00:00 You’re listening to the live happier, longer podcast, episode 33.
00:15 Welcome to the live happier, longer podcast. We’re your hosts, Molly Watts and Angela McDade. We are here to help you build the habits, of a happier, longer life starting now.
00:28 Hey Angela. Hey Molly. How are Ya? I am well. Are you happy? I am. Excellent. I’m happy too. It turns out it’s a good thing. It is. We’ve long believed here in our work at five for life that happiness is important. There’s actual truth and science to the fact that it can add years to your life. Yes. And today we’re talking to someone who’s fairly well educated who agrees with us. Absolutely. We are talking to doctor Catherine Sanderson. She is a psychology professor at Amherst College, also received her degrees from Stanford and Princeton. Um, has written numerous articles and has a new book out called The Positive Shift. Yeah. Talking about how mindset actually influences happiness, health, and longevity. Yeah. So we just appreciated our conversation with her. Definitely share a lot, echos a lot of what we say. Yeah, absolutely. Here is our conversation with Doctor Catherine Sanderson.
01:27 Hi Catherine. Hi Catherine.
01:29 Hi, how are you?
01:30 Oh, we’re great. Thank you. Thanks so much for taking the time to speak with us today.
01:34 Happiness is important for all of us?
01:37 Surely is. And we were just so delighted that we could set this up with you. Obviously we’ve already discussed a little bit that our message, our shared message and our passion and, and getting this point across to people is, is very important. So we can’t wait to talk with you about your book and about your work with the science of happiness.
02:00 Great. Looking forward to our conversation.
02:02 So The Positive Shift, this is the book that you’ve just recently released and it really focuses on how mindset influences your happiness, your health, and just as, like what we’ve talked about, your longevity.
02:20 Yes. And, and I think what’s so important about this research, which is really a large body of research from biology, from psychology, from neuroscience, is that it suggests that there are lots of things that we all can do to experience more happiness, better health, and yes, live longer. There are things that we can do in our control.
02:43 I know that in your research or that are the research that you compiled, not, I don’t think it was all yours, but definitely our true, yeah. Yeah. Um, that it’s true that people are, some people are born with, I guess you want to call it the happiness gene or an more optimistic outlook that that’s actual true science.
03:15 Yes. And the reality is there are people who have a head start on finding happiness. They have a genetic predisposition. And I like to think of this as how we know that metabolism works, that there are some people who can eat whatever they want and they never gained any weight.
03:21 And they’re probably the happy ones too.
03:25 That would be a cruel irony.
03:30 Sorry, I digress.
03:33 But to other people that can eat whatever they want, and they never gain any weight. And for those people it’s very, very easy to stay fed and for other people, and I’m one of these people and maybe you are one of these people, um, you have to make deliberate choices about making sure that you exercise and make healthy choices in terms of eating because you actually can’t eat everything you want to eat all the time, or you will gain weight. Your metabolism just doesn’t work that way. I think of mindset and happiness in the same way.
04:02 Yeah, that’s a great way to look at it. You know, you work with what you’ve got, whatever that may be. Yes. And it’s, I, I’m definitely fall into the camp of the people that have to work at it. And I actually think I’m probably in the camp of the people that have to work at both, which is why our work with five for life and developing these habits has been so important. When you, when you looked at all this research and you looked at how mindset was so important and that you could actually influence your natural disposition to being happier. Um, what did you find were some things that were, that you could control that people can do?
04:40 So I think there’s two broad sets of things that the research points to that are within our control. One set of things are actually our thoughts. The way that we think about the world. There is a very strong tendency among those of us who are not sort of naturally predisposed to find that silver lining no matter what. There’s a natural tendency to sort of overplay things as being terribly awful of that then in reality or just kind of one of them minor annoyances of daily life. So people have a tendency to sort of catastrophize and to interpret things in their lives as being really, really horrible when in reality they’re just not that big a deal. And so I think part of it is that we need to adopt a more positive mindset when things don’t go our way. You know, when we have car trouble, uh, when we are, you know, get rejected from a job or you don’t have a blind date that doesn’t lead to a second date or whatever. So relatively minor stresses of daily life, it’s really important to kind of take those and shrug them off and not get kind of mired in your thoughts about how this is terrible and things are always going to be awful and so on. So one broad set of things are basically how you think about yourself and how you think about the world.
05:59 Yeah. And I think that’s, I, I, we’ve been doing, we’ve done shared a lot on our podcast about mindset and about thinking and thought work. And one of the things that I think is, has been so illuminating for me in that discussion is the fact that how I feel about circumstances that happen is really a result of my thoughts. It doesn’t, the circumstance itself didn’t cause the feeling. It’s how I think about the circumstances at hand that is creating the feeling. And I can literally dictate the way that I think and shift how I feel.
06:37 I love that example. And I think that’s actually a very common myth that you described, right? That then, yeah, if the idea that your reaction is just the only reaction a person could have, right. It’s you and you should write this is just the reality instead of being of the say, wait, is this the reality or is this my choice and how I’m thinking about this as the reality.
07:03 Yeah. Right. And, and that’s certainly um, everybody that that is working on mindset and really mindful of that discussion. I think that’s the power right there is being able to choose your thoughts that way. And even taking that step to realize that you can choose that. That’s the first step. Yeah. Being self-aware, being aware of that. You’re thinking. Yeah. So, okay, so that was the first, the first overall balloon was, was really the thought that you can, you can work on what was, what was the number two, the number, the second biggest one.
07:37 And then the second biggest one is of how you spend your time. So basically your behaviors, and again, people often I think have the beliefs that happiness comes to them, you know, like magic, right? And you know, oh well it’ll come, you know, when I get married or when I buy a new house or when I win the lottery or when I retire or you know, whatever it is. As opposed to thinking that happiness actually is within your control in terms of how you spend your time. And there are very simple behaviors that people can engage in that we know empirical research shows makes you feel happier. So people often spend their time and energy in ways that the science really doesn’t show is going to pay off. And we also like we have choice about our thoughts. We have choice about our behaviors and what we do.
08:32 Absolutely. Absolutely. So, so what were some of the, the main actions are the main activities that you found that have the empirical research that help people become happier, have more optimism?
08:46 I want to start by saying that I’m going to list a few and reason I’m going to list a few is that happiness is also not one size all. Yeah. So some of the things people might be like, ah, that doesn’t really make me happy. And so what’s important and what I try to lay out in the book is that Hey, there’s a lot of different things that we know. Scientific Research makes people feel happy and you have to find the, you know, two or three that really speak to you. So I just want to be clear about that and that it’s not, here’s the answer. So for many people, spending time in nature feels really good and that can be literally going for a walk outside. It can be looking at a window at a pretty view. It can be having house plants, it can be having a bird feeder outside your window. I mean there can be lots of different ways in which we gain exposure to nature. But research as very consistently shown that people who have exposure to nature, who spend time in nature feel better psychologically, they feel more alert and more creative mentally and they experience better health. So things like lower levels of cortisol, a hormone that measures stress, lower blood pressure and so on. So for many people, spending time in nature is a really big one.
10:09 Yeah, that’s a fantastic, it’s a fantastic example and a great suggestion. I think that we’ve seen many, many articles and things that studies that support that and for not only just mental health but also physical health as well. So yeah, there’s, there’s, there’s compound effect there.
10:31 Absolutely. And that’s really important to remember, right? Because we know that psychological health and physical health are correlated, that those spending time in nature is one that you sort of get benefits on both dimensions.
10:43 Yeah, absolutely. Okay, so give us another one.
10:47 Yeah, another one. Doing things for other people, uh, giving and, and this I love because even within this category, so many different things count. So people who volunteer in their communities have higher levels of happiness. People who donate to charity, higher levels of happiness will, who do a random act of kindness. And that could be, I’m gonna, you know, bring donuts to the office. I’m going to pay for the persons meal, you know, uh, behind me in the drive through line, I’m going to donate blood. You know, any of those things. I’m going to help a mom with her stroller getting on an airplane. I mean, literally anything that is an act of kindness for scales. And as you can see, those can be, you know, spending time, they can be spending money, they can be long term sustained volunteers and that they can be just doing a, you know, as simple act of kindness for us. Stranger, you know, who’s having a bad day or something. It can be letting a car merge in front of you. I mean, so any small little act of random kindness actually makes us feel better.
12:00 Our daily action, number three, we call it, we say that one is share and we talk about it in terms of sharing yourself and your life with your time and your time with your family, friends. And the, and the community around you and it’s all on that same and it is, there is actual science behind that to back it up as to not only improving the overall quality of your life, but also, uh, has been proven to increase longevity as well. So it’s like there are, you know, good things to good things happen when you share your world. Share yourself with the world whether and that volunteering and that sense of purpose and giving to, in sharing yourself or giving to other people is definitely proven.
12:52 It is absolutely proven, as you’ve said, for both physical and psychological wellbeing, even longevity. And, and the other thing that I really liked about this one is that many of the act here can be very small. They don’t have to be, you know, giant, you know, name a hospital with my million dollar contribution, you know, or something. Or you know, just like the Peace Corps, they can be very, very small acts that, that make people feel happy. It could be, you know, spending thanksgiving, you know, working in, um, a soup kitchen. My mother in law who’s no longer alive, but my mother in law always did that on Thanksgiving and it just brought her tremendous meaning to be spending that day of thanks doing things for other people. So it was, you know, one morning a year, but it brought her great happiness. I think many people have, you know, other traditions within their family, whether that could be a, you know, donating blood regularly, whether that be, you know, helping maybe a senior citizen neighbor or something. My son, when he was really quite little, you know, seven or eight would you to love shoveling our driveway. We live in Massachusetts, so that’s uh, you know, um, it comes in to play a lot during the winter and the woman who lived across from us was in a wheelchair and Andrew just got very excited again because he loves shoveling the snow. But he would go over in the morning and he would also shovel her walkway and her driveway and it brought him just tremendous happiness. It made him feel really great.
14:22 And I think that’s the, that is the key point of that. It can be something simple. Like if you’re in the grocery store and somebody can reach something from the shelf, that’s a huge frustration to them. And it’s something you can do with very little effort. But just by doing it, you feel good. They feel good and it’s, it’s free. Stuff like that is free, you know?
14:48 Right. Well, I mean even, you know, frankly, the act of smiling, so the act of smiling at somebody else is totally free. Yeah. Takes the same amount of time is frowning or having a neutral expression and just the act of smiling at somebody, uh, makes you feel good and makes them feel good and sort of spread that good feeling around
15:09 and isn’t there? I think that there’s actual physiological things that happen in your body when you smile. Yeah.
15:15 Yeah. One of my favorite examples is that they did a super clever study in which, uh, they brought in people and had them hold chopsticks in their teeth in one of three facial expressions? Either a neutral expression, a slight smile or a big beaming smile. And then while you held the chopsticks in your teeth and one of these three facial expressions, you put your hand in a bucket of freezing cold ice water. And they just said keep it there until you can’t stand it anymore. Uh, and what they found was that people with the big beaming smile kept their hand in the water longer and they didn’t show the same level of heart rate reactivity because the neurological arousal as other people. So yes, the mere act of smiling changed how your body responded to pain.
16:05 Yeah. And that, that stuff like that is absolutely fascinating. It is. Well that’s just the, it’s the brain at work. Right. And the brain is so incredibly powerful. I’m sure as a professor in psychology, you have no lack of appreciation for the brain itself.
16:23 Well, and, and the reality is that we’re learning so much more than we did for example, 10 years ago or 15 years ago about this because we just didn’t have ways of testing it right now with a new techniques in terms of, you know, MRI testing, etc.. We actually have a much better understanding of what’s going on at a neurological level that we just didn’t have in the earlier research on positive psychology.
16:48 Yeah, we talk about that. Um, here and we’ve talked about it on the podcast. We’ve shared it with some in retirement communities that we’ve spoken to the fact that it wasn’t until after the two thousands that neuroscientist actually understood that the brain keeps developing neural pathways and synapses right up until the end. And for a long time we thought that that the brain’s growth was finite and that it stopped at a certain point in time. And that’s, that’s pretty recent. I mean, you know what I’m saying? In the course of of study, uh, just something that’s happened since the 2000. It’s just like you said, that the things that we’re being able to find and learn through neuroscience about the brain, it’s just really, and we’re really still, I think at the tip of the iceberg.
17:31 Well, and frankly the same thing as we as we talked a few minutes ago about the role of genetics. You know, that’s another thing that the idea that happiness couldn’t make it coded in your genes, that’s also, that’s another example of something that we, that we’re going to keep, I mean, imagine 10 years from now, what’s our conversation?
17:53 Right? Yeah. Well and it’s super important that, I mean, the reason that we, we talk about it too, it’s, it’s this population, our population is aging at a faster rate. You know, the, the baby boomers are going to hit the year or 10,000 a day are turning 65 and up until the year 2030, that’s going to be the case. And when that happens, after the year 2030, we will be facing a, a population in the the world. Not only just the United States, but the world that really is for the first time in history, uh, has such an a base in older people. And so being able to impact mindset as people age is so fundamentally important.
18:36 It is. And it’s a really good example of how there are things that people may need to especially do as they age. Because as you age, there’s an increased risk of experiencing health problems. It frankly experiencing loss that as you are alive longer, there’s a better chance for adverse events to happen. And so this ability to call into play some essential strategies for changing your thoughts, your mindset, changing your behavior is particularly important for people who may be struggling with some, you know, negative aspects of their life in some way.
19:14 And, and, and of course, and it isn’t limited to people as they age. You know, we say all the time, our five daily actions, there’s never a, you’re never too young to start. You’re never too old to start either. You can really take action on your mindset and creating this happier outlook anytime. Yeah. And that the younger you do it, the better right, the better you get at practicing and it becoming just a natural way of life for you.
19:44 I have a son who’s a sophomore in college and he is in the process of reading my book and periodically he calls me and he’ll say, that was so helpful for me to think about because you know, I’ve really been, you know, feeling sad about my dating relationship being over. But then I was thinking that really I can think about it as a learning experience and an opportunity to date new people. And it’s, and it’s such an example of how we often do not understand how much control we have over how we conceptualize, how we frame things. And yes, if we can establish a positive habit of thinking and behavior in our 20s or 30s, it will pay off for the rest of our lives.
20:29 For sure. Yeah. Again, you can choose to develop this, this habit, this mindset, and take those not only work on the thoughts, but create the actions as well. So it’s, it’s up to you. It’s your, it’s in your hands. And, uh, no matter what age you are, start off younger, get ahead, get the benefit for longer. But even people in their, you know, midlife and older can do this work, they can do these things and they will see immediate benefits and long term benefits.
21:06 Yes. Now I want to be clear, and this is, you know, a thing that I get asked a lot. You know, when people who come to hear me talk or read the book, that I think it’s important to, to be clear that for some people it takes practice to develop new changes as with anything. So for those of us who don’t naturally find the silver lining, it’s not as easy as saying, okay, I’m just going to focus on the positive. Um, but if we work at it over time, it becomes more of a natural habit that we can actually shift how we think and how we behave. For some people, that’s going to take a little bit more efforts to adopt these new habits. But yes, absolutely. Over time, no matter our age, no matter our predisposition, we can all do things that increase our happiness.
21:56 Yeah. And that for us, that is their biggest, uh, our biggest thing is to create these habits and the only way to create them is to keep doing it and practice and, and then, and then it becomes a more natural situation, right. Repetition and practice. But it definitely takes it just as you said, it’s going to take some people longer. It’s going to be, uh, go against your natural grain for, for some people. But that doesn’t mean it’s impossible. And I know that you agreed this is, it’s important work, right? It’s important not only because being a happier and more optimistic person feels better right away, but it has been proven to increase longevity.
22:40 Yes. And I’m 50 right now and I really spent a lot of my twenties, a lot of my 30, some of my forties. um being really anxious, being really anxious, worrying about tons of things that were really, really not important. And I wish that I had adopted all of these strategies earlier because yeah, it’s just a, it’s a more pleasant way to live. So in the more pleasant way to enjoy your moment to moment life. And it also has been shown to mean that we can in some cases at least live longer.
23:18 Yeah. Yeah. But also it means that your, your whole life, you know the people, you’re around. If you’re constantly worrying about things and fretting about things and anything that happens is a big drama and it’s just constant angst around you, people aren’t, aren’t gonna be happy to be around you. So if you can try and, you know, kind of get a more level tone on that, then you know, the payoff for people are around you and then the interaction you then get with other people and like your overall relationships are going to improve, which has the knock on effect of having a happier life as well. So it all, you know, all kind of ties in, in so many levels to meet your life at generally more happier life.
24:15 Well absolutely. And you’ve actually raised, another really important point is that one of the very consistent findings in literature is that the best predictor of our happiness is in fact the quality of our relationships. So if we can become, you know, a more pleasant person, a more optimistic person, a person who’s easier to be around and not take everything as a giant drama. It also means that we can have stronger, healthier relationships, which in fact again, are linked with better psychological and physical wellbeing. So that’s also a way in which it really is very cyclic.
24:54 Yes. Yeah, for sure. So we got off or went on to our other paths here, of course, as we do is we typically do, but come back to, or tell us more about the actions that I think that I remember in another talk that you did. And it certainly mirrors something that we’ve heard and learned is gratitude and expressing gratitude as an actionable habit..
25:19 Yes, absolutely. And that means two things. So one, it means expressing gratitude towards other people. So saying thank you. Uh writing letters. Uh, I describe in my book about a wonderful English teacher I had in seventh and eighth grade and how I neglected to write him a letter telling him how much he meant to me and how thankful I was for his role in shaping me as a writer. That that really of course is created my career. And I only expressed my gratitude for what he’d done to his widow after I learned that she had died, that he had died. And, and so I think one of the things is that it’s really important to reflect on people who have played a major role in our lives and to express outward to people when we appreciate what they’ve done for us at a personal level or at a professional level.
26:14 You know, that’s just an extremely important part of expressing our gratitude outward to other people. It really kind of falls into the random act of kindness thing, you know, saying thank you, but in a broader way. But the other really important aspect of gratitude is to be thankful for what we have in our lives. And we often spend a lot of time and energy thinking, well, you know, I would be happier, or you know, if I had more money or you know, if I had a bigger house or a nicer car or you know, whatever it is, job, you know, etc. But the reality is there’s so many things that we can be grateful for every single day. And that could be, you know, it Oh, it’s finally getting warm enough in Massachusetts and I can go for a walk outside. Um, that could be, you know, spending time having coffee with a dear friend. It could be sitting at night drinking a great glass of wine and looking at a sunset. And so thinking about the small moments of life and focusing on what you are grateful for in your life right now is also really important.
27:17 Yeah, and again, backed by science. We talk a lot about, you know, some of this stuff, people hear it and they’re kind of like, oh, that’s just, woo woo, good. You know, good feelings stuff. Right. And it’s not. It’s of course, if it’s, it sounds so great to be grateful for the sunrise, you know, this kind of thing that that’s what they hear us saying. But the fact of the matter is that if you can become more mindful and focus on gratitude on a daily basis and find gratitude in those small moments in those small times, it’s again backed by science that you will improve your overall quality of life, your happiness. And again, it’s been linked to longevity as well.
27:58 Yes. That reminds me that I, um, rhetoric, a review of this book online by somebody, well, I’m sure as a really thoughtful, smart person, but the person said something like, I really enjoyed the book. Um, even though there was a lot of discussion of like scientific research and studies or something like that. And it was, it was such a funny comment because I feel like many times people read, uh, you know, sort of help, self-help kind of book and it’s like the author has, you know, an epiphany or you know, some personal like theory or you know, awakening. Right. You know, you know, big thing and it sort of like this happened to me, you should try it. And to be honest, uh, this book is all about science, right? None of it is like my idea, like none of it is my idea. Right? Yeah. It’s really my synthesis of lots and lots of empirical scientific, scientific data across like psychology, biology and neuroscience and you know, economics. It, none of it is my idea. And, and that’s, you know, again, with, with my background, with my training, I’m not particularly interested in hearing, you know, some random person’s idea of something that worked for them. I want to know what the science tells us. We can be happier and healthier and I focus on trying to convey that.
29:20 Yeah. And we are exactly on the same page. Like this is great to hear, Oh, if you do this, this great result will happen. But we are constantly, but why? But why does it happen? You know, I mean it is good for somebody to say, oh do this, it’s great. But to know exactly the, the effect that it has on your body and why you feel good about it and you know, and everything how old acts, you know, and the, the big, the big picture is for me it actually important for some people it may not be but, but we have found that the more we have looked, kinda like what you said, the synthesis of all the information that’s out there to be able to pull so much fabulous information from people who have spent a long, long time studying this stuff to be able for us to read a thing and go, ah, it’s, it’s quite wonderful too to have that information all at our fingertips. And I personally am not, I mean so much like you, I’m I, I’ll assume Catherine that, I mean I’m not a naturally woo woo person like it doesn’t like that kind of thing doesn’t really appeal to me. The science appeals, to me, the, and the and that stuff appeals to me so much more. So I, I, our review would be completely different. I’m obviously, but it’s nice to know that it’s in this instance and what I think is so important about that is that happiness is an important, and optimism. I kind of look at them as, you know, kind of commingled yeah. That they are important markers scientifically for not only how long you might live, but also the quality of your life. So that’s something to understand and take and take, hold of and understand that this conversation about happiness is important.
31:27 It is, it is really important because as you know, it’s not only what do we feel and the quality of our life, our happiness, but it is actually associated as well with our health, our physical wellbeing and even how long we live. And that’s why I think the power of understanding what all this research tells us is that the research in and of itself is interesting, but it’s also really important at a practical level because we now know you’re not just stuck in the way that you’ve always thought or the patterns that you developed. And, and that’s true for happiness. And, and negative thinking. But it’s also true for acts of, you know, starting to engage in exercise or to meditate or you know, to express gratitude or other things that there’s so much that we do control and we have to just decide that it’s important to us and that we’re willing to do those things.
32:27 I’ve inwardly kind of chuckled or looked at the world and thought so many of us focus on how to be more productive, how to be more, you know, how to get further ahead, all these kinds of things. And so many people don’t want to take the time to actually look at their overall happiness and how, and their longevity and they just assume, I mean that, you know, they can go on along and, and not, uh, tend to their emotional wellbeing and that it’s going to be okay in the end. And, and really it’s, it’s quite the opposite. Productivity is probably not going to get you anywhere in the long run, but actually focusing on your happiness and your optimism might.
33:12 That point is brought home to me almost every day. I have a son who is a senior in high school, so you know, waiting to figure out where he’s going to be going to college and stuff. And so many of his peers and his friends parents are so worried about, oh you know, where are they going to get in? And this is, you know, a a life or death, you know, this admission decision, you know, set you want a course of happiness or not. And the reality is where you go to college does not determine your level of happiness. And, and I always used to just sort of chuckle when people really think about it as being this life or death thing because the reality is that there are people who are happy and all sorts of settings at all sorts of schools who are happy and not in school and who are at wonderfully great prestigious institutions and aren’t happy and, and maybe they have focused their whole lives on, you know, being productive and being efficient and doing well in school. But ultimately at the end of the day, if you’ve achieved great success in your professional life and your academic life, but you’re not happy at the core, is that really a life that we would envy?
34:27 Right. And that that’s one of the things for our kids. Um, we always say, you know, making like colleges is first big decision that they’d really make, but the choose where they want to go. And we always said, well, you know, go figure it out. And if it’s not for you, there’s nothing set in stone, you’re not stuck there forever. If it doesn’t work out and you want to change a to your course or the school or what there’s, there’s nothing is absolutely set in stone. So you know, nothing is final. You can make choices and change. Yeah. And that’s true. Whether it’s your college or your career or your, you know, your qualification or whatever or whatever it is. Or if you’re not, if you’re, if you’re struggling with your, your mindset, if you’re struggling with how you feel you can, you can take action.
35:25 And different people may feel ready for college at different times. My oldest child actually took a year off before going to college and spent the year working in Peru and it was a really important life changing experience for him and he just really kind of needed some time to learn and, and grow and mature a little bit. And it was a wonderful experience for him and has made him in fact far more successful in college. But he just was not really ready to go as a young 18 year olds. He needed some more time and a lot of people said, oh well, you know, he’s going to kind of get behind. He’s going to be a year behind. And I’m like a year behind what?
36:04 Yeah, exactly.
36:09 Right. It’s not a race.
36:12 Yeah. And again, that’s back to a mindset. Like people just think you have to, you have to do this. This is the course must do. You go to school, you then go to college. And, and it doesn’t have to be like that. There’s nothing, as I said, there’s nothing set in stone. Well and it’s, it’s, that’s again, I think indicative of a culture that has very much highly prized, you know, accomplishments and career advancements and, and sort of put overall happiness on the back burner. And I think we probably as a society suffer for it, um, both in our health and in our mental health as well.
36:51 Yeah, I gotta be honest. It’s really sad to me how little focus there is on happiness. I don’t even see it as a question. I mean, people, you know, say, well, you know, what do you want to be when you grow up? Or, you know, where do you want to live or whatever. That there’s just very, very little focused on, on the goal of even being happy. And, and, and one of the reasons I love this conversation and I love what you all are doing with your podcast is that getting happiness out there so that we’re talking about it as a priority, as a goal, as something meaningful and not just sort of like silly or luxurious is, is really, really important.
37:33 Yeah. And uh, fundamentally, like I said, we’re all about creating that longer life and that happier life and understanding that it does not happen without a plan, without actions. And so your book and the overall lessons that we can learn from it in terms of both changing our thoughts and changing our actions are again, are equally as important. So we certainly appreciate what you are having to say and what you’re doing, obviously on a much larger scale than we’ve been doing yet here at five for life.
38:09 Well, well, here’s the thing, more happiness is good for all of us. It’s better for the world. So writing about it, talking about it, teaching about it, just getting it out there in the conversation. Frankly, lots of different ways creates a better world because we are all benefiting when people around us are happier. And that’s true in our, in our personal lives, but it’s also just if you know strangers are happier, it’s more acquaintances or happy if our work colleagues are happy. Happiness is good for all of us.
38:44 Absolutely. So tell us where, we will put all of this of course in our show notes, but if people want to find you, find your books and find your other work, where’s the easiest place for them to do that?
38:59 So I have a website, so my book, the positive shift is available, you know, I hope everywhere, Barnes and noble and independent bookstores and Amazon and so on, very easy to find. If people want to hear more about me, you can watch a video for free about my talk on unhappiness and the one on mindset and health, my website, which is to Andersonspeaking.com and I just really appreciate the opportunity to talk with you all and your listeners about things we all can do no matter where we start on that natural genetic lottery. There are things we can do to be happier and healthier and live longer. And thank you both for getting the word out there.
39:41 Awesome. Thanks so much for taking the time today. We really appreciate it. We will put that link in our show notes and again, just thank you Catherine for taking the time to talk with us.
39:50 Take care. Have a nice rest of your day. Thank you. Bye Bye.
39:56 Thanks for listening to the live happier, longer podcast. Now it’s time to move, learn, share, and let go. Five daily actions to make the rest of your life the best of your life. See you next week.
40:13 Okay, so just a quick word before you go, if you haven’t already clicked that subscribe button on our podcast. We would love you to do that and we would also appreciate any feedback you have for us. Positive ones would be excellent. What will take anything you have to say and for a free copy of the Five for life planner head to fiveforlifeplanner.com and download your free PDF today.
