Eight secrets for guaranteed happiness
Thursday, April 21, 2022
Episode description: Relationships, parties, music, learned optimism, and more: life lessons from an eight-year-old, backed up by psychological research — and shocking yard work incident.
[TRANSCRIPT]
Laura: My interest in yard work is a lot like a solar eclipse. It only occurs about every 18 months, and it casts a shadow that causes me to stop and look intently at things I pass by daily without a second thought.
Gardening, yard-tending, plant-watering, and general maintenance of all things that grow are generally activities that fall to Nate. It’s not that I’m unwilling to help. It’s just that those chores seem to consistently fall off my radar, as evidenced by the many orchids that have perished at my hands because I remembered too late that they needed watering. Or maybe I gave them too much water? I’m still not sure.
Nate: neighbors might describe our landscaping approach as “affectionate neglect.” Between producing weekly episodes, mentoring 16 graduates through our intensive training program (Kasama Collective), forming a nonprofit, and recently launching that curriculum as a self-paced course (Kasama Labs), the past two years have had us working more than ever before. With the rain the past few months, the jungle at 3039 Madeline Street even attracted Laura’s notice.
I hand-weed when I can, but Laura isn’t an “incremental improvement” type of person. She’s more of a “striving for great things through great bursts of energy” person. So one afternoon recently, Laura grabbed the hedge trimmer to cut back the Japanese Irises which, over the almost-14 years we’ve been in our house, have spread and spread. “Sure,” I said, glad that she was offering to help. I went back to work, tuning out the intermittent background buzz.
Then some time later, Laura sticks her head into the shed and asks casually, “So what should I use if I want to cut something a little bigger?” And — classic parent mistake, answering without really paying attention, I said “Well, you probably want the limb loppers – you’ll see the medium and big ones hanging on the wall there in the basement.” And I went back to work, not noticing that it had become suspiciously quiet. (Classic parent mistake number two.)
A while later, I emerged from the shed, and walked out into the front yard, now a near-unrecognizable wasteland of clippings and branches. Everything at waist height or lower had been savagely hacked, as if a small helicopter had crash-landed in our yard and hit all the bushes on the way down. It wasn’t shaping or trimming, so much as rage pruning, where only one of them—human or nature—was going to get out alive. The most forlorn victim was the big camellia bush next to the driveway, which had been reduced from its former oval-shaped abundance to a scraggly skeleton with a few remaining leaves (evidently out of Laura’s reach) clinging to the top.
In the middle of it all was Laura, holding the limb loppers, with a look on her face that reminded me of Mattéa after she’d cut her bangs down to the scalp: half-proud, half knowing she’d perhaps taken this mischief a little too far.
“Well,” I said after a pause. “At least the yard isn’t overgrown any more.”
“I needed a change,” Laura replied with a not-very-apologetic grin.
Laura: I hadn’t intended to rage-prune. But as I decimated the overgrown lavender and hacked the Japanese irises into submission, my gaze fell on that 12-foot-tall camellia bush at the front corner of our house next to the driveway, that sprouts pink blooms twice a year, but at least twice a week snags my jacket or scratches my shoulder as I squeeze past it. It’s a small but regular annoyance — symbolic of all those parts of life where we bend and hunch every day, rather than taking the time to deal with the problem.
But not today, I thought, tightening my grip on the hedge trimmer. Not today.
First I trimmed back the outside greenery, exposing the ugly porcupine of twiggy branches inside. Then I cut a little deeper, thinking it would be nice if the bush didn’t grow so far into the already narrow driveway. Then I lopped off some of the branches above me, waving the power tool dangerously over my head like a villain from some chainsaw massacre movie. And that’s when I saw that the bush was not a bush, but a tree.
Inspired by this perspective shift, I kept cutting, until at last I could see limbs as thick as a child’s arm, and a nice sturdy trunk with branches that forked like a Y.
I found the limb loppers (the ones with the telescoping handles for maximum leverage) and took off a few of the lower branches to make it less bush and more tree. The more I cut, the surer I felt that this change was a great one.
And it was in that moment that I realized that the change I was after wasn’t just about the tree.
In last week’s episode, A Time to Change, we shared some big news: we’ll bring this chapter of Shelter in Place to a close at 200 episodes, and we’ll announce the new name for our next project in our season finale episode. We’ll also be dropping little hints about that name between now and then for those of you who like a good puzzle.
Whether you’re new here or have been with us from the very beginning, we’d love to hear from you about what Shelter in Place has meant to you. You can find instructions on how to submit a voice memo in the show notes and at shelterinplacepodast.org. We’ll include as many of those voice notes as we can in our finale episode next month.
The force that compelled me to hack that thing down to its bones didn’t just apply to our front yard landscaping. It applied to my life, to the sense I’d had for a long time that we needed to do things differently if life was going to be sustainable.
I wasn’t worried about the tree—it had survived my rage pruning before, I knew it would survive it again—and I could already imagine my unobstructed path from the car to the front door of the house, how much easier it would be to string up those lights next Christmas. But Nate wasn’t so sure.
Nate: “Please stop,” I said with a grimace, holding my hand out for the limb loppers. “You’ve done plenty.”
Right then, our daughter Grace came outside and saw the tree. She glided right past the piles of debris.
“Look,” she said, leaning into the Y shape of the lower branches. “It fits me perfectly.”
And it did. What had been hidden before was that the camellia had branches like a child’s seat, and it was just big enough for Grace to fit inside. Seeing her delight, I felt myself relax.
“I guess the leaves will grow back eventually,” I said.
“Give it a couple of weeks,” Laura said.
“This is going to be my new spot to play,” Grace added.
And just like that, I was brought back to reality. Grace reminded me that trees, like hair, usually recover from cuttings, and that happiness is found in all kinds of places.
Which is why we’re spending an entire episode today, in honor of Grace’s birthday month, to see the world from her perch in those branches, where she took what seemed like a mistake and turned it into delight that even I could see. We’re calling it 8 secrets for guaranteed happiness, or what we can learn from our almost-8-year-old Grace.
Secret #1: Happiness begins in the morning.
Laura: The past couple of years have been filled with so much uncertainty and disruption, but one of the things that can be counted on is that every morning at 7:00 a.m., Grace will shuffle out of her room, trailing bedhead and her polka dot fleece blanket, ready to face another day.
When Grace was younger and regularly waking up at 5:30 instead of 7, her internal alarm clock was a pain point for our family, but these days I’ve come to appreciate her reliability—and also to understand it better. When the pandemic began, a switch flipped inside me that’s had me up at 5 a.m. almost every morning since. For the first time in my life, I’ve come to appreciate the dark hours before dawn, when the noise and clutter of daylight hasn’t yet broken in.
As a former collegiate running coach, I’ve long been aware of the studies that point to regular bedtimes as a key to sleep quality, recovery, and athletic performance, but it was only recently that I became aware of the productivity cult around the 5 a.m. work day. While it’s true that I’ve found those early morning hours to be my most productive, what intrigues me even more is that there is a correlation between early risers and happiness.
A recent University of Warsaw study surveyed over a thousand adults ages 18 to 55 and found that morning people consistently reported higher levels of wellbeing and satisfaction than night owls. A similar study found that morning people experience less depression, seasonal affective disorder, and substance abuse than night owls.
Neuroscientists say that some of this can be explained because night owls typically get exposed to less natural light or simply sleep less, but the studies also pointed to a more subtle variable for early bird happiness: relationships.
There’s a well-established link between social support systems and happiness, and it seems that the consistent rhythms of the early riser lend themselves better to connecting with others and seeking out support. It’s also a chicken and the egg kind of thing, because people who have better social connections tend to get better sleep than those who spend a lot of time disconnected from others.
Before I became a morning person myself, it used to annoy me that Grace would wake up early. It was harsh to be robbed of the joy of sleeping in.
But these days Grace’s predictable morning wakeup is a reminder of what’s really important. On the mornings when I feel overwhelmed by work and I begin the day feeling stressed, I see her there snuggled up in her fleece blanket on the couch, waiting for me to scoop her up in my arms. Often she and I are the only ones up, and those quiet moments of morning have become some of my favorites. It’s my daily reminder that often the secret to happiness is right in front of us, just waiting to be snuggled.
Nate: Which brings us to secret #2: happiness is better together
On the days when we forget how much social connection matters—or every single day many times a day—Grace reminds us that life is better with others, especially when others equals friends. She’s very inclusive in her definition of that word—she’s just as happy if baby Rehan comes over as if her classmates Eloise or Alina do, and if there is a dog to be leashed and walked, that dog is girl’s best friend.
Laura: For Grace, a day without friends is a day without sunshine, flowers, and music. Laughter and delight turn to weeping and gnashing of teeth. Life is horribly unfair when your parents ask you to help out with chores or your siblings got snacks at school that you didn’t.
But when Grace does have a friend over, the clouds part and the world is just and right. The afternoons pass with smiles and self-serve snacks, an abundance of generosity for everyone, and an industriousness astonishing for anyone still in the single digits. Grace has been known to single handedly “teach” preschoolers how to spell their names and get excited about pretending to nap. Animals who find themselves leashed to Grace quickly learn to accept that they have become her new toy, doted on perhaps more than they would like, but at least it’s attention. Not surprisingly, Grace has been begging us for a dog for years, to which the answer is always: “we can talk about getting a dog when you learn to put away your clothes instead of scattering them on your bedroom floor.” So far we’re in no danger of getting a pet.
Nate: Since planning and logistics are one of my glaring weaknesses, constantly being pressed into the role of social manager is quite taxing. We’re talking about the guy who sometimes has trouble remembering the same weekday carpool schedule we’ve been doing with the neighbors for the last four months. But even I have to admit that Grace is onto something.
In 1938, Harvard University began what is now the longest running study on happiness, running for more than 80 years. The project followed a group of male students and later their spouses, kids, and additional control groups, observing what did and didn’t make them happy over time. What they found is this: “close relationships, more than money or fame, are what keep people happy throughout their lives.”
Yes, not smoking or abusing alcohol were important, but “people’s level of satisfaction with their relationships at age 50 was a better predictor of physical health than their cholesterol levels were.” Good relationships delay mental and physical decline, and they are better predictors of long and happy lives than intelligence, social class, or even genetics.
Even more shocking are recent studies on loneliness, which show that social isolation is associated with a 50% increased chance of dementia, a 29% increased risk of heart disease, and a 32% increased risk of stroke. Being lonely may be as bad for your long-term health as smoking, obesity, and physical inactivity.
So let’s invest in our close relationships! If you don’t know where to begin, check out the Campaign to End Loneliness in our show notes. And if you’re in the neighborhood, stop on by. We can jump on the trampoline together.
Secret #3: Happiness can be learned (and might require a lovey).
If you’re thinking that you’re too introverted to invest in relationships, Grace has an answer for you too: get yourself a lovey.
For those of you not familiar, “lovey” is the nauseatingly saccharine term universally used to define this generation’s update to blankies and stuffed animals. Essentially, it’s a cross between the two, a stuffed animal head with a mini-blanket body.
Grace’s lovey, loosely inspired by a cow, was originally nicknamed Peppermint, which got shortened to Pappy, because kids. At one time many years and facial oil exposures ago, it was white with gray spots. Now it’s a bleach-resisting mottled beige, the color of Grace’s devotion. From morning til night, whenever she can get away with it, Grace holds Pappy over her face, a bed-flavored air filter through which to mediate her experience.
Laura: The germaphobe in me, especially since Covid, bristles at how Pappy often accompanies Grace everywhere from bed to backyard. But as is often the case, there’s a grownup lesson hiding inside a childlike behavior pattern: if we’re ever going to go back to working in offices and in-person everything, we’d be a lot happier if we carried around grubby pieces of cloth to sniff so we don’t yell at the coworker who once again scheduled a meeting for something that could’ve been accomplished in an email.
Just kidding. What Pappy symbolizes is Grace’s ability to self-regulate her emotions. That lovey has gotten her through tantrums and tears. It’s helped her to have something physical to hold onto when her emotions are hard to grasp. If more of us adults had developed healthy practices for emotional management, we might not need quite so many 12-step groups, therapists, or lawyers. Does it make me wince every time Grace puts something over her face that’s also been on the front porch and the bathroom floor? Every time. But is self-regulating negative emotions better than an outburst, repression, or being passive-aggressive? I think so.
Nate: I wanted to call this episode sniffing Pappy, choosing happy, but Laura shot that one down. In an article about learned optimism, Dr. Hannah England writes that “those who develop the ability to see the world from a positive point of view can reap significant benefits including improved health, lower stress levels, increased career success, and even a longer lifespan.”
And she says that even if we’re glass half empty kind of people, we can learn to be happier by choosing to anchor our experiences to things that bring us delight and joy . . . things like Pappy. We saw this truth play out in real life in our two-part episode “A Better Age,” where we heard from people in their 50’s, 60’s, 70’s, 80’s, and 90’s. The big takeaway from those conversations was that happiness didn’t come from having an easy life; there was plenty of heartache and loss in their stories. But all of them had learned to make a habit out of focusing on the good things around them.
So whether your happiness comes from a dirty lovey like Pappy or a daily practice of meditation or prayer or simply stopping to count your breaths for a single minute, happiness is something we can all grasp if we’re willing to choose it.
Secret #4: Happiness needs a party
Laura: A few weeks ago during our parent-teacher conference with Maestra Romero, Grace’s 2nd grade teacher told us that before February was even over, Grace had been coming to school with a very specific concern, which she shared during circle time each morning. Day after day, she said she was concerned because her brother’s birthday was coming up and she didn’t know if her parents were even planning a party.
We were, and also this was at least five weeks before Gabe’s birthday. But learning about that moment after the fact made us realize just how much our daughter loves a good party. Long before the actual party that Gabe had barely thought about, Grace had plans for the food, party activities, and guest list. She was impressively good at thinking through every detail, maybe because she’d just done that same thinking for her sister’s birthday in February.
Nate: With Mattea in February, Gabe in March, and Grace and Laura in April, the first quarter of the year is one long ultramarathon of birthday anticipation around our house, which some of us find . . . a little tiring.
Laura: But once again, Grace’s default is set toward happy living. In a story for Psychology Today, psychologist and professor Lynn Zubernis says that anticipation of something good releases dopamine, that feel-good brain chemical that makes us feel happier. And even more interesting, there’s also value in planning and anticipation, even if those things end up not working out.
MRI studies show that anticipation correlates with higher brain activation and better well-being. (The study did not say whether this dopamine got canceled out if an exasperated parent responded with irritation at being asked about a distant birthday for the twenty-third time.)
Nate: So Grace, I apologize for some of my grumpiness around all of the birthday planning. And yes, let’s get talking about theme colors for your party in a few weeks, and for my birthday in October! And a quick note if you’re listening and wind up on the guest list — wear something pink.
Secret number five: Happiness can be worn.
Laura: I’ve shared in some of our recent episodes “Dancing Saved My Life” and “Finding the Fuego” that I’ve been finding a lot of joy in dancing with Making Waves Studios, a zumba, yoga, and meditation studio that offers classes both online and in-person. One of the best parts of my week is when Grace goes to the Saturday morning class with me, which is held right down the street from our house.
But she didn’t always want to join me. In the beginning, I had to convince her that it would be fun even if she didn’t know the dance steps. There might have been some bribing with gummy bears involved. It wasn’t until she spotted me putting on lipstick one morning that everything changed.
“Can I put on some?” she asked eagerly.
I didn’t answer her right away. When I was her age, makeup was a long way off, something I wasn’t allowed to wear until I was 13, which was also the age when I was allowed to get my ears pierced. I respect the boundaries my parents set in these areas, and in general I agree that Grace is way too young for makeup, but on this one occasion, I said yes.
“But only for this class,” I said sternly. She nodded, eyes shining and her newly-pinked lips smiling like she had just been queened.
It was a turning point, not just in convincing her to come dance with me, but in our connection. She knew I was letting her in on something special, and that something came to signify not just the grown-up feeling she got from wearing lipstick, but the time she and I got to spend together, first running the four blocks from our house to the studio, and then dancing beside each other for the next hour. It’s a little reminder that happiness isn’t just something we choose; it’s something we can put on and wear. Maybe it’s that favorite shirt that makes us feel confident, or the up-do that we learned on YouTube that makes our bed head look classy.
Psychologist De’Von Patterson gives a name to this experience: stimulus control. It’s when we give ourselves specific cues, which serve as a stimulus control for specific behaviors or feelings, like, say, happiness. He writes, “Some people may have an easier time being productive if they recreate the cues associated with their productivity. If they’re getting dressed, that puts them in the mindset to work or study.”
In this time of fewer external cues, when many of us can still get away with spending our workday in pajamas, there’s something to be said for creating those cues, whether it’s for better work, or just for feeling a little bit happier in the moment. So OK Grace — gloss away! Just not every day.
Secret #6: Happiness is a musical.
Laura: For years, we’ve been able to track Grace’s location around the house by whatever song she’s warbling:
First it was Frozen: “Let it go! Let it go!” (Sorry/not sorry)
Then Frozen 2: “Into the un-KNOooo-wn!”
Then West Side Story: Puerto Rico, my heart’s devotion . . .
Then The Greatest Showman “Ne-ver be e-nuuuuuff…”
Then Encanto: “We don’t talk about Bru-no, no no . . .”
I can mostly blame this one on myself. I was raised on musicals, and I’ve taken it upon myself to raise my kids that way too, though admittedly sometimes this backfires, as they haven’t all aged equally. #MusicManMeToo, anyone?
I’ve been a singer all my life, on stage and off. My first solo was on stage at church, where I sang “I am a promise” in front of five hundred grownups before I was Grace’s age. In college, I sang in an a cappella group. I was the roommate who sang in the shower, who was as likely to be singing and playing guitar as I was studying or hanging out with friends.
And yet it’s only been recently, when I’ve heard Grace belting out her solos with impressive gusto that I remembered how happy music used to make me, and singing in particular. Somewhere in the busyness and stress of adulting, I’d forgotten that, and done it less and less. Grace knows this secret to happiness by heart.
An NCBI study found that even for cancer patients, singing can improve mood and lower stress, cortisol, cytokine and neuropeptide activity. In other words, it can make us happier.
{Singing} So whatever you think of musicals, life is actually better when you’re living in one.
Secret #7: Happiness needs a mommy (& sometimes that mommy is us)
Laura: Before I became a mom, I used to worry that I lacked whatever maternal instinct chromosome every woman I knew had. I never had the baby bug (and still don’t), and even as a kid, no amount of money could make me enjoy babysitting. Thankfully, this has not stopped me from loving my children, and I try to make up in snuggle time or quality conversation what I lack in enthusiasm over early childhood development.
But looking at Grace, I’m inclined to think that the motherly instinct skipped a generation. Even though she was not yet three when her baby sister was born, Grace immediately established herself as “the other mommy,” a title she still carries today. Mattéa liked me just fine, but certain tears could only be comforted by Grace. I’ll never forget Grace’s first day of kindergarten, when I’d asked a friend to walk her inside while I parked the car since we were running late and Mattéa was with me. The minute Grace said goodbye, Mattéa started wailing, “mommy!” “I’m right here, Sweetie,” I said, reaching back to her carseat from the driver’s seat.
“Not you,” she said without missing a beat. “The other mommy.”
Nate: The caregiving theme continues today. No baby left unheld! Could be Grace’s motto. If there is a baby to be held and played with, she’ll find it. And remarkably, babies seem to know she can be trusted. They calm in her arms, instantly aware that they’re with a veteran other mommy.
Laura: And as usual, there’s a life lesson for us older folks here: studies show that people who perform more daily acts of kindness and help others are less likely to feel stressed, and those same people reported more stress and negativity on the days when they weren’t able to help others. Maybe that’s because when we go out of our way to help others and extend kindness to them, it gets our minds off our own problems.
So whether it’s holding babies or giving up your seat to someone who is going to have one, let’s take a note from Grace and learn how to give some love to those around us.
Secret #8: Happiness uncovers what’s hidden.
Nate: But let’s get back to our front yard and that poor camellia bush.
Seeing Grace perched in the newly-revealed branches brought into the open secret number eight: sometimes, happiness is uncovering what was hidden. Sometimes that means a radical change: stopping and dealing with an obstacle in our life so we can have a clear path to the place we want to go.
Sometimes it means cutting back what was there so it can grow into a shape better suited to its surroundings. Sometimes it means removing branches to discover what’s essential underneath.
Which is not to say that uncovering, that change, is easy, or that there aren’t tradeoffs. It will be a while until the bush leafs out again and no longer looks like a knobbly skeleton. The ugly water meter that used to be concealed under the camellia’s lower branches is now clearly visible.
But even I have to admit that this change—like the changes we’re making here at Shelter in Place—is ultimately a change for the good.
We can now walk straight from the car to the front door without contorting or snagging our clothes. Little by little, we’ve been pulling out overgrown plants with imbedded root systems and replacing them with more low maintenance and drought-tolerant succulents. Our yard is being restored to order. And perhaps best of all, we now have a daily reminder of all that Grace has to teach us about happiness, that sometimes the way to get there is simply by discovering a place that was just a part of the yard before, but now gives her a new way to see the world.
Laura: Through every episode, we’ve tried to be real about the struggle in a life that often feels overgrown or untended. We’ve shared these snapshots of our weed-filled yard and work-life imbalance because we hope that it makes you feel less alone in the moments when life feels capsized by overwhelm and overwork. We hope you’ve felt some solidarity in our stories, especially in those moments when the secret to your own happiness requires a little rage-pruning.
Whether or you’re new here or have been with us from the beginning, we’d love to hear what Shelter in Place has meant to you. You can find instructions on how to send us a voice memo for our season finale episode on our website, shelterinplacepodcast.org.
The music you heard in today’s episode was a special gift from lifelong friend Jake Amerding, who also knows that life is indeed better as a musical. His new album, where these songs came from, is coming out in May; you can find out more about Jake and every single study or bit of research we mentioned in today’s episode in our show notes at ShelterinPlacePodcast.org.
And as always, you can help make this work a little bit happier by leaving us a five-star review on Apple Podcasts, Podchaser, Goodpods, or any place that allows you to leave reviews. We’re so close to 200 reviews, and we’re hoping you’ll help us get there.