The Truth About Happiness
Before we dig deeper into the nature of happiness, Iâd like you to take a short quiz. Iâm going to introduce you to three people I met during my travels, and I want you to tell me which one you think is happiest.
The first is Jan Hammer, a 42-year-old father of three girls who lives in Ă
rhus, the second largest city in Denmark. Each morning at three oâclock, his alarm clock rings, and he rolls out of the warm bed he shares with his wife of 15 years. He eats two fried eggs and toast, washes it down with a mug of coffee, and slips into a blaze orange jumpsuit. By four oâclock heâs at the wheel of a high-tech garbage truck and is staring at a NASA-like dashboard with flashing buttons and multiple-view video screens. At each of 59 stops he jumps out of the cab and, with marmot-like zeal, trots from Dumpster to Dumpster and heaves fresh refuse into the hopper with the help of a hydraulic lift. âI donât even smell it anymore,â he huffs, sweat seeping through his jumpsuit.
The second person is Norridah Yusoh, a 43-year-old housewife who lives with her husband and three school-age children in an apartment in Singapore. Each morning she dutifully puts on a head scarf, covering her hair as her religion requires; makes her children breakfast; prepares lunch for her husband, an accountant; and sends her family off for the day. After theyâre gone, she does household chores and, at midday, she might walk to a nearby food market, to buy food from various vendors and stop to chat along the way. Some nights after dinner, she goes to the local McDonaldâs, where she socializes with other Muslim mothers as her children nibble french fries and do homework. Then, each night before bed, as tradition dictates, she kisses her husbandâs hand to show respect.
The third person is Manuel Uribe, a 45-year-old Mexican man who lives in a working-class neighborhood of Monterrey. Manuel has a knack for trading, a soothing facility for conversation, and a sincere compassion. Heâs also a big man. In fact, a combination of bad genes and a taste for junk food has ballooned his weight to the point where heâs confined to a bed in the living room of his motherâs house. This doesnât impede visitors. On any given day, his room is abuzz with people seeking to cut a deal, to get advice, or just to experience a dollop of Manuelâs charm. At noon, Manuelâs mother brings out his lunchâa lean filet of meat and a generous helping of steamed broccoli. âItâs from the Zone Diet,â he says. âIâve lost 200 pounds in the last year.â Just then the door opens. Claudia Solis, a 30-something secretary, walks in on high heels. She puts a knee on the bed, cranes her lovely neck, and plants a pink-frosted kiss on Manuelâs lips.
So whatâs the answer to the quiz? Which of these three people is the happiest? Youâve probably already guessed the answer: All three of them are happyâso happy, in fact, that, according to the latest research, they are almost certainly three of the happiest people in three of the happiest places on the planet.
How can that be?
Letâs go back to the garbageman. I met Jan at six oâclock on a gray morning in the alley behind my hotel in Ă
rhus. He was emptying Dumpsters into his behemoth garbage truck. He greeted me heartily, and I could instantly tell that he was a nice guy. Pulling off a dirty cotton glove, he offered me his plump hand, which emitted the sweet-sour smell of his profession.
Later, seated in his cab, Jan punched the accelerator, and we sped through the misty Danish dawn. âYou canât find a better job than delivering garbage,â he whispered conspiratorially. âI work only 21 hours a week and make $80,000 a year. I drive a Mercedes and take my family to Greece each year.â I looked over at him. He was wearing red square-rimmed glasses, Nike running shoes, and a bracelet that read âWorldâs Most Beautiful Garbage Man.â By eight oâclock heâd be done with his route and back at the garbage truck depot, he said. After a shower, heâd hit the gym and spa provided by his workersâ union. Some days, he might go to a second job where he worked as a freelance bricklayer. There he would make another $60,000 a year.
More important than the money, though, was the satisfaction he felt with his life. âIâm like the yolk of the egg!â he said, using a Danish expression for âfat and happy.â In his community, there was no stigma attached to the âgarbage deliveryâ business. On weekends, heâd socialize with the dentists and lawyers who lived on his block. Home by three oâclock every afternoon, he had time to help his three daughters with their homework. Three nights a week heâd go to a local gym, where heâd put on shorts, sneakers, a red sports shirt, and a whistle to coach his daughtersâ indoor soccer team. His life was rewarding and full.
As for Norridah, listen to what she said when I asked her to rate her happiness on a scale of 1 to 10: âIâm a 9.5! I have a lot of friends from a wide variety of backgrounds.â This was important for her, living in Singapore, because the government there strongly encourages harmony among the nationâs three major ethnic groups: Chinese, Indians, and Malays such as Norridah. âEver since my school days, Iâve mixed with Chinese and Indians and learned how to make friends with all of them,â she said. âMaybe I talk most with my Malay friends on the phone, but when I go outâwhich I do every dayâI meet my Indian friends at the market or play cards with Chinese friends. My children are the same way. They donât see color or race, they see people.â
âHow about your tudong?â I asked, using the Malay word for a head scarf. âYou live in this modern city, your husband is an accountant, your kids listen to iPods. Your scarf seems so traditional. Do you feel youâre free to take if off and show your hair, if you want?â
âThat is my own choice,â she said, gently passing her hand over the scarf. âItâs part of our religion, and it is the way of our leaders. I choose to wear it. My daughterâs generation might have different ideas. But it makes me comfortable, so I wear it.â
âAnd how about this custom of kissing your husbandâs hand?â I asked.
âThis is a form of respecting each other,â she said. âItâs part of being a good Muslim. Doing it every day makes sure youâre purged of guilt and grudges. I do it from the bottom of my heart, not that I have necessarily done anything wrong. Itâs just a show of respect. My husband reciprocates, but in his own way.â
And Manuel? What was the source of his happiness? Hereâs what he told me:
âWhen I was younger, I saw an ad for an electronics company in Texas looking for technicians who could speak English,â he said. âBut by the time I was 35, Iâd lost my savings, my auto parts business, and my wife,â he said. âI bought a gun and kept it in my bed, thinking I might use it on myself. Then one night God came to me and told me I had work to do.â Manuel went on a diet and started to lose weight. With his motherâs consent, he had a hole punched through his bedroom wall, installed double-wide glass doors to admit the world, and unleashed his knack for deal making. Today he receives up to 70 visitors a dayâclients seeking to trade everything from blue jeans to Thompson helicopters, cousins and friends stopping by for a chat, or people seeking his business advice. He doesnât have to go looking for social interaction; it comes to him.
As I sat with him one evening, his cell phone rang and he lifted the tiny device to his ear. On the other end, a desperately overweight girl was searching for hope. âIf I can turn my life around,â he said tenderly, âyou can too, dear.â When he hung up, an old friend stopped by for a visit. Then another phone call. This time it was news that the website Manuel runs had crashed. In his smooth, unflappable voice, he troubleshot the problem with the webmaster. I sat back and watched. âDoes this ever end?â I asked.
âIf it did, Iâd be dead,â he said.
A year later, Manuel married Claudia. With her help, he has lost more than 500 pounds. Life has never been better.
These three individualsâa garbageman with time for his kids, a housewife surrounded by close friends, and a junk dealer on a personal mission of faithâshare a common characteristic: They all consider themselves to be âvery happy.â More than that, they all believe that they will become even happier in the years to come. Like many people, they deal with challenges every day. They experience stress, periods of sadness, and grief. Life sometimes deals them a bad hand. They are, in many ways, not so different from the rest of us. Yet somehow they experience a sense of happiness greater than ours. Researchers have a term for this positive, optimistic condition: They call such people thrivers.
Thriving
According to the Gallup organization, âthrivingâ countries are those whose citizens think positively about their lives and report more happiness, enjoyment, interest, and respect. These countries also report significantly lower rates of health problems, sick days, stress, sadness, and anger.
Whatâs their secret?
During the past few decades, a small army of psychologists, social scientists, and scholars have asked the same question. Through rigorous experimentation and exhaustive surveys, theyâve given birth to a new science of happiness, focusing not only on defining the nature of human happiness, but also on discovering ways to improve our chances for personal well-being. Before we strike off around the world to learn the lessons of the worldâs happiness people, letâs turn to some of the leading experts to understand the scientific fundamentals of the field:
Ed Diener, Ph.D., is Joseph R. Smiley Distinguished Professor of Psychology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and the author of Happiness: Unlocking the Mysteries of Psychological Wealth.
Sonja Lyubomirsky, Ph.D., is a professor of psychology at the University of California, Riverside, and the author of The How of Happiness: A Scientific Approach to Getting the Life You Want.
Ruut Veenhoven, Ph.D., is director of the World Database of Happiness and editor of the Journal of Happiness Studies.
Jim Harter, Ph.D., is chief scientist of workplace management and well-being for Gallup and coauthor of 12: The Elements of Great Managing and Wellbeing: The Five Essential Elements.
Bruno S. Frey is a professor of economics at the University of Zurich and research director of CREMA (Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts). He is the author of Happiness: A Revolution in Economics.
MihĂĄly CsĂkszentmihĂĄlyi is Distinguished Professor of Psychology and director of the Quality of Life Research Center at the Claremont Graduate University in Claremont, California.
In what follows, Iâve distilled ideas from their books as well as from my interviews with these experts and sorted their answers according to key questions. Hereâs what they told me.
WHAT IS HAPPINESS?
MihĂĄly CsĂkszentmihĂĄlyi: As many a thinker since Aristotle has said, everything we do is ultimately aimed at experiencing happiness. We donât really want wealth, or health, or fame as suchâwe want these things because we hope they will make us happy. But happiness we seek not because it will get us something else, but for its own sake.
Sonja Lyubomirsky: I use the term âhappinessâ to refer to the experience of joy, contentment, or positive well-being, combined with a sense that oneâs life is good, meaningful, and worthwhile. However, most of us donât need a definition of happiness because we instinctively know whether we are happy or not.
Ed Diener: The word âhappinessâ means many things. It means positive emotions. It means life satisfaction. It means generally your life is going well. It means many different things in the different ways people use it. Everyone has this general idea. So I donât define happiness. I try to use these other, more exact terms, such as positive emotions, life satisfaction, marital satisfaction.
HOW DO YOU MEASURE HAPPINESS?
Sonja Lyubomirsky: We let people define happiness for themselves. Thereâs no happiness thermometer. No one else can tell you how happy you are. Itâs a subjective phenomenon. No one but you knows, or should tell you, how happy you truly are.
Jim Harter: We ask people to rate the quality of their overall life today on a 0-10 ladder of life developed by Hadley Cantril of Princeton, and what they think it will be in the next five yearsâto tap into their âreflectingâ self. The good news is that most people have a more positive view of the future than the presentâŠmaybe this keeps us striving for something better. We use responses to questions to categorize people as âthriving,â âstruggling,â or âsuffering.â We also ask people to recall their experiences from the previous day. This allows us to tap into the âexperiencingâ self or how much positive and negative emotions and experiences people have on a typical day. These are both important aspects of well-beingâŠthe evaluating self and the experiencing self...