How strong are your social connections? The science indicates strong social connections lead to life longevity.  

Transcript:

Welcome to Everyday Happiness where we create lasting happiness, in 2-ish minutes a day,  through my signature method of Intentional Margins® (creating harmony between your to-dos and your priorities), happiness science, and musings about life. 

I'm your host Katie Jefcoat and social connection is one of the greatest factors in determining long term happiness. Another would be optimism and you can see how those two go hand in hand.  

More than social connection determining fulfilled happiness, it’s also been linked to increased life expectancy, in fact, social scientists are discovering that social connection is as important as obesity, cholesterol, or smoking has on your life expectancy.  The science out of Harvard and other studies suggest that if you have meaningful social connections you have a higher likelihood of living longer.  

In a May 2019 CNN article. It mentioned “a recent review of 148 studies that found that people who are isolated face a 50% greater risk of premature death than those who have stronger social connections”.

Maybe this just seems like common sense, but it’s something that I am thinking about.  How strong are my social connections?  Am I investing in the people I love?  Am I creating deep meaningful relationships that will stand the test of time?  Am I part of a community that I enjoy, like a hobby group, church, networking groups, moms group?  All of those things matter when we are out in the world looking for social connection.  I invite you to contemplate where you would consider spending more quality time to enrich your social connections.  

Until next time, do us a favor and follow our Instagram feed @everydayhappinesswithkatie because we are about to share some exciting news and we don’t want you to miss it. 

Inspired by:  https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/hsph-in-the-news/active-social-life-longevity/ 

Get Everyday Happiness delivered to your inbox by subscribing at: https://www.katiejefcoat.com/happiness

And, let’s connect on social at @everydayhappinesswithkatie  and join the community on the hashtags #IntentionalMargins and #everydayhappinesswithkatie on Instagram

Links:  https://onamission.bio/everydayhappiness/

Happiness is persistence and if we can, like brushing our teeth, create some happiness hygiene habits, for even two-minutes a day, that work for us, we can boost our levels of long term happiness.  

Transcript:

Welcome to Everyday Happiness where we create lasting happiness, in 2-ish minutes a day,  through my signature method of Intentional Margins® (creating harmony between your to-dos and your priorities), happiness science, and musings about life. 

I'm your host Katie Jefcoat and let’s dig into why happiness habits are a daily practice. 

Shawn Achor in one of his talks, referring to a “rational optimism” the idea that optimism starts with a realistic assessment of the present, this calling it rational optimism, he explains that “optimism is a daily spiritual practice, and when we do it, we can transform this world.”

What this naturally leads us to is the idea that happiness is habitual.  We almost can’t get around it.  Achor’s research says that if you “ spend two minutes a day scanning the world for three new things you're grateful for. And do that for 21 days” you will boost your happiness. “The reason why that's powerful is you're training your brain to scan the world in a new pattern, you're scanning for positives, instead of scanning for threats.” and he says it’s the fastest way of teaching optimism.

When we practice daily gratitude, our brains are trained to scan the world for positivity.  “At positive, our productive energy rises by 31%. Our likelihood of promotion rises to 40%. Our intelligence rises significantly, our memory deepens and our social bonds become deeper so we feel connected to one another. We are sleeping better and our physical symptoms feel less acute and the same amount of stress in someone’s life when you are positive and grateful has a 23% drop in the negative effects of stress upon your life. Headaches, backaches, fatigue drop by 23% given the same level of stress.” This is Shawn Achor’s research and how extraordinary it is in proving why happiness matters.   

What this shows us is that happiness is persistence and if we can, like brushing our teeth, create some happiness hygiene habits, for even two-minutes a day, that work for us, we can boost our levels of long term happiness.  Whether that’s saying three new things we are truly grateful for each day, whether that’s saying something nice to someone else in gratitude, whether that’s sending a note in the mail, you get to choose your recipe for what feels aligned for you in those 2-minutes a day.    

This is magic.  This is like opening the doors, knowing you have the control and the tools to create optimism in your world.  Until next time, do us a favor and follow our Instagram feed @everydayhappinesswithkatie because we are about to share some exciting news and we don’t want you to miss it. 

Inspired by The Ten Percent Happier Podcast, Episode 156, with Shawn Achor.    

Get Everyday Happiness delivered to your inbox by subscribing at: https://www.katiejefcoat.com/happiness

And, let’s connect on social at @everydayhappinesswithkatie  and join the community on the hashtags #IntentionalMargins and #everydayhappinesswithkatie on Instagram

Links:  https://onamission.bio/everydayhappiness/

To-do lists are part of a lot of our lives.  But so often they are mismanaged and feel overwhelming.  Today we talk about getting back some control over the never ending to-do list.  

Transcript:

Welcome to Everyday Happiness where we create lasting happiness, in 2-ish minutes a day,  through my signature method of Intentional Margins® (creating harmony between your to-dos and your priorities), happiness science, and musings about life. 

I'm your host Katie Jefcoat and have you ever fallen into the trap where you look at your long to-do list and you realize it’s a lot of ideas and wants and not specifically have to-dos?  That’s when we know we need a revision.  Maybe you haven’t thought of it and when you look at your list today, you might be able to take some of the tips I am going to share and implement them today to free yourself of the guilt of never, ever, for even one day having a completed to-do list. 

First, I invite you to grab two pieces of paper if you hand write your to-do list and if not, get a blank WORD document and create two columns.  Tile them the short term mental parking lot and the long term mental parking lot.  Now you can decide what is short term and what is long term.  I usually say 2-4 weeks is short term and long term is more than 4 weeks.  Where, you are not actually going to complete that task, idea, thought, within the next month or so - but you don’t want to forget it. 

Once you have your columns, review your to-do list and start shifting your tasks.  This is so beneficial because it helps you identify what matters most, what is a priority and what needs your attention sooner.   Hopefully this also means you are creating space in your to-do list, so it doesn’t feel so overwhelming.  

I like to start every task with a verb.  Write the podcast episode. Review the draft.  Read the article.  Write and send the cards. 

Writer Jenée Desmond-Harris tweeted recently on how to divide your to-do list: 

She said "I started dividing my to-do list into 1) things I have to do, 2) things I want to do, and 3) things other people want me to do. Life changing! I often don’t get to #3 and I finally realized... this is what it means to have boundaries."

Source: Twitter

https://twitter.com/jdesmondharris/status/1408868731707555840

There are a million ways to tackle a to-do list, and when you find what works for you, it really can be magic.  Our to-do lists shouldn’t be a constant stressor.   

I like to choose 3 big things to complete in a day.  Everything else is gravy.  Some days, I just have one thing. That’s ok.  

Oftentimes we think we are machines, but in reality, when we have boundaries and some Intentional Margins we have a higher level of positivity which increases our productivity, lowers our stress and allows us to be more creative and better at problem solving.   

It can start with a well-managed to-do list that really is just the things we need to do.  I’m obsessed with to-do lists and how to organize them, so I would love to hear from you.  How do you organize your to-do list? Email me at [email protected] or DM me over on social @everydayhappinesswithkatie.   

Get Everyday Happiness delivered to your inbox by subscribing at: https://www.katiejefcoat.com/happiness

And, let’s connect on social at @everydayhappinesswithkatie  and join the community on the hashtags #IntentionalMargins and #everydayhappinesswithkatie on Instagram

Links:  https://onamission.bio/everydayhappiness/

What would happen, scientifically, if someone smiled at you?  Find out in today’s episode.  

Transcript:

Welcome to Everyday Happiness where we create lasting happiness, in 2-ish minutes a day,  through my signature method of Intentional Margins® (creating harmony between your to-dos and your priorities), happiness science, and musings about life. 

I'm your host Katie Jefcoat and let's talk about Dopamine - not only does it make us happier, but it turns on the learning centers of our brains, which magnifies our success and productivity. 

There is science around how a smile is contagious.  If you do a brain scan when you are smiling, small activations in your brain will show that you are smiling.  But if you stop smiling and the machine keeps scanning, but now, you are flashed a picture of someone smiling, all the little parts of your brain called mirror neurons will start to activate.  But you're not smiling.  But before your brain can register that you are not smiling and you are just looking at a photo of someone smiling, your brain drops a chemical called dopamine into your system that raises your level of happiness and your face moves into a smile before you can stop yourself.     

Your mirror neurons are always at work.  You notice this when someone in a room yawns and all of a sudden you feel fatigued and feel a yawn coming on.  Or one person coughs and pretty soon you hear all these coughs throughout a room.  

Not only do smiles spread, but feelings of stress, anxiousness, apprehensiveness, and nervousness will also spread. What we are learning in the research is that we can pick up stress and negativity the same way we can pick up second hand smoke.  

What we know is that we are influencing people all the time. With these mirror neurons we can create a positive behavioral change and watch it ripple out into the world around us and into other people’s brains toward a positive mindset.    

This proves that a simple smile can give you a boost of dopamine and when shared, can give others the same boost.   

Inspired by:  Shawn Achor on the Super Soul Podcast. 

Get Everyday Happiness delivered to your inbox by subscribing at: https://www.katiejefcoat.com/happiness

And, let’s connect on social at @everydayhappinesswithkatie  and join the community on the hashtags #IntentionalMargins and #everydayhappinesswithkatie on Instagram

Links:  https://onamission.bio/everydayhappiness/

How do we achieve a positive mindset when it’s so easy for our brains to defer to the negative?  That’s what we talk about on the show today.  

Transcript:

Welcome to Everyday Happiness where we create lasting happiness, in 2-ish minutes a day,  through my signature method of Intentional Margins® (creating harmony between your to-dos and your priorities), happiness science, and musings about life. 

I'm your host Katie Jefcoat and I was wondering why our brains are attracted to the negative. As a happiness curator and human who actually has negative and destructive thoughts, like all of us, I was curious why our brains are so easily attracted to the doom and gloom and what can we do about this.  After listening to Shawn Achor in his TEDTalk tell us that positivity is so incredibly beneficial, I went down the rabbit hole of trying to figure out why it feels so hard sometimes.  

It’s so much easier for our brains to go negative, it’s taking the easy way out. It turns out, this is literally how we were made. Our brain evolved to scan for problems and danger and it is skilled at finding problems when it looks. It’s how we survived as a species. Our brain was developed to keep us alive and this is how it worked.  If there was a threat, our brain would release flight or fight chemicals and this has been passed down to us through our DNA.   But now, we don’t need to be worried about a lion attacking us in our sleep.  But our brains don’t know that.  It is still scanning for negativity and risk, so that it will keep us alive.  

Our brains also create patterns. It’s why three minutes of negative news in the morning affects our day, even 8-hours later we are 27% more likely to report a negative day.  Shawn Achor says this negative news is transforming the course of our day and our society.  

What we know is that it is not the reality that shapes us but the lens we view the world through.  Shawn Achor says “Happiness does not stop us from change, it gives us the belief that change is actually possible.”  

To counterbalance this evolutionary trait,  we must intentionally create positivity circuits in our brains.  We must establish new patterns.  And over time, when done consistently, those patterns will start to become dominant.  It will be easier to see the patterns, to see the positivity even in the face of negativity.  

When we scan the world for gratitude and look for positivity each morning, our brains develop new neuro-connections and patterns that rewire our brains. So we are building our mental muscle to look for the positive and this is especially important when we are under stress, which is inevitable.  Your brain knows you have this exercise to scan for gratitude, so it knows it needs to collect data for it.  So it’s working in our favor.  That’s why it’s so important to do this now when you do not feel tremendous stress or negativity.   

What the science is finding is that happiness and gratitude is easier for some people, given their genes and their environment, but given the habit exercise of finding gratitude, you can move yourself from a pessimist to a low level optimist. 

When we find ourselves in a negative cycle, we can be intentional about looking for uplifting activities to pull ourselves out of a negative mindset.  This can be jumping jacks, a call to a friend, a walk outside.  Try to redirect your attention away from the negative thoughts and on to positive thoughts, positive memories.    

Another way is to savor positive moments.  This looks like paying extra attention to the positive moments and even remembering and re-living the moments later by journaling the small moments of a positive memory.  We want to store positive experiences in our long-term memory and one way to do that is to really savor the experience.  So when something good happens, take a moment to really focus on it.  Focus on the feeling you are experiencing and the happiness it evokes.   

Until next time, remember, kindness is contagious.  

Inspired by: https://www.hopetocope.com/shawn-achor-training-your-brain-to-choose-happiness/

and Shawn Achor on the Super Soul Podcast. 

Get Everyday Happiness delivered to your inbox by subscribing at: https://www.katiejefcoat.com/happiness

And, let’s connect on social at @everydayhappinesswithkatie  and join the community on the hashtags #IntentionalMargins and #everydayhappinesswithkatie on Instagram

Links:  https://onamission.bio/everydayhappiness/

We all want to crack the code right?  Just tell me what to do - that’s all I need to know.  When happiness expert Shawn Achor says he has the formula and he knows why we are getting it all wrong.  Listen in to find out how to achieve more happiness.   

Transcript:

Welcome to Everyday Happiness where we create lasting happiness, in 2-ish minutes a day,  through my signature method of Intentional Margins® (creating harmony between your to-dos and your priorities), happiness science, and musings about life. 

I'm your host Katie Jefcoat and Shawn Achor, a researcher, a world renowned happiness expert and New York Times best selling author says he has the formula for happiness, and what we’re likely doing, as a human race, is getting it completely backwards.  

Most people think the formula is that if you work hard, you will be successful and when you are successful, you will be happy.  Shawn Achor who has been to over 50 countries and studied happiness around the world says, we’ve got it all wrong.   He says this is scientifically backwards.

First, everytime your brain has success, you just change the goal post to something bigger.  You get good grades, now you have to get better grades.  You have 10,000 followers on Instagram, now you want 20,000.  We just keep moving the goalpost. And if happiness is on the other side of this goal, we’re always chasing it and never experiencing it.  Our brains never get there.  

Our brains actually work in the opposite order.  If we can raise our optimism, our positivity,  in the present, then our brains can enjoy what Shawn calls the happiness advantage.  

The happiness advantage is simple.  It is the theory that your brain at positive performs significantly better than it does at negative, neutral or stressed.  The research finds that at positive, your intelligence rises, your creativity rises, your energy levels rise.  

Achor’s findings indicate that our brains at positive are 31% more productive than if they are at negative, neutral or stressed.  You are 37% better at sales.  Doctors are 19% faster and more accurate in coming up with the correct diagnosis when their brains are positive.   

In fact, the research done by Sonjya Lyubomirsky found that at positive, people would enjoy better secure jobs, superior productivity, more resiliency, less burnout, less turnover, greater sales.   

So what this research says is that we can reverse the formula and if we can find a way to become positive in the present, then our brains can work with us, for us, to work more successfully. 

Tomorrow we are going to talk about why our brains end up in negative loops and why it’s so darn hard for some people to flip the script.  It’s easy to say “be more positive” but those are just words.   We’ll explore this more tomorrow. 

Inspired By:  The happy secret to better work | Shawn Achor

Get Everyday Happiness delivered to your inbox by subscribing at: https://www.katiejefcoat.com/happiness

And, let’s connect on social at @everydayhappinesswithkatie  and join the community on the hashtags #IntentionalMargins and #everydayhappinesswithkatie on Instagram

Links:  https://onamission.bio/everydayhappiness/

We all know watching the news doesn’t make us feel good, but does it scientifically matter for our well-being? Listen in to find out. 

Transcript:

Welcome to Everyday Happiness where we create lasting happiness, in 2-ish minutes a day,  through my signature method of Intentional Margins® (creating harmony between your to-dos and your priorities), happiness science, and musings about life. 

I'm your host Katie Jefcoat and the medical school syndrome is this idea that in medical school the very first year, you read through all of the disease and symptoms that could happen and suddenly you start to think you have them all.  It’s the way our brains work.    

When we turn on the TV news and it’s all negative, we start to think that the world is all negative, that the sky is falling.   We see that the majority of the information is not positive and our brains start to think that is the ratio between positive and negative in the world. 

What researchers have found is that as little as three minutes of negative news in the morning affects our day. Even 8-hours later we are 27% more likely to report a negative day.  Shawn Achor says this negative news is transforming the course of our day.  

What positive psychology scientists research and prove is that It’s not the reality that shapes us but the lens we view the world around us through.  

We’ve talked about this idea in a slightly different way on this podcast, behavior contagion, where birds of a feather flock together, when if the people you hang out with are happy, you are more likely to be happy.  

What we know is that you can trump your genes and your environment in just two-minutes a day by practicing daily happiness habits, like gratitude and random acts of kindness.  

Today is a short episode.  I invite you to reflect on what you consume and ask yourself if you are setting yourself up for a positive day.  And reflect on any changes you may want to consider.  If you’re open, I’d love to know what changes you want to make.  I’m over @everydayhappinesswithkatie on social.  You can also subscribe to get a daily recap of the episodes to read in your inbox over at www.katiejefcoat.com/happiness. 

Get Everyday Happiness delivered to your inbox by subscribing at: https://www.katiejefcoat.com/happiness

And, let’s connect on social at @everydayhappinesswithkatie  and join the community on the hashtags #IntentionalMargins and #everydayhappinesswithkatie on Instagram

Links:  https://onamission.bio/everydayhappiness/

Scientifically, a positive mindset can have a profound effect on job satisfaction, productivity and job promotion.  Learn the science behind this in today’s episode. 

Transcript:

Welcome to Everyday Happiness where we create lasting happiness, in 2-ish minutes a day,  through my signature method of Intentional Margins® (creating harmony between your to-dos and your priorities), happiness science, and musings about life. 

I'm your host Katie Jefcoat and Shawn Achor, happiness researcher and New York Times bestselling author, says that what we think is that our external world is predictive of our happiness.  But in reality, he says if he knows everything about our external world he can only predict about 10% of our long term happiness.     

He said 90% of our long term happiness is not predictive of our external world, our circumstances and surroundings, but how our brain processes the world around us.  

The lens we use to view the world is the most critical component of long term happiness in positive psychology research today.  

This is all to preface his research that job success at work is only 25% predictive of IQ.  That means that being smart only has a 25% impact on whether you are good at your job. 75% of job success is predictive of your optimism levels, your social support, and your ability to see stress as a challenge instead of a threat. 

That’s incredible right?  I think about kids going to college and all the stress they are under.  And those entry level jobs and the jobs at the tippy top in the C-Suite.  What we know is that we can rise to the level of success we’re after by how we view the world, how we treat others - if we have a positive social support system - and how we view stress.  

I heard not that long ago about a study.  Two researchers from Virginia found that when looking at climbing a mountain, when they asked people who were solo climbers how tall the mountain was, they overestimated its steepness by 10-20% as compared to climbers that would judge the same mountain standing next to the buddy they were climbing with.   

That shows you how successful teams can be in the workplace too.  It’s scientifically better, the work feels more manageable when you are working with someone else.  

So, can happiness make me more successful at work?  The research indicates it is a responding yes!   Until next time, remember, kindness is contagious, go out and spread some kindness today.  

Inspired By:  The happy secret to better work | Shawn Achor

Get Everyday Happiness delivered to your inbox by subscribing at: https://www.katiejefcoat.com/happiness

And, let’s connect on social at @everydayhappinesswithkatie  and join the community on the hashtags #IntentionalMargins and #everydayhappinesswithkatie on Instagram

Links:  https://onamission.bio/everydayhappiness/

A story about how kindness won a client sale over experience and knowledge. The power of a positive attitude.     

Transcript:

Welcome to Everyday Happiness, where we create lasting happiness and two-ish minutes today through my signature method of Intentional Margins®, creating harmony between your to-dos and your priorities, happiness, science and musings about life. 

I'm your host, Katie Jefcoat. And I wanted to let you in on an experience that happened to me just a couple of days ago.  I was going to a furniture store. I planned to go to this furniture store where I picked some stuff out online, and I wanted to place the order. I called this store and the person that answered the phone was Gidion, that was his name. And he was very helpful and felt a little bit newer-ish, but was definitely trying to point me in the right direction for some questions that I had about this furniture. 

He told me what his work hours were later in the week, and that I could come in at any time and place the order in person with him and then also look at a few things in the store. So of course, I did. And this is what happened. 

I go to the store. In the back of the showroom, there's a big round table with four stations that are diagonal from one another that are computer stations. He's at one of those. I go over, introduce myself, and we start talking about what kind of furniture I am looking for. And at about the same time, another designer sits down to my right. 

She is a little bit older than Gidion, maybe 10-20 years. And she clearly is a more established interior designer, you can tell, she has a little bit of a chip on her shoulder. She has a binder full of orders and papers and seems like she has an extensive customer list. She probably knows really what she's doing. When she sat down she wasn't super polite or nice. But that was fine. I was working with the person next to her. And I just let this evolve. About 30 minutes later, I'm still working with Gidion, and a customer comes into the store and is looking at rugs behind this table. 

She has with her, probably her four year-old toddler. And the toddler is if you can remember toddlers he was doing like a bear crawl kind of on the floor, just you know, he had a couple of toys and he was clearly just trying to entertain himself at his mother's feet while his mom was looking at rugs. And this designer turns around, and she says to this mother, I don't think that your kid should be on the floor. It's not safe. And the mother scooped up the toddler and they both went about their day. 

But it reminded me a little bit about what it means to be kind and how that matters in business. I could have easily made an effort to work with this more experienced interior designer. But instead, I chose to work with Gideon, because he was kind, because he was willing to learn, and because he was doing everything that he could to get the sale, to make me happy, to create a pleasurable buying experience. It just goes to show that whether you're experienced or not, kindness matters and in this case, kindness won out and all of my business is going to this person that hasn't been doing this very long, but is so grateful for the opportunity to have this order. So maybe when you're thinking about growing your own business, you will also think about how kindness matters. Until next time, remember kindness is contagious.

Get Everyday Happiness delivered to your inbox by subscribing at: https://www.katiejefcoat.com/happiness

And, let’s connect on social at @everydayhappinesswithkatie  and join the community on the hashtags #IntentionalMargins and #everydayhappinesswithkatie on Instagram

Links:  https://onamission.bio/everydayhappiness/

Today I share a conversation with my friend Jenna and what she does to create a happy physical space.  It’s a good one.   

Transcript:

Welcome to Everyday Happiness, where we create lasting happiness in two-ish minutes a day, through my signature method of Intentional Margins®, creating harmony between your to-dos and your priorities, happiness, science and musings about life. 

I'm your host, Katie Jefcoat, and I was talking to my friend, Jenna, about this series that I'm doing with you about physical space and clutter, and how that contributes to our happiness or unhappiness. She was all about it, I have to say she was actually really talking about some great ideas that she has that she does to create happiness in her physical space. 

She agreed that I could share them with you to inspire you to maybe think about this as you're creating your physical space. So she, like most of us, is all about no clutter in our space, and to really have our desk organized. She thinks that when your space is organized, your mind is calmer. And she talked about that a lot. We talked about it together. And I think she's right. I feel so much better. 

These are the things that she told me she does to help her physical space, not feel so overwhelming. First, she makes her bed every single morning. So making her bed makes everything seem calmer. Physical spaces, less cluttered, more tidy, such a good idea, right. And then she told me about this Maya Angelou doll that she has, it's a Barbie. It's a Maya Angelou Barbie. She has it at her desk. She works for a toy company. And so she has a lot of these kinds of trinkets at her desk. It makes her happy, because she knows Maya's story, Maya's achievements and it inspires her to continue to do the work that she does. 

I just thought that was so interesting to have this Maya Angelou doll, this Barbie doll that really inspires my friend, Jenna to continue to create all of this abundance and greatness in the world. So maybe there's something like that that you want to highlight. Once you dig out from all of the clutter and all of the piles of paper. I don't know. 

She also said that color matters to her. Her color is yellow, and she has yellow around her office and in her home office, because it makes her happy. The color makes her happy and that's enough for her. 

So I'm just curious if you have anything in your physical space that makes you happy and if you would share it with us. We're over @everydayhappinesswithkatie on social media and we can't wait to hear about your physical space.

Get Everyday Happiness delivered to your inbox by subscribing at: https://www.katiejefcoat.com/happiness

And, let’s connect on social at @everydayhappinesswithkatie  and join the community on the hashtags #IntentionalMargins and #everydayhappinesswithkatie on Instagram

Links:  https://onamission.bio/everydayhappiness/