As a therapist, you might imagine, I have had many, many self-help books suggested to me. I have become more and more picky about what books I choose. The criteria I have come to use is that the author have something to back up what they are saying. The advice might sound great, but is there anything to back it up. When I find myself with a self-help book in my hand, I immediately flip to “About the author”. Is the author a professional in some capacity? As a person, what sort of credentials do they have to back up their claims? The second thing I look for is where did they come by their information? This can mean quite a bit more flipping, especially if you are looking for something that is not there. Usually if a book is backed by studies or empirical research, it will be easier to find. They will want you to know, “Hey! I didn’t just make this up!” The writing of professionals hailing from academia seemed to be much more steeped in scientific study, so I lean heavily in that direction. Former Harvard profession, Tal Ben-Shahar pointed out in his recently released DVD “Happiness 101” (which you can find at www.PBS.org) pointed out that the academics have the knowledge but have had little voice. He shared that the average academic journal is read by seven people. So, use these quick tips to cut through the clutter. Here are a few gems on the subject of Happiness I highly recommend. Click on the book to find out about buying the book or click on the author’s name to find out more about that particular author:

Authentic Happiness by Martin Seligman
The How of Happiness by Sonja Lyubomirsky
Positivity by Barbara Fredrickson
Happier by Tal Ben-Shahar
Stumbling on Happiness by Dan Gilbert

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Why aren’t we happier? There are a few reasons why people are not nearly as happy as they think they should be. One of these reasons is comparison. Here is a personal example. Everyone I knew had a cool new phone, so I wanted a cool new phone. So, I went to the phone store and found one that had lots and bells and whistles and gadgets and doohickeys! My techie geek glands kicked into gear and I started salivating and my eyes glazed over and I said “I want THAT one!” I was SO excited! I couldn’t wait to get it home and start playing with my new toy. Which had a very thick instruction booklet. In fact, here were online tutorials where I could learn how to use my brand new doohickey! There were so many thingybobs on my doohickey that before long I was frustrated. “I just want to make a call!” I shouted at the phone (though no one was listening). So, the phone was so complicated that it took me months before I had read enough of the instruction booklet, watched enough tutorials and called technical support enough that I felt comfortable even using the phone, let alone take pictures, E-mail with it and listen to my favorite music on it. The BEST feeling I had about that phone was in the store! So, what I thought was going to make me happy, didn’t! Before I go on, think about YOU. Think about your own life. How many times did you get what you wanted and it turned out that wanting was a better experience than having? Maybe it wasn’t with something as material as a phone. Maybe it was the job, or your spouse or having a child. Please take a moment to reflect before reading on.
So, back to the question, why aren’t we happier? Dan Gilbert, author of Stumbling on Happiness explains it like this, “The comparisons we make when we [] estimate how much we will like things are not the same comparisons we will use when we consume them. This problem of shifting comparisons can bedevil our attempts to make rational decisions.” Using my phone as an example, I thought I would REALLY like it because it had all kinds of bells and whistles. But when I actually used the phone, I didn’t want bells and whistles, I wanted a phone that I could use easily. People do this a lot and this is one of the reasons I so enjoy teaching Happiness 101. I enjoy educating people about what will actually make them happy instead of what they THINK will make them happy. This Saturday, is Happiness 201. Yes, TWO-oh-one! After this four-hour workshop, you will walk out with a PERSONALIZED PLAN FOR YOUR HAPPINESS! I only teach this class every six months or so and it is only $50!! Well, it is $50 if you pay in advance. It’s $65 at the door and Saturday is sneaking up fast. So, “the door” is the one on my office – at 220 East 3900 South #7, Salt Lake City or if you are interested in paying in advance send me an E-mail at frank@saltlakementalhealth.com or you can send me a message on Facebook. You can’t miss me, I’m the one with the big smile on his face!

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In his book, Authentic Happiness, Martin Seligman (or as I have started calling him, “Uncle Marty”) describes a study in which trained psychologists attempted to predict whether people would lead happy lives just by looking at their yearbook photo. Dacher Keltner and LeeAnne Harker studied the photographs of 141 women graduating from Mills College in 1960, specifically looking at their smile. A man named Guillaume Duchenne discovered specific markers of a genuine smile – namely the corners of the mouth turn up and the corners of the eyes crinkle – like crow’s feet. It turns out that the muscles that control these movements are difficult to control voluntarily and therefore are a good indicator of genuineness. They referred to the women with the less genuine smile as the “Pan American smile” – after stewards of the now-defunct airline. Do you suppose if they were truly happy and sporting the Duchenne smile that the airline would still be around? But, I digress. 30 years after the yearbook pictures were snapped, Keltner and Harker found that, indeed, the graduates sporting the Duchenne smile were statistically happier, reporting more personal well-being than the Pan-American smilers. Now, this of course does not mean if you were not genuinely smiling for your yearbook photo that you are doomed to a life of despair. On the contrary! It’s never too late! Studies have shown that your body has a biological reaction when you smile – Duchenne or even the “why do I have to pose for this picture” fake smile. Your body does not know the difference and so it releases chemicals into the pleasure center of your brain. So, smile more! It feels good to you and you will often find that people are friendlier and may even smile back. Or if nothing else, we can take our cues from Ziggy, “Smile! People will wonder what you’re up to.” ~Frank

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I have been teaching Happiness 101 as part of my private practice since April ’09 and only a month ago did I learn that former Harvard professor Tal Ben-Shahar released a DVD called “Happiness 101”! I just got it in the mail the other day after ordering it from PBS. It’s a great little video. In it, Tal gives a wonderful analogy of the downside of multitasking. First, think of two of your favorite songs. Go ahead, this is part of the exercise.
Please don’t proceed until you have your two songs in mind.
These two songs that you have now thought of your two songs, please rate them on a scale from 1-10 about how much you like them. Likely your top song is a 10 and your second fav is pretty close to that (a 9 or a 10). Take a few more seconds to think of how your songs sound. ‘Maybe even hum or sing a few bars from each one. Listening to each song will give you a Happiness Boost (Lyubomirsky, The How of Happiness). Think of how much you would enjoy that.
Now, imagine playing both songs at the same time. Playing a 10 song and a 9 song together does not yield a Happy experience of 19. Your two favorite songs played at the same time sounds more like NOISE, plummeting its listening pleasure to a 2 or 3 (at best).
Take this simple analogy and apply it to your own life. What are the things you enjoy doing most? For instance, it might be spending time with your children and reading. Trying to do both at the same time significantly lowers the experience of each activity. A lot of people are texting while doing other things. How much are they really enjoying these combined activities? Our current world is built around multi-tasking, especially at work. However, I am sure with a little effort you could find ways to do less multi-tasking and use mindfulness to fully enjoy the present moment.

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Since I have been teaching Happiness 101 for so long, I am getting a reputation for being “the happy guy” or “the happy therapist”. As a result, when clients, students, friends or family members run across an article about Happiness, they immediately think of me. I love this and have been the recipient of many articles, websites and books about Happiness. This is wonderful not only because it makes me more proficient in the topic of Happiness, but raises my level of Happiness as well. In the January 17th edition of Parade Magazine (you know, the little insert inside your Sunday paper) there was a little article about ways to happily get fit, comparing those who get a dog with people who get a gym membership. Physical exercise is the number one Happiness Booster (Lyubomirsky, The How of Happiness). According to researchers in Great Britain, people who own a dog spend approximately eight hours per week walking their pooch. Comparatively, those that spent their New Year’s resolution getting a gym membership average two hours in the gym per week. Not only are they getting more exercise but 86% of dog owners reported they like playing with their dog, while only 16% of gym goers said they like going to the gym. We all know the follow-through on New Year’s resolutions can be tough too. 46% of gym goers admitted to making excuses not to going to the gym but only one third of dog owners opt out of taking Fido for his walk. So, if you got a New Year’s gym membership and your resolve is beginning to flag three weeks, consider stopping by the Humane Society and picking out a hound. Statistics are betting, you’ll be Happy you did.
~Frank

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What IS love exactly? How does it work? Are there reasons we love whom we love? Or is our love “unconditional”. If your love is unconditional, what exactly does that mean? Does it mean you will tolerate any behavior? Obviously much has been written on the subject of love. The founder of Positive Psychology, Martin Seligman, purports in his book Authentic Happiness that we love others for a particular combination of strengths that we hold dear. For instance, if we value honesty and our friend or partner exhibits honest behavior, then more tumblers in the key of love fall into place. Seligman lists 24 strengths that play a part in our feelings of friendship and love. You can test go onto Seligman’s site, www.authentichappiness.com and measure your strengths. Invite your significant other to take it too. It’s a great way to get to know each other better.

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Oxymoronic, isn’t it? Grief never feels good but there are good ways to grieve. This implies that if there are good ways to grieve, there are bad ways to grieve as well. The best way I can explain it is the band-aid analogy. You can do it the fast painful way or you can drag the pain out – possibly for years. While taking off the band-aid has two speeds – fast or slow – the speed of grief is more like slow or slower. Many have hoped that after two or three of those gut-wrenching sobbing sessions that they are all done, they’re over it. In her book, The Worst Loss, Barbara Rosof states that typically grieving lasts for weeks if not months depending on many things – particularly the strength of the relationship. No one wants to grieve. No one wants to feel that pain. Many people go to great extremes to avoid feeling their pain, immersing themselves in drugs, alcohol, work or an endless stream of projects. There is no way around it. The only way through it is to feel your feelings and allow yourself to heal. This is not to imply you will “get over it”. Grief is about learning to live with the loss. Aside from feeling your feelings, Rosof recommends two other critical points: your grief is unique and has its own timeline. Comparing your grief to others will probably only serve to make matters worse. The final point is to get support. Ironically, many people tend to isolate when they need to reach out the most. Caring Connections offers a grief support group. The Sharing Place offers support as well, not only to adults but specialize in helping children to grieve. If you are grieving, please reach out for help.
~Frank Clayton, LPC

Please pray for Haiti

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Mindfulness is one of the keys to being happy. After all, how can we enjoy the moment if we are not mindful? On the other end, mindfulness also helps us to be more aware of our negative thoughts, beliefs, patterns and behavior. Meditation is one of the best ways to improve mindfulness. Meditation can be done in many, many ways. One experiment in meditation I called the Right Now Game. The object of the Right Now Game is to become aware of all that is going on “right now”. What is going on for you right now? As Nick Nolte’s character in the movie The Peaceful Warrior says “There’s never nothing going on.” This, by the way, is a sound bite I hear when I open my computer. The rest of the quote is “Take out the trash. The trash is anything that distracts you from this moment – here, now”. It is a GREAT inspirational movie. As inspirational as it is, no, I did not get the idea for the Right Now Game from The Peaceful Warrior – but I certainly could have. There are SO many things going on right now – even if you are simply sitting and reading this article. “Sitting” and “reading” are, after all, verbs.
How to play the Right Now Game:
Say or think to yourself “Right now ___________________________” and fill in the blank.
Here are some examples:
Right now I am sitting. Right now I am reading. Right now my heart is pumping. Right now my bladder is digesting my food. Right now I am a husband. Right now I am a therapist. Right now I am living in Salt Lake City. Right now I am an American. Right now I am a friend. Right now I am pausing to think of what “right now” to write next. Right now I am adjusting my glasses. etc. etc.
I also suggest making sure you liberally pepper your “right nows” with how you are feeling: Right now I (physically) feel some tension in my shoulders. Right now (emotionally) I feel content.
Staying in touch with your emotions is an important part of mindfulness because so often we make decisions based on our emotion – AND a miriad of other reasons it might be important to be in touch with our feelings, but that’s an entirely different article.
The other “right now” I suggest is “Right now I am doing _____________________ because _______________”. This is important because if you do not at least occassionally think about why you are doing what you are doing, you might find yourself focusing so completely on being in the moment that you forget why you are there. For instance, “Right now I am driving to work because I want to keep my job.”
When I did this, I enjoyed it so much I did it for another two days. I never forgot where I laid my keys and I was more attentive and more alive than I had ever felt in my life. Give it a try – “right now” (sorry, I couldn’t resist).
~Frank

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Please watch the attached video. I suggest you do so when you have a quiet moment and can give it your undivided attention. It’s less than three minutes long but could change the way you see your entire life.
Go ahead.
I’ll wait.

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Messages from Water
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Welcome back!
I know. It’s hard to believe, but it is true. It’s been scientifically proven. If you are still in a state of disbelief, I invite you to go to Dr. Emoto’s website by clicking here before reading on.

Like the man said in the video, if our thoughts can do that to water, imagine what our thoughts can do to us.
With that in mind, here are a few other sobering statistics:
The average person has 45,000 negative thoughts per day
The average person complains 70 times a day
Human beings are comprised of over 70% water

What messages are you telling yourself – both in thought and in word?
What messages are you telling yourself through your behavior?
What kinds of messages are you allowing into your world – and how are those messages effecting you?
What kind of TV are you watching? News? Crime shows? “Reality” shows of people behaving badly?
How about the radio? Have you really listened to the words of the music you listen to – and by singing along with it, what are you affirming to yourself?
Do your friends support you or do they tear you down?
Even your clothes are influencing you. Certainly if a word written on a vial can change water at a molecular level, then hate words written across your T-shirt can have an impact on you.
In Happiness 101 I constantly beat the drum of “CHOICE” and how the things you do every day can take you a step closer to happiness or further away.
Today is YOUR day. It’s your choice. ‘Make it a good one.
~Frank

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Sadly New Year’s resolutions seem to becoming something of a joke. It has become almost assumed that we will make this commitment to ourselves and break it by spring. I hope that if you have made a New Year’s resolution, that you take it seriously. Breaking promises to yourself breaks down your trust in your ability to follow through. If you have made a resolution, I offer the following tips to succeed:
Be specific: If your goal is not clear, how will you know when you have succeeded? For instance, if you said “I want to do more push-ups” – this is general. How would you know when you have done enough push-ups to say “Yea! I reached my goal”? To say “I want to do 10 more push-ups” is more specific.
Know your baseline: You must know where you are starting from to know how much you want to improve. If I want to do 10 MORE push-ups, I must first know how many push-ups I can do now. If your goal is something difficult to measure, you could determine a baseline by asking yourself where you are now on a scale from 1-10. For instance, “I want to be happier” is a great goal but how would you measure it? So you could ask yourself “On a scale from 1-10, how happy am I now?” You then record this number and revisit it at a set time.
Set a time limit: Without a time limit your goal would imply that it expected that you do this for the rest of your life. Even if you do have that intention, it is important to set regular times to review your goal. You want to also make sure the time frame you have set is reasonable.
Do-able: Is your goal reasonable? Is it something you can do? Is it something you have control over? For instance, if your goal is to lose weight, that’s great but if you have a thyroid problem or take medications that cause weight gain, you could be left feeling frustrated. A goal you have control over is, “I will work out for 30 minutes, four days a week.”
A final word (in writing): Please write your goal down – and date it. An old friend of mine used to say, “A goal not written is just a wish”
~Frank

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