; and we shall not fail to lament that, while in some respects we are elevated above the brutes, we are in so many important ones destined for ever to remain their inferiors.

A survey21 of beliefs about the causes of illness across cultures shows that the three most common explanations are biomedical (referring to physical causes of disease), interpersonal (illness is caused by witchcraft, related to envy and conflict), and moral (illness is caused by one’s own past actions, particularly violations of food and sexual taboos).

Optimists Optimism is normal, but some fortunate people are more optimistic than the rest of us. If you are genetically endowed with an optimistic bias, you hardly need to be told that you are a lucky person—you already feel fortunate. An optimistic attitude is largely inherited, and it is part of a general disposition for well-being, which may also include a preference for seeing the bright side of everything. If you were allowed one wish for your child, seriously consider wishing him or her optimism. Optimists are normally cheerful and happy, and therefore popular; they are resilient in adapting to failures and hardships, their chances of clinical depression are reduced, their immune system is stronger, they take better care of their health, they feel healthier than others and are in fact likely to live longer. A study of people who exaggerate their expected life span beyond actuarial predictions showed that they work longer hours, are more optimistic about their future income, are more likely to remarry after divorce (the classic “triumph of hope over experience”), and are more prone to bet on individual stocks. Of course, the blessings of optimism are offered only to individuals who are only mildly biased and who are able to “accentuate the positive” without losing track of reality. Optimistic individuals play a disproportionate role in shaping our lives. Their decisions make a difference; they are the inventors, the entrepreneurs, the political and military leaders—not average people. They got to where they are by seeking challenges and taking risks. They are talented and they have been lucky, almost certainly luckier than they acknowledge. They are probably optimistic by temperament; a survey of founders of small businesses concluded that entrepreneurs are more sanguine than midlevel managers about life in general. Their experiences of success have confirmed their faith in their judgment and in their ability to control events. Their self-confidence is reinforced by the admiration of others. This reasoning leads to a hypothesis: the people who have the greatest influence on the lives of others are likely to be optimistic and overconfident, and to take more risks than they realize.

The noise of the town some floors below was greatly muted. In a state of complete mental detachment, he went over the events, the circumstances and the stages of destruction in their lives. Seen in the frozen light of a restrictive past, everything seemed clear, conclusive and indisputable. Now it seemed unthinkable that a girl of seventeen shoudl be so naive; it was particularly unbelieveable that a girl of seventeen should set so much store by love. If the surveys in the magazines were to be believed, things had changed a great deal in the twenty-five years since Annabelle was a teenager. Young girls today were more sensible, more sophisticated. Nowadays they worried more about their exam results and did their best to ensure they would have a decent career. For them, going out with boys was simply a game, a distraction motivated as much by narcissism as by sexual pleasure. They later would try to make a good marriage, basing their decision on a range of social and professional criteria, as well as on shared interests and tastes. Of course, in doing this they cut themselves off from any possibility of happiness--a condition indissociable from the outdated, intensely close bonds so incompatible with the exercise of reason--but this was their attempt to escape the moral and emotional suffering which had so tortured their forebears. This hope was, unfortunately, rapidly disappointed; the passing of love's torments simply left the field clear for boredom, emptiness and an anguished wait for old age and death. The second part of Annabelle's life therefore had been much more dismal and sad than the first, of which, in the end, she had no memory at all.

Naturally, it causes psychological harm as well; it shouldn’t surprise you that a national survey of 24,000 workers found that men and women with few social ties were two to three times more likely to suffer from major depression than people with strong social bonds.9 When we enjoy strong social support, on the other hand, we can accomplish impressive feats of resilience, and even extend the length of our lives. One study found that people who received emotional support during the six months after a heart attack were three times more likely to survive.10 Another found that participating in a breast cancer support group actually doubled women’s life expectancy post surgery.11 In fact, researchers have found that social support has as much effect on life expectancy as smoking, high blood pressure, obesity, and regular physical activity.12

First coming aboard, a new arrival makes a cautious survey of the crew, trying to winnow the affable and good-natured from the surly and truculent. Some of the crewmen will seem easygoing, happy-go-lucky, good-fellows-all; others may appear to be reserved or even aloof. Yet I found that at the end of a voyage these aloof ones were often the persons whom I grew to like and respect the most, while those who seemed so agreeable turned out to be rascals.

We find there are systematic problems with subjective measures related to inequality. How people use the word ‘happy,’ for instance, or how they present themselves. I don’t think these surveys mean nothing, but I wouldn’t put a great deal into them. All of our measures are objective, like death rates, obesity, and so on.” He is right, there are obvious flaws in these happiness surveys. Happiness is subjective and clearly tricky to quantify, plus notions of happiness differ depending on whom you ask.

What do the sports we love the most say about us? A study carried out by Mind Lab surveyed 2,000 UK adults and found that bicyclists are “laid back and calm” and less likely than runners or swimmers to be stressed or depressed. Runners tended to be extroverted, enjoyed being the center of attention and preferred “lively, upbeat music.” Swimmers, the study concluded, were charitable, happy and orderly, whereas walkers generally preferred their own company, didn’t like drawing attention to themselves and were comparatively unmaterialistic

But one of the main reasons why Denmark does so well in international happiness surveys is the welfare state, as it reduces uncertainty, worries, and stress in the population. You can say that Denmark is the happiest country in the world or you can say that Denmark is the least unhappy country in the world. The welfare state is really good (not perfect, but good) at reducing extreme unhappiness. Universal and free health care, free university education, and relatively generous unemployment benefits go a long way toward reducing unhappiness

say that you were a woman living on a farm at the turn of the last century. You have a lot of kids and not a lot of money. Winter’s coming, and you’ve got to feed them all the way through it. When do you start planning? The split minute you get through the last winter, that’s when. You pull out the seeds you saved from last year’s crop, you start your seeds, you plant your garden (and no, you can’t rent a rototiller, so you probably have to fuss around with a hoe or a horse and plow or something). And don’t forget that if that garden is going to feed the family it’s going to have to be a rather massive—cute container gardening or interesting Pinterest-worthy novelty gardens would not cut it. You tend it all summer, and you harvest. You can, you dry, you preserve. You fill your root cellar and hopefully by midway through autumn you can stand back and survey the fruit of all that labor, grateful that it all came together and secure in the knowledge that you have supplied your family with what they need. Now compare that feeling with grabbing a can of beans at the store and feeling happy that you remembered to do that so there’s some green on your kids’ plates tonight. It’s much easier, yes . . . but not quite the same in terms of satisfaction in a job well done.

IS IT STRANGE COMING here and not being the one on trial?” Keefe asked, checking his expertly styled blond hair in a shiny facet on one of the jeweled walls before he followed Sophie into Tribunal Hall. “Because I’d be happy to help you break a few laws if you’re feeling left out.” “Me too!” Ro—Keefe’s bodyguard—jumped in. Her pierced nose crinkled as she surveyed the empty auditorium, which was built entirely out of emeralds. “Ugh, you guys have really out-sparkled yourselves with this place. It’s basically begging me to smash something.” “No one will be smashing anything,” Sandor—Sophie’s bodyguard—warned. “Or causing any other problems!

The broad white road unrolled before the long procession, the sun and sky surveyed it cloudless, the wind tossed the tree boughs above it, and the twelve hundred children and one hundred and forty adults of which it was composed trod on in time and tune, with gay faces and glad hearts. It was a joyous scene, and a scene to do good. It was a day of happiness for rich and poor — the work, first of God, and then of the clergy. Let England’s priests have their due. They are a faulty set in some respects, being only of common flesh and blood like us all; but the land would be badly off without them. Britain would miss her church, if that church fell. God save it! God also reform it!

When we surveyed roughly three hundred people about how they would feel if their primary backup mate had sex with someone else, on a scale from “happy” (+3) to “upset” (–3), men more than women said that they would be upset, but only by a small margin. But when we asked how upset they would be if their backup fell in love with someone else, women were roughly twice as upset as men, with the average upset being –2.5. Similarly, women were more upset than men—extremely upset—if their backup entered into a long-term relationship with someone else. Olivia’s loss of Noah as her backup explained what otherwise seemed like a hypocritical double standard—one standard for herself and a different one for Noah—and perplexing rage.

the personal happiness rating of U.S. citizens was about the same as that of Cubans and Egyptians, whose per-capita GNPs were respectively five and over ten times less than that of the Americans. West Germans and Nigerians came out with identical happiness ratings, despite an over fifteenfold difference in per-capita GNP. So far, these discrepancies only demonstrate that our instruments for measuring optimal experience are still very primitive. Yet the fact that differences do exist seems incontestable. Despite ambiguous findings, all large-scale surveys agree that citizens of nations that are more affluent, better educated, and ruled by more stable governments report higher levels of happiness and satisfaction with life.

There is a lovely old-fashioned pearl set in the treasure chest, but Mother said real flowers were the prettiest ornament for a young girl, and Laurie promised to send me all I want," replied Meg. "Now, let me see, there's my new gray walking suit, just curl up the feather in my hat, Beth, then my poplin for Sunday and the small party, it looks heavy for spring, doesn't it? The violet silk would be so nice. Oh, dear!" "Never mind, you've got the tarlaton for the big party, and you always look like an angel in white," said Amy, brooding over the little store of finery in which her soul delighted. "It isn't low-necked, and it doesn't sweep enough, but it will have to do. My blue housedress looks so well, turned and freshly trimmed, that I feel as if I'd got a new one. My silk sacque isn't a bit the fashion, and my bonnet doesn't look like Sallie's. I didn't like to say anything, but I was sadly disappointed in my umbrella. I told Mother black with a white handle, but she forgot and bought a green one with a yellowish handle. It's strong and neat, so I ought not to complain, but I know I shall feel ashamed of it beside Annie's silk one with a gold top," sighed Meg, surveying the little umbrella with great disfavor. "Change it," advised Jo. "I won't be so silly, or hurt Marmee's feelings, when she took so much pains to get my things. It's a nonsensical notion of mine, and I'm not going to give up to it. My silk stockings and two pairs of new gloves are my comfort. You are a dear to lend me yours, Jo. I feel so rich and sort of elegant, with two new pairs, and the old ones cleaned up for common." And Meg took a refreshing peep at her glove box. "Annie Moffat has blue and pink bows on her nightcaps. Would you put some on mine?" she asked, as Beth brought up a pile of snowy muslins, fresh from Hannah's hands. "No, I wouldn't, for the smart caps won't match the plain gowns without any trimming on them. Poor folks shouldn't rig," said Jo decidedly. "I wonder if I shall ever be happy enough to have real lace on my clothes and bows on my caps?" said Meg impatiently. "You said the other day that you'd be perfectly happy if you could only go to Annie Moffat's," observed Beth in her quiet way. "So I did! Well, I am happy, and I won't fret, but it does seem as if the more one gets the more one wants, doesn't it?

We have a legal system that is a flop — a laughingstock,” says Professor Langbein. “We have a legal system which encourages people not to want to do business in this country.” The American legal system isn’t even working for the lawyers. Even though law is now the highest-paid profession, the lawyers aren’t happy. Many say they went to law school hoping to do good, but now find themselves working incredibly long hours doing tedious work that’s often more about money than justice. A survey of California lawyers found most would change careers if they could. Something’s very wrong when America’s brightest young people are choosing a profession many won’t like, where they’re not building something, not making the economic pie bigger, just fighting over who gets which slice, making each slice cost more, and taking our freedom in the process.

Alcohol is the great impersonator, fooling at least four different receptor molecules. In a quick survey of the functions of these victims, we can see exactly how alcohol works its magic. 1. It slows us down, “relaxing” our neurons. By blocking receptors for our brains’ chief excitatory neurotransmitters, alcohol coats the brain in a bit of molasses, slowing reaction times and slurring speech. We could probably do without this effect. 2. It gives us a pleasant buzz. Acting like cocaine —but much weaker —alcohol blocks dopamine reuptake, increasing the concentration of the happy neurotransmitter in the key parts of our brains. 3. It blocks pain. By stimulating the release of endorphins, alcohol lets us sample the “runner’s high” without even putting on our running shoes. Resembling morphine and heroin in this respect, but again at a greatly reduced magnitude, alcohol spurs our body to produce a little opiate-like high. 4. Alcohol makes us happier, at least while it’s in our system. Like a “do-it-yourself Prozac kit,” alcohol modifies and increases the efficiency of our serotonin receptors.

The rise of loneliness as a health hazard tracks with the entrenchment of values and practices that supersede any notion of "individual choices." The dynamics include reduced social programs, less available "common" spaces such as public libraries, cuts in services for the vulnerable and the elderly, stress, poverty, and the inexorable monopolization of economic life that shreds local communities. By way of illustration, let's take a familiar scenario: Walmart or some other megastore decides to open one of its facilities in a municipality. Developers are happy, politicians welcome the new investment, and consumers are pleased at finding a wide variety of goods at lower prices. But what are the social impacts? Locally owned and operated small businesses cannot compete with the marketing behemoth and must close. People lose their jobs or must find new work for lower pay. Neighborhoods are stripped of the familiar hardware store, pharmacy, butcher, baker, candlestick maker. People no longer walk to their local establishment, where they meet and greet one another and familiar merchants they have known, but drive, each isolated in their car, to a windowless, aesthetically bereft warehouse, miles away from home. They might not even leave home at all — why bother, when you can order online? No wonder international surveys show a rise in loneliness. The percentage of Americans identifying themselves as lonely has doubled from 20 to 40 percent since the 1980s, the New York Times reported in 2016. Alarmed by the health ravages, Britain has even found it necessary to appoint a minister of loneliness. Describing the systemic founts of loneliness, the U.S. surgeon general Vivek Murthy wrote: "Our twenty-first-century world demands that we focus on pursuits that seem to be in constant competition for our time, attention, energy, and commitment. Many of these pursuits are themselves competitions. We compete for jobs and status. We compete over possessions, money, and reputations. We strive to stay afloat and to get ahead. Meanwhile, the relationships we prize often get neglected in the chase." It is easy to miss the point that what Dr. Murthy calls "our twenty-first-century world" is no abstract entity, but the concrete manifestation of a particular socioeconomic system, a distinct worldview, and a way of life.

You need to get out in the practice ring more, brother,' Cassian told him, surveying his friend's powerful body. 'Don't want that mate of yours to find any soft bits.' 'She never finds any soft bits when I'm around her,' Rhys said, and Cassian laughed again. 'Is Feyre going to kick your ass for what you said earlier?' 'I already told the servants to clear out for the rest of the day as soon as you take Nesta up to the House.' 'I think the servants hear you fighting plenty.' Indeed, Feyre had no hesitation when it came to telling Rhys that he'd stepped out of line. Rhys threw him a wicked smile. 'It's not the fighting I don't want them hearing.' Cassian grinned right back, even as something like jealousy tugged on his gut. He didn't begrudge them their happiness- not at all. There were plenty of times when he'd seen the joy on Rhys's face and have to walk away to keep from weeping, because his brother had waited for that love, earned it. Rhys had gone to the mat again and again to fight for that future with Feyre. For this. But sometimes, Cassian saw that mating ring, and the portrait behind the desk, and this house, and just... wanted. The clock chimed ten thirty, and Cassian rose. 'Enjoy your not-fighting.

Simon, mark well my words! Wives are the devil ­ and I know!' `In truth,' Alan sighed, `I am the only wise one amongst us all.' `Art a silly lad!' Fulk rumbled, and cast him an affectionate though fiery glance. `Alan speaks sooth for once,' Simon said, and placed his finger on Margaret's indignant lips. He had her in his arms again, and like a needle to the magnet, Jeanne had drawn near to her Geoffrey. `For Alan throughout hath known that needs must I fall, and at Margot's feet.' `Ah, and he knew that I loved thee, even before I knew it myself,' Margaret cried. `Methinks he hath worked very quietly to bring about our happiness. And yet he will not seek his own.' `I observe thy folly,' he said, `and know mine own wisdom. That is happiness.' Jeanne looked at Geoffrey, and a smile passed between them, of boundless conceit. Margaret stole her hand into Simon's, smiling also. Not one of them answered Alan, and he laughed, leaning on his father's shoulder, and surveying his two friends with soft, satisfied eyes. `Are my sage words beneath contempt?' he asked. `Ay,' Simon answered simply, and looked down into Margaret's face for a long moment. A deep breath he drew, and glanced again at Alan. `Beneath contempt,' said Simon the Coldheart.

When we survey the wretched conditions of man, under the monarchical and hereditary systems of Government, dragged from his home by one power, or driven by another, and impoverished by taxes more than by enemies, it becomes evident that those systems are bad, and that a general revolution in the principle and construction of Governments is necessary. What is government more than the management of the affairs of a Nation? It is not, and from its nature cannot be, the property of any particular man or family, but of the whole community, at whose expense it is supported; and though by force and contrivance it has been usurped into an inheritance, the usurpation cannot alter the right of things. Sovereignty, as a matter of right, appertains to the Nation only, and not to any individual; and a Nation has at all times an inherent indefeasible right to abolish any form of Government it finds inconvenient, and to establish such as accords with its interest, disposition and happiness. the romantic and barbarous distinction of men into Kings and subjects, though it may suit the condition of courtiers, cannot that of citizens; and is exploded by the principle upon which Governments are now founded. Every citizen is a member of the Sovereignty, and, as such, can acknowledge no personal subjection; and his obedience can be only to the laws.

And whatever you make of the country-by-country surveys of national happiness that are now published with some regularity, it’s striking that the ‘happiest’ countries are never those where self-help books sell the most, nor indeed where professional psychotherapists are most widely consulted. The existence of a thriving ‘happiness industry’ clearly isn’t sufficient to engender national happiness, and it’s not unreasonable to suspect that it might make matters worse. Yet the ineffectiveness of modern strategies for happiness is really just a small part of the problem. There are good reasons to believe that the whole notion of ‘seeking happiness’ is flawed to begin with. For one thing, who says happiness is a valid goal in the first place? Religions have never placed much explicit emphasis on it, at least as far as this world is concerned; philosophers have certainly not been unanimous in endorsing it, either. And any evolutionary psychologist will tell you that evolution has little interest in your being happy, beyond trying to make sure that you’re not so listless or miserable that you lose the will to reproduce. Even assuming happiness to be a worthy target, though, a worse pitfall awaits, which is that aiming for it seems to reduce your chances of ever attaining it. ‘Ask yourself whether you are happy,’ observed the philosopher John Stuart Mill, ‘and you cease to be so.’ At best, it would appear, happiness can only be glimpsed out of the corner of an eye, not stared at directly.

IF, O most illustrious Knight, I had driven a plough, pastured a herd, tended a garden, tailored a garment: none would regard me, few observe me, seldom a one reprove me; and I could easily satisfy all men. But since I would survey the field of Nature, care for the nourishment of the soul, foster the cultivation of talent, become expert as Daedalus concerning the ways of the intellect; lo, one doth threaten upon beholding me, another doth assail me at sight, another doth bite upon reaching me, yet another who hath caught me would devour me; not one, nor few, they are many, indeed almost all. If you would know why, it is because I hate the mob, I loathe the vulgar herd and in the multitude I find no joy. It is Unity that doth enchant me. By her power I am free though thrall, happy in sorrow, rich in poverty, and quick even in death. Through her virtue I envy not those who are bond though free, who grieve in the midst of pleasures, who endure poverty in their wealth, and a living death. They carry their chains within them; their spirit containeth her own hell that bringeth them low; within their soul is the disease that wasteth, and within their mind the lethargy that bringeth death. They are without the generosity that would enfranchise, the long suffering that exalteth, the splendour that doth illumine, knowledge that bestoweth life. Therefore I do not in weariness shun the arduous path, nor idly refrain my arm from the present task, nor retreat in despair from the enemy that confronteth me, nor do I turn my dazzled eyes from the divine end. Yet I am aware that I am mostly held to be a sophist, seeking rather to appear subtle than to reveal the truth; an ambitious fellow diligent rather to support a new and false sect than to establish the ancient and true; a snarer of birds who pursueth the splendour of fame, by spreading ahead the darkness of error; an unquiet spirit that would undermine the edifice of good discipline to establish the frame of perversity. Wherefore, my lord, may the heavenly powers scatter before me all those who unjustly hate me; may my God be ever gracious unto me; may all the rulers of our world be favourable to me; may the stars yield me seed for the field and soil for the seed, that the harvest of my labour may appear to the world useful and glorious, that souls may be awakened and the understanding of those in darkness be illumined. For assuredly I do not feign; and if I err, I do so unwittingly; nor do I in speech or writing contend merely for victory, for I hold worldly repute and hollow success without truth to be hateful to God, most vile and dishonourable. But I thus exhaust, vex and torment myself for love of true wisdom and zeal for true contemplation. This I shall make manifest by conclusive arguments, dependent on lively reasonings derived from regulated sensation, instructed by true phenomena; for these as trustworthy ambassadors emerge from objects of Nature, rendering themselves present to those who seek them, obvious to those who gaze attentively on them, clear to those who apprehend, certain and sure to those who understand. Thus I present to you my contemplation concerning the infinite universe and innumerable worlds.

I believe that the clue to his mind is to be found in his unusual powers of continuous concentrated introspection. A case can be made out, as it also can with Descartes, for regarding him as an accomplished experimentalist. Nothing can be more charming than the tales of his mechanical contrivances when he was a boy. There are his telescopes and his optical experiments, These were essential accomplishments, part of his unequalled all-round technique, but not, I am sure, his peculiar gift, especially amongst his contemporaries. His peculiar gift was the power of holding continuously in his mind a purely mental problem until he had seen straight through it. I fancy his pre-eminence is due to his muscles of intuition being the strongest and most enduring with which a man has ever been gifted. Anyone who has ever attempted pure scientific or philosophical thought knows how one can hold a problem momentarily in one's mind and apply all one's powers of concentration to piercing through it, and how it will dissolve and escape and you find that what you are surveying is a blank. I believe that Newton could hold a problem in his mind for hours and days and weeks until it surrendered to him its secret. Then being a supreme mathematical technician he could dress it up, how you will, for purposes of exposition, but it was his intuition which was pre-eminently extraordinary - 'so happy in his conjectures', said De Morgan, 'as to seem to know more than he could possibly have any means of proving'. The proofs, for what they are worth, were, as I have said, dressed up afterwards - they were not the instrument of discovery.

In 2000, for instance, two statisticians were hired by the YMCA—one of the nation’s largest nonprofit organizations—to use the powers of data-driven fortune-telling to make the world a healthier place. The YMCA has more than 2,600 branches in the United States, most of them gyms and community centers. About a decade ago, the organization’s leaders began worrying about how to stay competitive. They asked a social scientist and a mathematician—Bill Lazarus and Dean Abbott—for help. The two men gathered data from more than 150,000 YMCA member satisfaction surveys that had been collected over the years and started looking for patterns. At that point, the accepted wisdom among YMCA executives was that people wanted fancy exercise equipment and sparkling, modern facilities. The YMCA had spent millions of dollars building weight rooms and yoga studios. When the surveys were analyzed, however, it turned out that while a facility’s attractiveness and the availability of workout machines might have caused people to join in the first place, what got them to stay was something else. Retention, the data said, was driven by emotional factors, such as whether employees knew members’ names or said hello when they walked in. People, it turns out, often go to the gym looking for a human connection, not a treadmill. If a member made a friend at the YMCA, they were much more likely to show up for workout sessions. In other words, people who join the YMCA have certain social habits. If the YMCA satisfied them, members were happy. So if the YMCA wanted to encourage people to exercise, it needed to take advantage of patterns that already existed, and teach employees to remember visitors’ names.

This has been a wonderful day!' said he, as the Rat shoved off and took to the sculls again. 'Do you know, I've never been in a boat before in all my life.' 'What?' cried the Rat, open-mouthed: 'Never been in a—you never—well I—what have you been doing, then?' 'Is it so nice as all that?' asked the Mole shyly, though he was quite prepared to believe it as he leant back in his seat and surveyed the cushions, the oars, the rowlocks, and all the fascinating fittings, and felt the boat sway lightly under him. 'Nice? It's the ONLY thing,' said the Water Rat solemnly, as he leant forward for his stroke. 'Believe me, my young friend, there is NOTHING—absolute nothing—half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats. Simply messing,' he went on dreamily: 'messing—about—in—boats; messing——' 'Look ahead, Rat!' cried the Mole suddenly. It was too late. The boat struck the bank full tilt. The dreamer, the joyous oarsman, lay on his back at the bottom of the boat, his heels in the air. '—about in boats—or WITH boats,' the Rat went on composedly, picking himself up with a pleasant laugh. 'In or out of 'em, it doesn't matter. Nothing seems really to matter, that's the charm of it. Whether you get away, or whether you don't; whether you arrive at your destination or whether you reach somewhere else, or whether you never get anywhere at all, you're always busy, and you never do anything in particular; and when you've done it there's always something else to do, and you can do it if you like, but you'd much better not. Look here! If you've really nothing else on hand this morning, supposing we drop down the river together, and have a long day of it?' The Mole waggled his toes from sheer happiness, spread his chest with a sigh of full contentment, and leaned back blissfully into the soft cushions. 'WHAT a day I'm having!' he said. 'Let us start at once!

Numbers express quantities. In the submissions to my online survey, however, respondents frequently attributed qualities to them. Noticeably, colors. The number that was most commonly described as having its own color was four (52 votes), which most respondents (17) said was blue. Seven was next (28 votes), which most respondents (9) said was green, and in third place came five (27 votes), which most respondents (9) said was red. Seeing colors in numbers is a manifestation of synesthesia, a condition in which certain concepts can trigger incongruous responses, and which is thought to be the result of atypical connections being made between parts of the brain. In the survey, numbers were also labeled “warm,” “crisp,” “chagrined,” “peaceful,” “overconfident,” “juicy,” “quiet” and “raw.” Taken individually, the descriptions are absurd, yet together they paint a surprisingly coherent picture of number personalities. Below is a list of the numbers from one to thirteen, together with words used to describe them taken from the survey responses. One Independent, strong, honest, brave, straightforward, pioneering, lonely. Two Cautious, wise, pretty, fragile, open, sympathetic, quiet, clean, flexible. Three Dynamic, warm, friendly, extrovert, opulent, soft, relaxed, pretentious. Four Laid-back, rogue, solid, reliable, versatile, down-to-earth, personable. Five Balanced, central, cute, fat, dominant but not too much so, happy. Six Upbeat, sexy, supple, soft, strong, brave, genuine, courageous, humble. Seven Magical, unalterable, intelligent, awkward, overconfident, masculine. Eight Soft, feminine, kind, sensible, fat, solid, sensual, huggable, capable. Nine Quiet, unobtrusive, deadly, genderless, professional, soft, forgiving. Ten Practical, logical, tidy, reassuring, honest, sturdy, innocent, sober. Eleven Duplicitous, onomatopoeic, noble, wise, homey, bold, sturdy, sleek. Twelve Malleable, heroic, imperial, oaken, easygoing, nonconfrontational. Thirteen Gawky, transitional, creative, honest, enigmatic, unliked, dark horse. You don’t need to be a Hollywood screenwriter to spot that Mr. One would make a great romantic hero, and Miss Two a classic leading lady. The list is nonsensical, yet it makes sense. The association of one with male characteristics, and two with female ones, also remains deeply ingrained.

Even male children of affluent white families think that history as taught in high school is “too neat and rosy.” 6 African American, Native American, and Latino students view history with a special dislike. They also learn history especially poorly. Students of color do only slightly worse than white students in mathematics. If you’ll pardon my grammar, nonwhite students do more worse in English and most worse in history.7 Something intriguing is going on here: surely history is not more difficult for minorities than trigonometry or Faulkner. Students don’t even know they are alienated, only that they “don’t like social studies” or “aren’t any good at history.” In college, most students of color give history departments a wide berth. Many history teachers perceive the low morale in their classrooms. If they have a lot of time, light domestic responsibilities, sufficient resources, and a flexible principal, some teachers respond by abandoning the overstuffed textbooks and reinventing their American history courses. All too many teachers grow disheartened and settle for less. At least dimly aware that their students are not requiting their own love of history, these teachers withdraw some of their energy from their courses. Gradually they end up going through the motions, staying ahead of their students in the textbooks, covering only material that will appear on the next test. College teachers in most disciplines are happy when their students have had significant exposure to the subject before college. Not teachers in history. History professors in college routinely put down high school history courses. A colleague of mine calls his survey of American history “Iconoclasm I and II,” because he sees his job as disabusing his charges of what they learned in high school to make room for more accurate information. In no other field does this happen. Mathematics professors, for instance, know that non-Euclidean geometry is rarely taught in high school, but they don’t assume that Euclidean geometry was mistaught. Professors of English literature don’t presume that Romeo and Juliet was misunderstood in high school. Indeed, history is the only field in which the more courses students take, the stupider they become. Perhaps I do not need to convince you that American history is important. More than any other topic, it is about us. Whether one deems our present society wondrous or awful or both, history reveals how we arrived at this point. Understanding our past is central to our ability to understand ourselves and the world around us. We need to know our history, and according to sociologist C. Wright Mills, we know we do.8

According to data collected from a General Social Survey on average married couples have sex with each other about eighty times a year which about twice a week which is not too bad, but some men like my husband for example may want to be sexted down once a day whether its fucking or giving head either way they nut right. Sex is a very important part to having a happy marriage. Now I know you may want to ask how or why is sex so important well let me break it down to you sex is a form of intimacy if you stop having sex then a part of your intimacy is gone.

numbers. According to a 2007 survey conducted by AOL and the family magazine Cookie, 94 percent of parents say their children are spoiled, up from the 80 percent measured by a 1991 Time and CNN poll. This percentage may sound high, but to me the question is, Who are these other

had failed to learn the value of money and how to work for it. And in a Center for a New American Dream survey, a vast majority of parents (87 percent) reported that the consumerism of modern society makes instilling good values in their children a much harder job. That the amount of

In a three-year period, we had 78 projects, and 77 of them were delivered on time, on budget, and in scope. Then I surveyed the customers and found out that none of them was happy!

Unhappy Places According to World Values Surveys from 1995 to 2007, the 10 unhappiest places on Earth are: 1. Zimbabwe, 2. Armenia, 3. Moldova, 4. Belarus, 5. Ukraine, 6. Albania, 7. Iraq, 8. Bulgaria, 9. Georgia, 10. Russia.

National surveys find that when someone claims to have 5 or more friends with whom they can discuss important problems, they are 60 percent more likely to say that they are ‘very happy’.

Helliwell and his team have run several iterations of the World Values Survey and the Gallup World Poll through their statistical grinders and have found that when it comes to life satisfaction, relationships with other people beat income, hands down. For example, these polls asked people if they had a friend or relative to count on when needed. Just going from being friendless to having one friend or family member to confide in had the same effect on life satisfaction as a tripling of income.

How much does social time matter? One more survey: a 2008 study by the Gallup Organization and Healthways found a direct relationship between well-being and leisure time. The more people hung out with family and friends in any particular day, the more happiness and enjoyment they reported, and the less stress and worry. It’s no surprise that it’s good to hang out with people we like.

And indeed today as it struggles with its financial crisis, the central issue in Greek politics remains resentment of the influence of Brussels, Germany, the International Monetary Fund, and other external actors, which are seen as pulling strings behind the back of a weak Greek government. Although there is considerable distrust of government in American political culture, by contrast, the basic legitimacy of democratic institutions runs very deep. Distrust of government is related to the Greek inability to collect taxes. Americans loudly proclaim their dislike of taxes, but when Congress mandates a tax, the government is energetic in enforcement. Moreover, international surveys suggest that levels of tax compliance are reasonably high in the United States; higher, certainly, than most European countries on the Mediterranean. Tax evasion in Greece is widespread, with restaurants requiring cash payments, doctors declaring poverty-line salaries, and unreported swimming pools owned by asset-hiding citizens dotting the Athenian landscape. By one account, Greece’s shadow economy—unreported income hidden from the tax authorities—constitutes 29.6 percent of total GDP.24 A second factor has to do with the late arrival of capitalism in Greece. The United States was an early industrializer; the private sector and entrepreneurship remained the main occupations of most Americans. Greece urbanized and took on other trappings of a modern society early on, but it failed to build a strong base of industrial employment. In the absence of entrepreneurial opportunities, Greeks sought jobs in the state sector, and politicians seeking to mobilize votes were happy to oblige. Moreover, the Greek pattern of urbanization in which whole villages moved from the countryside preserved intact rural patronage networks, networks that industry-based development tended to dissolve.

In October 2009, Time magazine devoted an entire issue to “The State of the American Woman.” One writer pointed out that, ironically, as women have gained more education, more economic independence, more power, and more freedom, they have become less and less happy. According to evidence gathered by numerous surveys, they are unhappier now than when the feminist movement set about to solve the problem of women’s unhappiness.7 Clearly, the new model of womanhood is even less fulfilling than the old one was. The solution isn’t to try to rewind the clock to the 1950s, and squeeze women back into that culture’s “Leave It to Beaver” stereotype. No. The solution—the biblical solution—is to embrace the Word of God, and ask Him to help us figure out how to live out His divine design in this culture. Truly “smart girls” know that the place to get more know-how, freedom, and joy is in a relationship with Christ—the One “in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Col. 2:3).

Why do people report themselves to be as happy as they were back when we all had less? Well, for one thing, we are comparing two societies that are both majestically wealthy in comparison to almost all societies throughout history. Neither the surveyed Americans of the 1950s nor those of the 2000s were struggling with endemic distress- hunger, pain, humiliation. And average people who are not in such distress are statistically more likely to call themselves happy than not.

I slowed my steps as I started up the path toward the front entrance, feeling like I was about to walk on smoldering embers. Had the fire burned down enough that it couldn’t harm me? Or would I be scorched? Reaching the front door, I took a deep breath, aware of the importance of what I was about to do and fearful that I would not succeed. Then I rapped firmly upon the dark wood. This was not the time to practice timidity. Grayden opened the door himself and our eyes met. For a moment, neither of us moved, equally flustered--he was stunned to find me on his stoop, while I had expected a servant to answer my knock. “May I come in, my lord?” I inquired, sounding more nervous than I would have liked. “As you wish.” He leaned back against the door frame and gestured for me to enter, his manner not entirely hospitable. I stepped inside and glanced around the spacious foyer, then cleared my throat, ready to begin a short, but well-rehearsed, statement of contrition. “I owe you an apology, Lord Grayden. I’m sorry for failing to attend the dinner to which you were invited at my family’s home. While I do not deserve your kind regard, I hope you will be gracious enough to forgive me.” “That depends on what you were doing instead.” “Excuse me?” I squeaked, for this was an unexpected reaction. My mind spun, trying to decide what to do. Did I need to apologize better? Or should I just leave? He laughed, and I felt even more flustered. “Your mother and sisters kept changing their stories. Makes me think they didn’t know what you were doing. I’d like the mystery solved.” Taken aback, I surveyed him, noting his dark brown hair that made his skin appear all the more fair, his perfectly proportioned nose, his gorgeous green eyes and his inviting smile. He wanted me to be honest. I decided to risk it, for nothing worse could come of his knowing the truth. “I forgot you were coming.” He straightened and rubbed the back of his neck with one hand. “At least I know you’re not a liar.” “Not usually,” I blurted, and he laughed once more. “Well then, I accept your apology.” “That’s very considerate of you.” I hesitated then gave him another curtsey. “Good day to you, my lord.” His eyebrows rose in surprise. “You’re leaving so soon?” “Yes,” I replied, a grin playing at the corners of my mouth. “You see, I haven’t been invited to stay.” Before he could respond, I slipped past him and out the door, pleased at his befuddled expression. All in all, things had gone well--I had accomplished my appointed task; at the same time, I was certain I could cross another suitor off the list. After all, even the best impressions Lord Grayden had of me left much to be desired. But I didn’t feel as happy about that outcome as I had expected. Strangely, the young man held more appeal for me now than he had before. I sighed, for my nature did indeed appear to be a fickle one.

In fact, contemporary surveys show that the awareness of leading a moral or religious life imbued with righteousness is a significant index of happiness.

In 2010, UCLA researchers conducted a survey of more than 25,000 people ages 18–75 and found that the majority rated their own attractiveness as about a seven out of ten. This suggests that the average person thinks he is a little better looking than the average person. About a third of the people under 30 rated themselves as somewhere around a nine. That sort of confidence is fun to think about considering that it is impossible for everyone to be better-looking than half the population.

Do you enjoy your work? Are you happy to get out of bed each morning and dress for the office? If you answered ‘no’ to either of these questions, you are not alone. In a 2014 Conference Board survey, 52 per cent of Americans claimed to be unhappy at work and in a recent CIPD study 23 per cent of Britons claimed to be looking for a new job. In the same survey only about one-third claim to feel engaged with their work. You can see the effects of this in absence, stress and depression. In fact, you can see it in the rush hour in the tired and sad-looking faces of so many commuters. The majority of people I coach are unhappy or dissatisfied with their working lives. They describe their work in so many depressing ways – as ‘boring’, ‘tedious’, ‘mind-numbing’, ‘stressful’, ‘painful’ or even ‘scary’. I hear similar opinions as I travel the world from all types of people no matter what their background, education or choice of career.

I survey the lux in flux and exploit it to stay happy," she said. I was bewildered. She sensed my hesitation to be drawn deeper and did exactly that. "You see, the trick to tide over misery is not to fight it; but, in sensing those little specks of happiness which providence embeds therein.The mere scale of it boosts enough to float over back to happiness." She was asking me to sense and extract happiness from sadness, cheer from misery, and order from chaos; while being in the midst of the latter. She was asking me to feel at ease with the uncertainty all around by using the certainty of my consciousness of it.

recent studies have debunked the oft-repeated assertion that half of all marriages end in divorce. A closer look at the statistics indicates that a majority of marriages actually last a lifetime. Furthermore, surveys show that the vast majority of married people describe themselves as happy, fulfilled, and unwilling to contemplate any other condition of life.1

According to the Employee Benefit Research Institute's 2014 Retirement Confidence Survey, 65 percent of workers now plan to work for pay for at least some period of time in retirement.

A Northwestern Mutual life insurance survey studied financial discipline and happiness in retirement. They found that people who rated themselves as being "highly disciplined" planners were much more likely than those who were non-planners to say that they were happy in retirement

There is a remarkable man named Matthieu Ricard, he’s written some books on happiness, he’s French, he has a doctorate in cell biology from Pasteur Institute, his mentor there actually won a Nobel prize for the research they are doing, but after graduate school he made a startling decision, he decided he’d give up science and go to the Himalayas, become a monk and meditate for the rest of his life. He’s been called I think by his publisher’s publicists the happiest man in the world, because he’s been studied by scientists and on this right-to-left ratio, he’s very far to the left. There’s a scientist named Paul Ekman, who’s the world’s expert on the facial expression of emotion, Paul is the keenest observer of the face, as a revealer of what you’re feeling, he’s a very dangerous man. Once I was walking down the street with Paul on the way to a meeting that I was conducting and Paul was telling me about a system for training people to get good at this, that he had just developed and as he’s telling it, we’re getting to the meeting hall and I thought this is really interesting, but I hope he wraps it up, I’ve got to think about what I am gonna do at the meeting, at that moment he says to me: and if someone had studied the system they’d know you’re getting a little angry with me right now. This is why Paul is so dangerous. Paul was interested in emotional contagion. He wanted to know what would the effect be of someone like Matthieu who is very upbeat on someone who is quite the opposite. So Paul did a quite phone survey of faculty at the University where he teaches asking who is the most abrasive, difficult, confrontational member of our faculty, oddly enough everyone agreed who that was, so he calls professor X and says “in the interest of science would you take part in a scientific experiment” and the professor is delighted says “sure, I’d be happy to”. As the day drew near and near, he started making demands which became increasingly outrageous and so they had to dump him and go with the second most difficult professor and the experiment was both Matthieu and the professor have their physiology measured and they’re gonna have a debate, the debate is on the premise that the professor should do what Matthieu did, the professor had a very influential secured well-paid tenured position, but the premise of the debate is that he would give it up and become a monk and go to a Hermitage for the rest of his life. At the beginning of this debate, physiology showed that he was really agitated at the thought of that, Matthieu was totally calm, so as the discussion starts Matthieu stays absolutely calm and the professor gets calmer and calmer and calmer, by the end of 15 minutes he’s having such a good time he doesn’t want to stop the discussion. So our emotions are contagious for better or for worse. Particularly when we pay full attention to each other.

The Wild Days: NLP 1972 to 1981: This is a first hand interpretation of the events and relationships created during the development of NLP.6 Happy Parents Happy Kids: Words and Actions for Parents and Kids: This is a book on parenting using components of the NLP model to provide strategies for common parenting challenges. The book includes many practical exercises.7 I have also designed a computer program called LifeSet Meta Programs Survey. This is a 48-question assessment survey designed to elicit “meta programs” and hence to understand the drivers of people’s behaviors.

Robin Simon, for instance, has found that parents who have custody of their children are less depressed than those who don’t. That’s a big departure from most other parenting-and-happiness studies, which suggest that single mothers (who more frequently have custody of their kids) are less happy than single fathers. But there’s a difference between Simon’s study and others: she was measuring depression, and depression surveys often ask questions about overall meaning and purpose as well as questions about day-to-day mood. They ask whether participants have had trouble getting going that week, for instance, or whether they have felt like failures, or whether they feel hopeful about the future. And it seems perfectly reasonable to assume that someone with children under his or her roof, as opposed to someone whose children were taken away, would answer these questions with more optimism. The former have reasons to get up in the morning, reasons to feel like they have made something of their lives, reasons to be connected to the future.

Crying It Out (Extinction) The optimal time to use this strategy is after three to four months of age (post–due date). Perhaps this is when both parents must return to work full-time or with postcolicky infants (colic usually starts to dissipate at three to four months) or after parents see partial success with graduated extinction. Extinction can successfully be used earlier, but most parents find it unacceptably harsh for younger babies. Extinction was used with some twins in my survey at five to six months of age after the due date, when the parents had suffered from becoming desperately sleep-deprived. At three to four months, many parents in my survey used extinction successfully. Extinction means open-ended crying at night. The process is pretty straightforward: if you know that it is time to sleep and not time to feed, you ignore the crying, without a time limit. Initially, the baby will fall asleep after wearing herself out crying, but very quickly this process teaches the baby how to fall asleep unassisted without protest or crying. And the baby then stays asleep for a longer time. A major fear here is that prolonged crying by one twin will disturb the sleeping of the other. Parents in my survey stated that the sleepy twin, surprisingly, almost always adapted to the crying after a few nights and slept through their sibling’s protests. Of course, another major fear is that you will harm your child by letting him cry. But as long as he is safely in his crib, letting him cry is only a means to an end of better sleeping. There is no published research showing that this procedure causes any harm to children. In contrast, there is no question that not sleeping well truly harms them. If your twins’ bedtime is early and naps are in place, the process of extinction usually takes three to five nights. In general, the parents in my survey describe the first night’s crying to be thirty to forty-five minutes, the second night’s ten to thirty minutes, and the third night’s zero to ten minutes. If their bedtime is too late or a twin is not napping well, the process may take much longer, or it may appear to work but the success is short-lived. Sometimes older children cry more on the second night than on the first, but the entire process still takes just a few days. “We started around three or four months as fatigue from care and unpredictable sleep schedules reached the breaking point. The first night, our babies cried for about twenty minutes; the second for about ten minutes. They’ve slept through the night ever since.

Based on my study of Harvard undergraduates, the average number of romantic relationships over four years is less than one. The average number of sexual partners, if you’re curious, is 0.5 per student. (I have no idea what 0.5 sexual partners means, but it sounds like the scientific equivalent of second base.) In my survey, I found that among these brilliant Harvard students, 24 percent are unaware if they are currently involved in any romantic relationship. What

In a survey of thousands of respondents, researchers in England found that of all the “happy habits” science has currently identified as being keys to a more fulfilling life, self-acceptance was the one most strongly associated with overall satisfaction. Yet the same study revealed that this particular habit was also the one people practiced least! Respondents

But one of the main reasons why Denmark does so well in international happiness surveys is the welfare state, as it reduces uncertainty, worries, and stress in the population. You can say that Denmark is the happiest country in the world or you can say that Denmark is the least unhappy country in the world. The welfare state is really good (not perfect, but good) at reducing extreme unhappiness. Universal and free health care, free university education, and relatively generous unemployment benefits go a long way toward reducing unhappiness. This has particular significance for those who are less well off, a segment of society who is happier in Denmark than in other wealthy countries.

In a survey of more than 10,000 people from 48 countries, happiness was viewed as more important than success, intelligence, knowledge, maturity, wisdom, relationships, wealth, and meaning in life.

Gender stereotype beliefs may not seem like they are influencing you, but at a subconscious level they can even censor and influence your memories. This is what Dan Gilbert calls the ‘stereotype proof of memories’. For example, in a study that asked participants to think about how they were feeling a few months earlier, when volunteers were prompted to think about their gender, female volunteers remembered feeling more intense emotion, and male volunteers remembered feeling less intense emotion. For the others in the survey who were not asked to think about their gender, both males and females reported feeling the same levels of emotion. Yet, when the concept of gender was introduced females recalled feeling more stereotypically feminine emotions like sympathy and guilt, and males recalled feeling more stereotypically masculine emotions like anger and pride.

The new view of marriage is reflected in the findings of a 2007 survey by the Pew Research Center. Throughout history and across different societies children have been pivotal to the prevailing conception of marriage. Yet when respondants to the Pew survey were provided with a list of items and asked to identify which were "very important " to a successful marriage, they ranked children near the bottom of the list. Practically every other consideration-- shared religious beliefs, shared interests, a happy sexual relationship-- ranked more important than children.

Distraction will, of course, interrupt attending to experiences; one survey reported

Any researchers of age forty or older who have surveyed the poor in countries like India can recall an occasion when they were surprised to discover that someone they thought was much older than them was in fact significantly younger. Premature aging can result from many causes, but steroid use is definitely one of them—and it is not just that affected individuals look older, they also die sooner. Yet because the immediate effect of the medicine is to make the patient feel rapidly better and she is not told what might happen later, she goes home happy

At South West Surveys we travel throughout the UK delivering fast, effective, highly detailed and accurate surveys. Our staff have a minimum of 15 years experience using Trimble robotic total stations, GPS and Faro 3D laser scanners, along with the latest data collection technologies available. Our client’s requirements are paramount, therefore we are happy to tailor our services to suit your individual needs or simply use a predetermined specification.

At South West Surveys we travel throughout the UK delivering fast, effective, highly detailed and accurate surveys. Our staff have a minimum of 15 years experience using Trimble robotic total stations, GPS and Faro 3D laser scanners, along with the latest data collection technologies available. Our client’s requirements are paramount, therefore we are happy to tailor our services to suit your individual needs or simply use a predetermined specification.

Learn now, my brother, once for all, because I must open to thee my heart: there is no Indian who does not consider himself infinitely more happy and more powerful than the French.

Unhappy people—especially those bereaved or depressed—tend to be more self-focused and brooding. A depressed mood motivates intense thinking—a search for information that makes one’s environment more understandable and controllable (Weary & Edwards, 1994). Happy people, by contrast, are more trusting, more loving, more responsive. If people are made temporarily happy by receiving a small gift while mall-shopping, they will report, a few moments later on an unrelated survey, that their cars and TV sets are working beautifully—better, if you took their word for it, than those belonging to folks who replied after not receiving gifts.

National Opinion Research Center surveys reveal that the percentage of Americans who describe themselves as “very happy” has been steadily declining since the late 1950s.

PHILOSOPHER: Think of it this way: Life is a series of moments, which one lives as if one were dancing, right now, around and around each passing instant. And when one happens to survey one’s surroundings, one realizes, I guess I’ve made it this far. Among those who have danced the dance of the violin, there are people who stay the course and become professional musicians. Among those who have danced the dance of the bar examination, there are people who become lawyers. There are people who have danced the dance of writing and become authors. Of course, it also happens that people end up in entirely different places. But none of these lives came to an end “en route.” It is enough if one finds fulfillment in the here and now one is dancing.

I think the purpose of team-building is that it’s cooperative and everyone approaches it with an open mind and a good outlook, thereby keeping up morale,” he says meaningfully, dipping his chin and lifting his brows. “I suppose we could take turns picking said activity if that would help? I’d be happy to visit your coven, write up surveys, stand outside of Kindergarten classrooms with signs telling them that Santa’s a hoax and your mom decapitated your Elf on the Shelf … Throw M&M’s at them while they cry. You know, whatever it is that you like to do for fun.

Americans today enjoy a prosperity like no other people in human history. So if money produces pleasure and pleasure produces happiness, we should be the happiest people ever assembled on this planet. The fact is, we are not. How can this be? This is the question New Republic editor Gregg Easterbrook addresses in his provocative book The Progress Paradox: How Life Gets Better While People Feel Worse. Easterbrook reviews the extraordinary progress made since the time of our great-great grandparents: Average life expectancy has increased dramatically; we are far healthier, without the threat of dreaded diseases like polio and smallpox; the typical American adult has twice the purchasing power his or her parents had in 1960, with the quality of life immeasurably improved.[11] We ought to be very happy, Easterbrook concludes. Yet Americans rank number sixteen in a survey of the happiest people in the world. (Nigerians rank number one.)[12] Americans tell pollsters that the country is on the wrong course, that their parents had it better than they do, that people feel incredibly stressed out. More people are popping Prozac and Zoloft pills; the number of people clinically depressed has increased tenfold in the post–World War II era. Remember the paradoxes we talked about earlier? Well, here is another: Life is better, but we feel worse.

if there really is no way you can win, you never say it out loud. You assess why, change strategy, adjust tactics, and keep fighting and pushing till either you’ve gotten a better outcome or you’ve died. Either way, you never quit when your country needs you to succeed. As Team 5 was shutting down the workup and loading up its gear, our task unit’s leadership flew to Ramadi to do what we call a predeployment site survey. Lieutenant Commander Thomas went, and so did both of our platoon officers in charge. It was quite an adventure. They were shot at every day. They were hit by IEDs. When they came home, Lieutenant Commander Thomas got us together in the briefing room and laid out the details. The general reaction from the team was, “Get ready, kids. This is gonna be one hell of a ride.” I remember sitting around the team room talking about it. Morgan had a big smile on his face. Elliott Miller, too, all 240 pounds of him, looked happy. Even Mr. Fantastic seemed at peace and relaxed, in that sober, senior chief way. We turned over in our minds the hard realities of the city. Only a couple weeks from now we would be calling Ramadi home. For six or seven months we’d be living in a hornet’s nest, picking up where Team 3 had left off. It was time for us to roll. In late September, Al Qaeda’s barbaric way of dealing with the local population was stirring some of Iraq’s Sunni tribal leaders to come over to our side. (Stuff like punishing cigarette smokers by cutting off their fingers—can you blame locals for wanting those crazies gone?) Standing up for their own people posed a serious risk, but it was easier to justify when you had five thousand American military personnel backing you up. That’ll boost your courage, for sure. We were putting that vise grip on that city, infiltrating it, and setting up shop, block by block, house by house, inch by inch. On September 29, a Team 3 platoon set out on foot from a combat outpost named Eagle’s Nest on the final operation of their six-month deployment. Located in the dangerous Ma’laab district, it wasn’t much more than a perimeter of concrete walls and concertina wire bundling up a block of residential homes. COP Eagle’s

Andrei sometimes wondered how much a river would change Los Angeles. He pictured a long stream of water that divided the city, much like the River Thames or the Seine. Rivers nourished. The water happily rewrote the aisles of streetlamps and transformed one’s nighttime walk into a feature film. It carried boats filled with a surveying crowd that waved back at any brandishing hand on land that tried. It fostered lunch dates, amusing dares, and a reference for the lost. Andrei had spent one summer abroad and met these rivers. He was astonished at the difference in conversations the Europeans had with him. They were simple and alive. The pubs helped. The accents, too. Was it the rain that reminded? he speculated. The museums? The red buses? The cheap flights to any neighboring country? So—what was it about the geography of LA that made connection impossible? Just then, the sun glared at him. He glared back.

the old joke that if you relied only on cross-sectional surveys, you’d have to conclude that there are people in Miami who are born Cuban and die Jewish.

Nobel Prize winner Daniel Kahneman found that when you survey people in the moment, their happiness levels are highest while with friends... To be fair, research by Beverley Fair shows that we're the absolute happiest when with both friends and spouses. But even within a marriage, friendship reigns. Work by Gallup found that 70 percent of marital satisfaction is due to the couple's friendship. Tom Rath says it's five times as critical to a good marriage as physical intimacy.

We've all read a thousand articles that say marriage makes you healthier and happier. Umm, no. Many of these studies merely survey married people and single people, compare the happiness levels, find that the married people are doing better, and crow "See? Marriage makes you healthy and happy." But that's committing an error called "survivorship bias." If you want to determine if getting married makes you happier, you need to include separated, divorced, and widowed people in with the currently married, not with the unmarried... A 2010 study from Australia even said previous research probably underestimated just how happy people in happy marriages are. But the flip side is even more damning than you may have guessed. A study of medical records of five thousand patients analyzed the most stressful life events people deal with. Divorce came in #2 (Death of a spouse was number one.) Divorce even beat going to prison.

These basic goals of safety, health, happiness, even success, are often too shallow to be admitted by conscientious parents. But they still lie beneath the surface, like tectonic forces, and shape how we parent. In a recent Harvard survey, 80 percent of youth said adults in their lives were more concerned about their success or happiness than caring for others. Ironically, in the same survey, the adults insisted that growing caring kids was their top priority. Obviously, there is often a gap between what we believe should matter and how we actually live.1

He was a keen observer of human behavior. He surveyed Athens, and everywhere he saw people who had enough: enough food, enough money, and certainly enough culture. Why weren’t they happy?