The Happiness Equation

Notes from Neil Pasricha’s presentation at The Art of Leadership Conference, Friday, October 21, 2016.

This speaker is the author of The Book of Awesome and The Happiness Equation.

There have been over 105,000 books written about happiness.

Secret #1 — first be happy, then you can do great work and have big success. Happy people are 40% more likely to get a promotion. Happy people live an average of 10 years longer. Ten years!

Happiness Challenge: to increase your happiness, pick one of the following “Big Five” happiness habits and do it for 20 days in a row.

1. Brisk nature walks (20 min 3x/wk)
2. 20-minute replay (journal 20 min/d)
3. 5 conscious acts of kindness a week
4. Meditation (e.g., 10 minutes deep breathing; apps: headspace, 10%happier, calm.com)
5. Gratitude (jot down 5 things you are grateful for at the end of the week)

Secret #2 — the secret to never being “busy” again. When we are focused we are happier. Make time for the important things that take time by automating and regulating the things that are less important but still need to be done. For example, dedicate a certain amount of time during the day as email-free.

Secret #3 — turn your biggest fear into your biggest success. Action leads to motivation. When you decide to do it, you become motivated. Just start doing it. An object in motion will remain in motion until acted upon by an equal or greater force.