Warmth - Springing Ahead

Today we put the insulation back in the east basement wall. Homer framed the wall earlier this week. Do you think not having insulation on one basement wall since October would have impacted our heating bill for the winter? Since the window company only gave us a 1 hour notice of their arrival, this lack of insulation actually ensured that the job got done. If we hadn't already removed the framing and insulation, they would not have come that day. Recession? What recession? The contractors in Calgary missed the memo.

Interior framing and sub floor are planned to be completed in the next two weeks. Progress at last!

Spring ahead tonight to your
Bright Star Dreams

Cooking Sensation

Not me, Homer. Yesterday, this arrived at our door.

Our old one, a much smaller version, died shortly before Christmas. We now have fresh sun dried tomato hummus and there is a pot of soup on the stove. I am so blessed to have my own personal chef.

Let the Sun Shine In

Today, four months after we paid for our building permit and removed the insulation and framing around our existing basement windows, the concrete cutters arrived to cut our foundation and put in larger egress windows in our basement for our planned bedroom and recreation room development. They did a fantastic job. It was worth the wait.

Sunday Shopping

Today, I realized that my 20 year dinosaur for a bike is holding me back from one of my dreams - cycling. The potential replacements:

Learn

Sorry for the long delay between posts - with work and a cold I haven't had much time for blogging. I am going to try to finish my list - I've got at least 14 more posts to go. It probably won't be as consistent as it was, as I don't have as much time to research the topics as I did at Christmas. I may intersperse some other posts. Gretchen from the Happiness Project recommends a one sentence journal . Write one sentence about your day that made you happy. I may try this. It is difficult to commit to writing a journal or a blog, but I am pretty sure I can find time for one sentence. So without any further blathering here goes my post about learning.

"Growth itself contains the germ of happiness."
- Pearl S. Buck

"Wisdom is the supreme part of happiness."
- Sophocles

The research I found shows the act of learning can make you happy. Patients who had brain injuries were able to overcome the effect of the injury through retraining their brain. You can retrain your brain by doing brain exercises. The conditions for new nerve cell growth calls for intense concentration at a novel and rewarding mental task. One of the side effects of this kind of intense concentration is an increase in the level of happiness.

In order for this retraining to occur, the retraining is required to be completed at an intense level. A minimum of 7-8 hours per day, 5 days a week for 2 - 3 months is required. It is a full time job. This is contrary to most rehabilitation programs, which are normally only 2 hours 2 - 3 times per week.

The other thing the research found is that people who are happier do better at brain exercises and people who do better at brain exercises begin to feel happier. This is an interesting observation. I wonder if the reverse is true also - if you are unhappy and not succeeding at something then are you better off stopping or you will become more unhappy. I just started working on a new system implementation project in January. The vendor for the system is providing intensive training on the system over the next 2 -3 months.

This week we have been in a meeting room 7 hours a day learning how to setup and configure the system. I find this type of intensity quite draining rather than energizing. I think if I treated it more like being in school and a brain exercise rather than work, the feeling might be reversed. It is not very often that I get paid to learn something new. Usually, I have to pay for my own training and take time off work without pay to do it. This is a fabulous opportunity and I am going to treat it such rather than a burden.

Keep learning and reach for your
Bright Star Dreams


P.S. Here are some links to some research I found about learning and happiness.

http://www.micelife.com/heaven/2008/01/20/brain-training-and-happiness/

http://wikimag.org/2008/12/28/brain-fitness-training-makes-you-feel-good/

http://www.sharpbrains.com/tag/happiness

http://www.thepathway.org/pdf/DST_White_Paper.pdf

http://www.learningisfree.com/self-improvement/happiness/31949-brain-training-youll-be-happier-for-it.php

Surround Yourself with Positive People

"Friendship is a strong and habitual inclination in two persons to promote the good and happiness of one another."

- Eustace Budgell (1711)

The law of attraction suggests that happiness will attract happiness, but could it be the other way around happiness will create happiness? A joint research study by Harvard Medical professor, Nicholas A. Christakis and University of California Political Science associate professor, James H Fowler, discovered: "People who are surrounded by many happy people and those who are central in the network are more likely to become happy in the future." The conclusions indicate that the happiness resulted from the spread of happiness in the network not as a result of similar people associating. The spread of happiness was traceable to three degrees of separation - a friend of a friend or a friend of a neighbor. The likelihood of happiness spreading was higher between people who were the same gender. As well the happiness spread is more likely when the friends live in close geographic proximity, within a mile of each other.

A friend of mine had a vision of the ideal community where the neighborhood was made up of all his close friends and family. When he explained it I thought it sounded a bit too 60's commune like, but now I see there is merit in this type neighborhood. This study also explains why urban sprawl is not only environmentally unsound, but is also emotionally detrimental to the community.

Many of my friends live on the opposite side of town from me. We tend to get together for lunch because we all work in downtown. They keep suggesting that I need to move closer. I love where I live and have no desire to move, but maybe it would help me be happy if we were to move. Any suggestions on how I can convince Homer?

If you want to read more about the study and its findings here is the link:
http://jhfowler.ucsd.edu/dynamic_spread_of_happiness.pdf

Surround yourself with happy people, to move closer to your

Bright Star Dreams

Take Action

"To live for results would be to sentence myself to continuous frustration. My only sure reward is in my actions and not from them."

- Hugh Prather

"Many people have a wrong idea of what constitutes true happiness. It is not attained through self-gratification, but through fidelity to a worthy purpose."

- Helen Keller

"If you observe a really happy man you will find him building a boat, writing a symphony, educating his son, growing double dahlias in his garden. He will not be searching for happiness as if it were a collar button that has rolled under the radiator."

- W. Beran Wolfe

"Action may not always bring happiness, but there is no happiness without action."

- Benjamin Disraeli

When I was looking for quotes for this post I found a dozen that fit, I had a hard time choosing. These are my four favorites.

Happiness research has shown that action is one of the main indicators of happiness, as well as one of the major ways to move from being unhappy to being happy. Research has found that happy people are busy people, but not just bustling busy. The activity needs to be quality activities. Happy people are involved in their life. They invest their energy in living.

The research has identified 5 types of activities that are likely to increase happiness:

1. Enjoyable activities - Doing things that you enjoy will make you happy - who knew?
2. Exciting activities - activities that are thrill based like sports, rock concerts and amusement parks
3. Novel Activities - doing new things will make you happier. Happy people are more likely to try new things.
4. Social activities - Happy people have an active social calendar
5. Meaningful activities - Happy people involve themselves in meaningful activity.

I have spent the last three weeks working to put in a system. With the long hours, I have not had time for any of the above. I pre-wrote all of the previous happiness posts over Christmas and scheduled the posts. Ironically the post "Embrace Failure" was posted on the weekend we did the implementation. After working 11 days straight, I was exhausted. I had no energy for action, but after reading the research, I realize I have to take action or risk being unhappy. Tomorrow I am back to work and will be back to my noon hour yoga. Three of the members of my new project team also do yoga, so hopefully we will keep each other motivated. I also get to organize a celebration for the successful system implementation and completion of my last project - something that should increase my happiness.

Be active to be happy and seek your

Bright Star Dreams

P.S. here is another link to some happiness research that I have found: http://www.gethappy.net/v204.htm