Human happiness final

Core components of mindfulness

1.Attention to present

2.Accepting and open

Physiological systems affected by mindfulness practice

Reduced amygdala

Reduced Default Mode Network (DMN) activity (less self-rumination)

immune strengthen

better memory (in cerbellum)

MBSR and benefits

MBSR-mindfulness based stress reduction

8-week mindfulness program that reduces stress, anxiety, and pain; improves emotional regulation and immune function; alters brain activity; and promotes long-term psychological and physiological resilience.

How mindfulness reduces pain

By uncoupling the sensory
dimension of the pain
experience from the
affective/evaluative alarm
reaction

Core Mindfulness Practices

Mindfulness in

Breathing

body

attention

compassion

movement

Key limitations of the mindfulness literature

study sizes

Mindfulness for teachers

Mindfulness training reduces teacher stress and burnout

Mindfulness in Healthcare

Cope with stress and connect with patients

Mindfulness in prisons

Reduces anger, hostility and mood

also with rehabilitation and reintegration

Mindfulness in firefighter/veterans

Reduces PTSD

Compassion

Concern of unmet need, pain, or distress with desire to relieve suffering

Compassion both a

State and trait

Flexible and dynamic vs stable and unchanging

Aspect of self compassion

Context vs traits

Self acceptance aspect

Specific activity vs global

self acceptance aspect

Self compassion

being supportive toward oneself when experiencing suffering or pain—be it caused by personal mistakes and inadequacies or external life challenges

stress

when demands outweigh resources we have

Esustress

good stress

Problematic stress

chronic stress

self compassion benefits

improves kindness and happiness, coping

reduces PTSD, depression etc

Self compassion encompasses

1) Flexible & dynamic mindset (vs. stable & unchanging)

2) Contextualized attributional style (vs. internalized trait views)

3) Self-compassion within specific activities (vs. global/all things)

self compassion Three key pillars

1. Exercising Mindfulness 

   1. noticing your feelings without getting overwhelmed by self-criticism

2. Recognition of our Common humanity

   1. remembering that struggle is part of being human

3. Exercising Self-kindness

   1. responding with warmth instead of judgment

Play

Qualities of mirthful state
(Stuart Brown, Play, 2009)
• Apparently purposeless
• Voluntary
• Inherent attraction
• Freedom from time
• Diminished consciousness of self
• Improvisational
• Desire to continue
• Signals Safety

playful teasing

Playful teasing and happiness
• In summer camp, campers who
teased more playfully have more
friends (Kraus et al, 2014)
• In couples, those couples who are
happier have more nicknames for
each other
• Happier couples tease each other
in more playful fashion

play benefits

• Play routines teach social norms and boundaries

• Play allows us to explore assuming possible identities

• Play breeds Knowledge about laws of physics, nature

• Play with language teaches multiple meanings of words, necessary for understanding there are multiple perspectives on any situation, a key to theory of mind.

• Playful teasing is linked to happiness

On-Record Communication

What it is:

• Direct, explicit, literal

• Meaning is stated clearly

• Follows Grice’s conversational maxims (clear, relevant, truthful, sufficient)

Examples:

• “Please stop talking.”

• “I’m upset about what you said.”

• “That comment hurt my feelings.”

Function:

• Efficient

• Leaves little room for misunderstanding

• Used when clarity is more important than social nuance

Off-Record Communication

What it is:

• Indirect, implied, playful, or ambiguous

• Meaning must be inferred

• Often violates Grice’s maxims on purpose to create meaning

Examples:

• “Wow, it’s really quiet in here…” (implying someone should speak)

• Sarcasm or irony

• Teasing, joking, nicknames, puns

Function (emphasized in the presentation):

• Signals playfulness and safety

• Allows social flexibility and deniability (“I was just joking!”)

• Supports bonding, teasing, flirting, and humor

characteristics of teasing

playful and off record

signals safety

theory of mind

body sensitive

emotional light

reciprocal

social purpose of teasing

signal safety, strengthen bonds, teach perspective-taking, negotiate social boundaries, explore identity, and increase happiness through playful interaction. (theory of mind)

Exploring boundaries

lay routines teach boundaries
– Rough and Tumble Play in children: learn
boundaries between pleasure, pain, harm
– Coyotes, dogs in rough and tumble learn
how not to bite, or bite in playful but not
harmful ways (Bekoff, 2001)
– Flirtation (playful exploration of potential
romantic interest): learn boundary
between friend, intimate

Exploring identities

• Play allows us to
explore assuming
possible identities
• Barrie Thorne (Gender
Play, 1993) studied
lunchtime play of
middle school girls:
gender play of
imitations (e.g., of
older women) and
teasing was about
trying out sexual
identities

Navigating conflict

allows us to understand conflict

learning about world

Knowledge about laws of physics, nature
• Playing with liquids, sand, dirt, dropping objects:
understand substance (e.g., liquids, solids), conservation
(how mass or volume stays the same independent of
shape), even gravity (as two-year-olds drop food to floor)

Meaning

Finding peace in the face of Stress

Two modes of making meaning

Scientific vs Narrative

Scientific

analytic, rational,
linear
• Hypotheses, evidence,
inferential statistics, proof

Narrative

stories

images and imagination

expressive writing paradigm

Pennebaker

write about strongest trauma

Findings: increased well being, immune function, less depression

lowered negative feelings

Fiction stories

simulate our own experience in empathic leap of imagination

• Reading fiction benefits our ability to read others’ emotions

• Reading fiction benefits our ability to understand social situations

McAdam self as narrative

McAdams says we understand who we are by telling a story about our life.

• We all have core passions (what deeply matters to us) that guide our choices and goals

• Our life story has themes and motifs (like helping others, independence, fairness)

• It includes vivid memories and images that stand out and shape how we see ourselves

• We think about our contributions—what we give to others or the world

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📖 Life as a Story

• Our identity unfolds in chapters (childhood, adolescence, adulthood, turning points)

• Each chapter has:

  • Characters (family, friends, mentors)

  • Communities (school, culture, society)

  • Settings (where life happens)

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🧠 Why We Tell These Stories

We tell our life story to:

• Make sense of conflicts and stress

• Integrate trauma and hardship

• Balance tensions like:

  • Self-interest vs. compassion

  • Justice vs. fitting in

  • Duty vs. freedom

• Connect past, present, and future goals into one story

core passions

• (what deeply matters to us) that guide our choices and goals

• mcadam’s (narrative)

characters, community, setting

we have this in our narratives,

why is our narrative self

Tell to integrate conflicts, stresses, trauma, and goals

catharsis

By Aristotle
purging of emotion, but
dramatic insight into why we
have stress, struggles through
acts of imagination as in
theater

Aesthetics

• the realm of pleasing experiences that are free of the pressures of reality (fiction, film, art, etc.)

benefits of Fiction and Film

• Universal stories: love, anger/justice courage, suffering, power

• Simulate your own experience through empathic leap of imagination

• Reading fiction benefits our ability to read others’ emotion and understand social situations

Function of music

• When we enjoy music together our bodies and minds are synchronized (Savage et al., 2020)

Music allows members of cultures to make sense of the great themes of social living

music has emotion

flute

from bone 80k years ago

Meaning (Three elements)

Purpose

significance

understanding

Three signs of meaning

Flow

calling

Eudaimonia

Flow

(meaning)

Balance between skills, challenges
in goal directed, rule bound
system with clear feedback

Calling

What you are doing has Significance,
Meaning, it is good for others, align with your
values, intrinsically motivated by your interest

4 sources of calling

individuation

contribution

self-connection

unification

Individuation

Distinguish yourself

Contribution

Bring benefits to others

Self-connection

Authentic expression of self

Unification

Group belongingness

Eudaimonia

Using reason to
match your talents, strengths,
virtues to your work, your service,
your recreation, your aesthetic life

from aristotle

Happiness

feeling good/bad about life

Happiness equation

Positive Emotion + Social Connection + Resilient Mind

BEARS

Breathe

empathize

accept

revere

serve

Altruism

helping others even when it is costly/risky; often associated with selfless or prosocial intentions/motives

Elevation

sense of wonder at incredible acts of kindness, goodness of other people

Compassion

emotional response to suffering/vulnerability; promotes prosocial behavior (kindness!)

Empathy

 ability to understand and/or feel what others feel

Kindness

the intentional act of directing generous benevolence to a person (giving, sharing, believing the best of others, thinking well of them, etc.); often involves empathy, compassion, and/or altruism, but not necessarily required.

Kidness aroused

By

Visualization

reflection

sound

Proposed mechanisms mindfulness

1. Increased mindfulness

2. Decrease in rumination, repetitive negative thoughts

3. Increase in self-compassion

4. Less cognitive and emotional reactivity

Kahneman & Deaton (2010)

• Emotional well-being = emotional quality of an individual’s everyday experience (frequency/intensity of joy, anger, sadness, etc.)

• Life Evaluation = thoughts that people have about their life when they think about it

• Findings: 

  • Income and education are more closely related to life evaluation

  • Health, caregiving, loneliness, and smoking are relatively stronger predictions of daily emotions

  • Life evaluation rises steadily with log income while emotional well-being plateaus at $75,000

5 Hows of Sustainable Happiness

Positive Emotion

Optimal Timing and Variety

Social Support

Motivation, Effort, and Commitment

Habit

Awe birth

•  cite childbirth as their most salient experience of awe for most people

Three principles of being with the death,

• Not knowing … what dying is like… pushes us to observe, be open, wonder.

• Bearing witness… letting the dying guide the experience.

• Compassionate action… being open to suffering, and its companion: kindness.

Davidson 2003

An 8-week MBSR program led to increased left-sided anterior brain activation, a pattern associated with positive affect, along with reduced anxiety. Participants in the mindfulness group also showed a greater antibody response to the influenza vaccine, and changes in brain activation predicted immune improvements, suggesting a link between mindfulness, brain function, and immunity

Limitations:
The study had a small, mostly homogeneous sample and used a waitlist control, limiting generalizability and causal inference. Brain measures relied on EEG, a relatively crude method, and the intervention was short and conducted in a work setting, leaving long-term and more precise neural effects unclear