SOMETIMES we all fall into the trap of thinking: “If only my house was bigger, my bank account was fuller and I was slimmer then I’d be really happy.”
That’s a lot of ifs.
And we all know deep down that none of those things guarantee happiness anyway.
Chasing contentedness is understandable, though – we want to enjoy our lives, plus research shows that happiness makes you live longer.
One study in the Social Science & Medicine journal, found that, compared to very happy people, the risk of death was 6% higher among those who considered themselves pretty happy – and 14% higher among those who were not happy.
Dr Rangan Chatterjee isn’t surprised.
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The presenter of BBC1’s Doctor In The House and host of podcast Feel Better, Live More, has spent 20 years getting to the root of his patients’ health and wellbeing woes.
According to Dr Chatterjee, around 80% of our problems – from back pain to liver cirrhosis – can be traced back to our modern lifestyles of poor diet, lack of sleep, stress and limited exercise.
He believes that helping people make small lifestyle changes can have a huge impact on health and wellbeing – and happiness is at the crux of it.
This is the message of his new book Happy Mind, Happy Life. “When you feel happier in your life, you naturally make better lifestyle choices,” he says.
“If you feel pretty content with the way things are, you’re unlikely to open a tub of ice cream every evening or drown your sorrows in booze.”
So how do we become happier, healthier humans?
Dr Chatterjee believes we’ve never been taught what happiness and mental wellbeing are or how they feel.
“Many of us think that happiness is out of our control – that it’s something that happens to us,” he says.
“But we can be the masters of our own happiness, once we learn that being happy is a skill.”
Understanding the difference between what Dr Chatterjee calls “core happiness” and “junk happiness” is crucial.
“Core happiness is not about bouncing out of bed every morning with a smile on your face, all sparkles and fairy dust.
“And it’s not that feeling when you’ve bought something new and you feel really good about it,” he explains.
“Core happiness is when we feel a sense of calm and control over our lives and we are being the person we truly want to be.
“But we can get waylaid, confusing core happiness with junk happiness.
“Junk happiness can come from scrolling Instagram for three hours, drinking alcohol, gambling, sex, online shopping and pornography.
“It might give us a quick hit of feeling better, but eventually it makes us feel worse.
“If the thought of an evening spent doing something makes you shrink inside, it’s probably junk happiness. Whereas if it lifts you up inside, it’s core happiness.”
Dr Chatterjee’s ultimate tool for increasing how happy you feel is to seek out “social friction”.
Friction sounds a lot like stress and strain, but he says it’s actually the perfect learning opportunity.
“Social friction is when you feel tension or triggered by someone else.
Let’s say you read an email that annoys you or someone barges in front of you at the till.
You might think: ‘How rude, I can’t believe they did that!’ and make yourself the victim, but that’s disempowering, because it means you will only feel good, or less bad, when that person behaves in a different way.
“This is a weak position to put yourself in, because your wellbeing, your feeling of calm and contentment, is then dependent on others,” says Dr Chatterjee.
“Instead, write a different story about the same situation.
“Say to yourself: ‘The tone is a bit off in that email, but I know that life’s pretty tough for that person at the moment and they probably wrote it in a rush.’”
This switch in perspective can be a source of strength. “It’s a very simple thing, but I promise it’s life-changing when you do this regularly, because you start to train yourself to choose the happy story in every situation.
“And it gets easier with time,” he says.
“Not only will this trick help you feel happier and calmer, but it will naturally make you more compassionate, too.”
You don’t need to put in hours of effort to boost your happiness quota. Instead, Dr Chatterjee swears by one daily habit, which he says is crucial to his health and happiness, and that’s: “To go on holiday every day.”
And don’t worry, you won’t need your passport!
“One of the big things holidays give us is perspective on our life.
“You’re on the plane and you suddenly get this big-picture view of your life, you can see how you get swept up in the minutiae,” he explains.
“But you can take a holiday from your life every day. You just don’t have to get on a plane to do it.
“It could be a 20-minute walk round the park, doing a jigsaw puzzle, painting, listening to or playing music, yoga, meditation or journalling – whatever you like doing that is purely for you and allows you to step out of your life and reflect on it is beneficial.”
For Dr Chatterjee, it’s a daily dose of solitude. “I wake up before my wife and kids, because I love to have 30-40 minutes to myself at the start of the day.
“I know I’m less productive, I’m more snappy and I’m not as good a father, husband or doctor on the days when I haven’t done that.
“That time-out is so important, because when you’re in the midst of stress and anxiety, you can’t think straight, as your emotional brain is ruling the roost, so you can’t make logical, rational decisions.”
And he’s living proof that it works.
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“I’m much happier now than I was five years ago,” he says.
“And because I keep applying these principles in my life, I’m hoping that in 10 years, I’ll be even happier than I am right now!”
