One day after 9/11, I would like to depart a bit from the sci­en­tific focus of this blog, and add some per­sonal reflec­tions on the “men­tal mus­cles” of Being Pos­i­tive and Appre­ci­a­tion, which is what we prob­a­bly need to sur­vive in times when we read of a new bomb­ing every day, still 5 years after the ter­ror­ist attack.

I remem­ber a few years ago when, over brunch, my good friend Rohit pro­posed that

Hap­pi­ness = Real­ity – Expec­ta­tions. (Play with it, and it grows. It is very powerful)

A few months later after this dis­cov­ery, at a pub­lic con­cert, while some friends were hav­ing a lively debate on this equa­tion, a nearby stranger pro­posed a nice refinement:

Hap­pi­ness = (Appre­ci­a­tion, of what we have, and can do) x ( Real­ity – Expectations)

Which is nicely phrased in the sen­tence I have read in a num­ber of places

We need Seren­ity to accept
the things that can­not be changed,
Courage to change the things
which should be changed,
and Wis­dom to dis­tin­guish
the one from the other.

Mahatma Gandhi encour­aged us to “Be the change you want to see in the world”.

The fact is that there is much good around us, and much more good of us can do. We don’t always see it this way, but it is a fact (if you doubt this, why don’t you do the Bas­ket­ball exper­i­ment in a pre­vi­ous post). We prob­a­bly would ben­e­fit from hav­ing eas­ier access to a CNN of Pos­i­tive News, of Kind Ges­tures, Unex­pected Gen­eros­ity, Magic Coin­ci­dences, Beau­ti­ful Growth.

Some con­stant sources of inspi­ra­tion, encour­age­ment, and Appreciation:

- Ashoka: Inno­va­tors for the Pub­lic, and their con­vic­tion that “Every­one is a changemaker”

- The Schwab Foun­da­tion for Social Entre­pre­neurs, that sup­ports amaz­ing and inspir­ing agents of change worldwide.

- Just read a review of socio­bi­ol­o­gist E.O. Wilson’s last book The Cre­ation: A Meet­ing of Sci­ence and Reli­gion, where he tries to bridge both worlds and focus them on com­mon ground.

No mat­ter our reli­gion, or lack thereof, we can ben­e­fit from what the book Daniel Goleman’s Destruc­tive Emo­tions: How Can We over­come Them pro­poses as “A Gym for Emo­tional Skills”. Neu­ro­sci­en­tist Anto­nio Dama­sio opened new ground in his sem­i­nal Descartes Error book on the role of emo­tions in our decision-making.

How can one train this mus­cle of Appre­ci­a­tion? well, no clin­i­cal stud­ies here, but my wife and I like to do, less often that we should, an exer­cise pro­posed by Jef­frey Brant­ley in Five Good Min­utes: 100 Morn­ing Prac­tices To Help You Stay Calm & Focused All Day Long:

First, travel back, in your mind’s eye, to a time when you felt a healthy exhaus­tion, and let you relive that moment as vividly as you can.

Then, remem­ber, re-experience, a lov­ing exchange that really touched you. Pause. See the moment. Smell it. Hear what hap­pened around you.

Next, visu­al­ize the most car­ing ges­ture you have ever received, as full of details as pos­si­ble. Who gave you that gift of car­ing. How you felt.

Now, travel to the most mag­nif­i­cent place you have seen. Enjoy the views. Pause. Lis­ten. Smile. Appreciate.

Good night

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