Laurie Santos: The Pursuit of Happiness

1. Prioritize Social Connection

Actively seek and prioritize social interactions, even with strangers, as studies show that being more social and connecting with others significantly improves happiness and mood, despite initial predictions of awkwardness.

2. Do Nice Things For Others

Engage in acts of kindness and do nice things for others, as this provides a greater boost to happiness than self-focused activities.

3. Prioritize Present Moment Awareness

Intentionally pay attention to the present moment, often with a non-judgmental attitude, as this presence can improve well-being over time and make you happier.

4. Prioritize Sleep and Exercise

Focus on basic healthy habits like getting enough sleep and regular exercise, as these are critical for mental health and overall happiness, and often the first things to be neglected during busy or stressful times.

5. Challenge Happiness Misconceptions

Understand that our minds often mislead us about what truly brings lasting happiness, such as external achievements or material possessions, to avoid misdirected effort.

6. Discover True Happiness Sources

Actively work to uncover and pursue the correct sources of lasting happiness, rather than relying on mistaken intuitions that lead to disappointment.

7. Prioritize Time Affluence

Prioritize creating a subjective sense of having ample free time (time affluence), as feeling ’time famished’ has a significant negative impact on well-being, comparable to unemployment.

8. Master Your “Second Arrow”

Understand that while you can’t always control the ‘first arrow’ (external negative events), you are responsible for your ‘second arrow’ (your reaction to those events), and can choose to regulate your response.

9. Set Proactive Emotional Boundaries

Establish clear boundaries with people, situations, and activities to control your attention and avoid putting yourself in emotionally draining or negative circumstances, thereby regulating your emotions proactively.

10. Cultivate Rituals and Routines

Create and maintain daily rituals and routines to help compartmentalize different aspects of life, reduce cognitive overwhelm, and foster social connection and a positive mindset.

11. Embrace Normal Negative Emotions

Avoid the trap of ’toxic positivity’ by recognizing that experiencing negative emotions like sadness, anger, or fear is a normal and human part of life, not a sign of failure.

12. Combat Languishing with Flow

Engage in activities that induce a state of ‘flow,’ where you feel actively engaged, energized, and challenged, as this is a proven way to overcome feelings of languishing or apathy.

13. Use Stoic Negative Visualization

Start each day by briefly visualizing the loss of things you value (e.g., spouse, job, health) to reset your reference point, counteract hedonic adaptation, and foster greater appreciation for what you have.

14. Keep a Gratitude Journal

Regularly write down three to five things you are grateful for, as this simple practice can significantly improve your well-being in as little as two weeks.

15. Express Gratitude Directly

Write and deliver detailed thank-you notes to people you appreciate, as this act can significantly boost your well-being immediately and for over a month.

16. Override Unhelpful Happiness Intuitions

Put in effort to overcome natural cravings and intuitions that don’t lead to lasting happiness, similar to choosing healthy food over junk food, to live a more fulfilling life.

17. Model Emotional Calm for Children

Parents should embody calm and a positive emotional state, as children naturally catch emotions through emotional contagion, and a parent’s anxiety can be transmitted to their kids.

18. Parents: Prioritize Your Own Happiness

Focus on improving your own happiness and well-being first, as your positive emotional state and practices will naturally benefit your children through modeling and emotional contagion.

19. Let Children Experience Failure

For parents, allow children to experience failure, as it is crucial for learning, developing resilience, and preventing anxiety about future challenges.

20. Avoid Over-Intervening in Parenting

Parents should resist the urge to preemptively solve all problems for their children, as this can undermine children’s sense of competence, increase anxiety, and hinder their ability to learn independently.

21. Identify Burnout Symptoms

Be aware of the three components of burnout: emotional exhaustion, personal ineffectiveness (lack of meaning), and depersonalization (cynicism/lack of compassion), as these are signals that changes are needed.

22. Heed Burnout’s Warning Signals

Treat burnout symptoms as critical emotional signals, like a car’s gas gauge, indicating that you must make changes to avoid running out of fuel or facing catastrophic problems.

23. Rest and Redefine Work Identity

Respond to burnout by taking genuine, restorative time off and by re-evaluating and renegotiating your identity and relationship with your job.

24. Understand Emotional Contagion

Recognize that emotions are contagious, and while others’ negativity can affect you, your own optimism and positive emotions also have the power to influence those around you.

25. Pause, Regulate, Then Act

Develop strategies to regulate emotions by creating a pause between feeling an emotion and acting on it, preventing negative reactions from escalating problems.

26. Mindfully Observe Emotional Signals

Cultivate mindfulness to observe your physiological and emotional responses (e.g., rising blood pressure, clenched jaw) in challenging situations, allowing you to acknowledge emotions without immediately reacting.

27. Detach From Thoughts and Emotions

Through mindfulness, recognize that you are not your thoughts or emotions, which enables you to pause, create distance, and choose a different, more intentional reaction.

28. Manage Attention-Stealing Distractions

Actively manage distractions that pull your attention away from the present moment to boost overall happiness and well-being.

29. Mindfully Manage Phone Use (WWW)

Before using your phone, ask ‘What for?’ (purpose), ‘Why now?’ (trigger), and ‘What else?’ (opportunity cost) to become more mindful and intentional about your technology use.

30. Practice Attentional Hygiene

Consciously monitor and control where your attention is directed, as our attention can be easily stolen by distractions, impacting our well-being.

31. Meditate for Presence

Engage in meditation to intentionally pay attention to the present moment with a non-judgmental attitude, which directly contributes to increased happiness and well-being.

32. Reduce Commitments for Free Time

Consciously reduce your commitments and activities to create more free time, which is a crucial ingredient for happiness and opens opportunities for connection and well-being.

33. Invest Money to Buy Time

Use discretionary income for time-saving purchases (e.g., pre-cut groceries, takeout, hiring help for chores) to free up more personal time, which contributes to greater happiness.

34. Reframe Purchases as Time-Saving

Consciously reframe existing purchases, like ordering takeout, by calculating the time saved, which can enhance your subjective sense of time affluence and boost happiness.

35. Opt for Engaging Leisure Activities

Select leisure activities that are more challenging and actively engage you to induce a state of ‘flow,’ rather than passive entertainment, to maximize the benefits of free time.

36. Cultivate Social, Playful Fun

When seeking fun, prioritize activities that are social, induce a state of flow (engagement), and are approached with a playful, childlike attitude, free from performance or monetary goals.

37. Respond to Attention Bids

In relationships, consciously respond positively to your partner’s ‘bids for attention’ (e.g., sharing a thought, asking about their day), as consistently ignoring these can signal relationship trouble and reduce connection.

38. Beware Upward Social Comparison

Be aware that our brains naturally compare ourselves to those who make us feel worse, which prevents us from feeling good about what we have.

39. Fight Hedonic Adaptation

Recognize that humans adapt to positive circumstances, causing even the best things in life to lose their ‘oomph’ over time, and actively work against this tendency to maintain appreciation.

40. Recognize Evolutionary Happiness Traps

Recognize that natural selection prioritizes survival and reproduction, not individual happiness, which explains why we are often driven to pursue resources and status that don’t ultimately make us happy.

41. Limit Activities, Reduce FOMO

Limit the number of activities and choices to reduce feelings of FOMO, anxiety, and time famine, allowing for more bandwidth and appreciation for in-person social connection.

42. Practice Communal Prosocial Behaviors

Participate in behaviors often associated with religious institutions, such as going to communal gatherings, doing nice things for others, and altruistic acts, as these behaviors (not necessarily beliefs) are linked to increased happiness.

43. Join Non-Religious Community Groups

Seek out non-religious institutions or groups (e.g., CrossFit) that encourage social connection, altruism, and presence, as the behaviors fostered by these communities can also significantly improve happiness.

44. Don’t Actively Seek Happiness

Continuously striving to ‘seek happiness’ can ironically lead to negative emotions, make you less present, and be counterproductive to achieving true well-being.