Rob Woodman, Ph.D., MSCP

Brene Brown: The power of vulnerability | Video on TED.com

2011-04-26T23:02:00.000-07:00

Brene Brown: The power of vulnerability | Video on TED.com

10 Things Science Says Will Make You Happy by Jen Angel — YES! Magazine

2011-04-20T09:01:00.000-07:00

10 Things Science Says Will Make You Happy by Jen Angel — YES! Magazine

I See the Beauty

2010-11-22T19:19:00.000-08:00

“Oooh. Look there. That's beautiful.” The reds, yellows and greens that paint the landscape are breathtaking this time of year. You don't need to go to New England to see the colors change for fall. We have our own art show right here in the Sacramento Valley.

As much as our eye is caught by the brilliant colors and we are taken for a moment by the sheer beauty of it, we also take our ability to appreciate beauty for granted. And yet, it may be something more developed in humans than in any other species and exercising that part of our brain, the part that perceives beauty, can change our lives. It changes our lives because we can't perceive beauty without appreciation, a form of gratitude.

I recommend to people to take a beauty break a few times each day. Colored leaves and sunsets are easy to notice. What is less easy to take account of and possibly more important is the beauty of things right around us. It can be the simple things and the small things that count the most. It can be the way a curtain folds and falls to the floor, a passing cloud, the negative shapes of the sky between tall buildings, the watery reflections of passing people in a store window, the repeated pattern of neat rows of books on shelves, the sound of birds, the softness of carpeting or a mohair coat.

Do this experiment. Right where you are now, notice how you are feeling. And now find something in your environment that is beautiful. Remember that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so the object you find beautiful does not need to have something special about it, you just need to find the beauty in it. Then savor that beauty. Enjoy it. It only takes a moment but it is a good moment. Now notice once again how you are feeling. Notice the difference? Of course, this feeling, like all feelings, will fade but there is nothing that prevents you from taking a beauty break when ever you want to feel this way.

And here is another suggestion. Go for a beauty walk. Walk for a half an hour or an hour looking for beautiful things along the way. Because beauty is what you imbue things with, it is your perception after all, there is no end to the amount of beauty you can see along the way.

Enjoy!

The Unhappy Critic

2010-10-27T14:55:00.000-07:00

Many of us find ourselves being critical of other people and life situations. We complain when someone drives while talking on the phone, we remark when the line at the grocery store is too long and store clerks are not properly deployed, we notice with irritation that someone was hasty, dismissing or rude. You might say that is a natural response and perhaps it is.

In my younger years I attempted to be a classical musician. As I advanced in my art I became more and more critical with the performances I was hearing. I became acutely aware not only errors of tempo, intonation and notes, but of historically incorrect interpretation, or what seemed to me to be a dull performance. Being a critic gave me a feeling of power and superiority. It made me feel good about myself even if I did not enjoy a performance.

What I noticed is that the world-class musicians who were my teachers did not function like that. Instead of finding fault, they were able to recognize the jewels in even a frankly bad performance. Whereas I had become a cynic, they found joy in the attempts of their students.

What I came to realize is that being a cynical critic is intellectually facile. It is way too easy to use hindsight, as it were, and objective observation to criticize others. Much more intellect is required to appreciate other's attempts at doing something, to understand and accept other's limitations, to understand that someone may be struggling with difficulties that are beyond his or her knowledge, understanding or control.

Making the shift from being a cynical critic to being someone who is understanding and accepting makes a huge difference in how one experiences the world and life. Quite simply, it makes one happier. You may not feel as powerful or superior but which would you prefer: to be a powerful and superior, unhappy critic or the person who can find enjoyment in most things and acceptance of the rest?

Why We Dance

2010-09-17T13:51:00.000-07:00

What most of us do is sit and think all day. We might wiggle our fingers on a keyboard, but for the most part, our body is simply a conveyance for our brains. I don't think this is how man is meant to live.

We have an extraordinary ability to think and to learn. Our culture prizes this ability beyond all else. But how we are meant to live is through our bodies in contact and harmony with our surroundings. Thinking becomes a tool, like your hand. Where would we be without hands? But when you think about it, hands are very limited in what they can do. They can't digest food, they can't dream, they can procreate.

Becoming embodied, that is, to fully inhabit our bodies, to let our bodies provide our experience, and to let our bodies be expressive, is to be more fully human. As Gabriel Roth said, "The quickest way to quiet the mind is the move the body."

It is in quieting the mind and becoming embodied that we become more fully human as well as more aware of being part of the great Oneness of all things. Most of us have precious few opportunities for this sort of experience in our lives and yet it is what we yearn for.

It is my experiences at dance events that I had some of the first and most powerful experiences of my self since I was a child. I continue to revel in this uncensored, spiritual play of human animal responding to the beat of the music. What I experience is joy, peace, bliss.

Cognitive neuroscience tells us that when improvising to music, the right and left hemispheres and the limbic system, the emotional brain, are balanced and integrated. When that happens we experience joy, peace and bliss. This is the state we are meant to be in most of the time. This is what it is like to be balanced, responsive to one's surroundings, flowing and free and flexible, active and centered. This is why we dance.

Who's to Blame?

2010-02-27T10:11:00.000-08:00

I got two interesting comments from my last post. They interested me because they both said the same thing and were unexpected to me. Essentially what the commentators said was that if someone is not able to make the choice to be happy because of some condition or circumstance, then my argument blames them and that blame is unjustifiable. I can't help but agree. Blaming is unjustifiable.

It is my observation that blame attempts to find a cause and effect relationship or to find an explanation in an attempt to resolve a problem or to prevent harm from occurring again in the future. According to Tennen and Affleck (1990), blaming comes from an attributional style. It places responsibility for events outside of the person and onto someone or something else.

What is more interesting to me is the question of who does not blame and what happens to them? Again, according to Tennena and Affleck, “One [style] is the person's ability to find the good or benefit in a bad situation. This ability is characterized by statements such as 'Maybe it is for the better,' and 'Some good may come out of this.' Similarly, people who tend to make downward comparisons (e.g., 'I am fortunate for what I have. Others have lost so much more.') are less likely to blame others.”

Martin Seligman includes this ability to find good in bad situations and to make downward comparisons as part of learned optimism. In other words, we can all learn to find good in bad situations and make downward comparisons and blame less. Of course, it would take some practice and creativity for many of us to learn to do it. But the payoff is big. It is a tool, which, if well practiced, can help us cope with enormous tragedy and disappointment. It can also help us preserve our good relationships with other people. Knowing that you have the ability to overcome great difficulty without shifting responsibility to someone or something else brings with it a sense of confidence and maturity that is hard to shake.

There is one comment that I am already anticipating and that is that some people have a tendency to blame themselves even when the blame is not justifiable. Again, I think this comes from an attempt to find a cause and effect relationship or to find an explanation in an attempt to resolve a problem or to prevent harm. However, blaming oneself doesn't accomplish that end but is an end-point in itself. It puts the self at the center rather than defining and solving the problem at the center. So while you may be the person responsible, blaming yourself does not help. Blaming yourself is a distraction and makes you feel bad. Feeling bad is not a good place to be if you need to solve or prevent a problem. In these cases, if you place the problem outside of the self, without blaming anyone else, you can get a good look at it and then find a solution.

Here's a bit of advice for couples. It is not uncommon to blame one another for your unhappiness and the cause of your disagreements and fighting. It is far more useful to look at the repeated pattern of interaction that leads to the disagreements and your pattern of fighting, and work on changing that. Neither of you is to blame as you are both caught in the same pattern. By shifting your attention from blaming to the problematical patterns of interaction, you have a good chance of feeling better about each other and working together for change.

Happiness is a choice

2010-02-08T16:07:00.000-08:00

It sure seems like it is things that make us happy. Those things, either object or events, can seem to happen either randomly, or more often to other people than to us. What you may not realize is that you can choose to be happy.

Let me tell you a story. Recently I came to the realization that I would have to admit defeat and give up something that is very important and precious to me. In talking about it I could not help but weep and when alone I cried big sobs. I was very unhappy and this unhappiness was lasting for days. My mind kept trying to find some way to not admit defeat, not give up, to salvage something of what was so important to me.

Then I began to chastise myself. I try to teach people how to be happy and I'm spending my time being miserable. I not only felt unhappy about my loss, but also ashamed of myself. Then a small voice came to me and said, “Why don't you apply the things you know to become happy?”

That's an interesting question. Indeed, why not? I came up with two reasons. The first one is simply that I had not thought of it. I had been thinking about how to change the situation and not at all about how to make myself happy. The other reason is that somehow feeling so bad felt good. Maybe that's not quite it. A bad thing was happening to me so I should feel bad. And feeling bad was communicating to me and to others how important a loss I was experiencing. Now, having done that, do I need to keep feeling bad or can I move on and be happy?

I made the choice to be happy. Just making that choice alone relieved me of some of the sadness I had been feeling. I knew enough to enjoy that little bit of relief and to savor it. As the day went on I found that I had to make the choice to be happy over and over again, each time enjoying the little bit of relief and savoring it. Slowly the sadness itself began to become less and I was able to think of other things, including thinking of something I would enjoy. It was something small but it was something to savor and build upon. So little by little, making the choice to be happy over and over again, building on small pleasure after small pleasure, savoring each one each time, I came back to being my usual happy self.

If I dwell on what I had to give up I feel sad again. It still hurts when I think about it. But now, that hurt is temporary. It gets smaller and smaller compared to the rest of my happy life. Like everyone else, I have hurts and disappointments. Bad things happen to me and knock me off my feet. But it is in making the choice to be happy that I can get up again and enjoy my life.

Happy at work, happy at home. Suggestions for a happy life.

2010-01-08T09:52:00.000-08:00

Is there a correlation between happiness at work and happiness at home? This question was asked by Marshall and Kelly Goldsmith of 3000 people, about half men and half women, who were well educated. These findings might not apply to everyone. None-the-less, they are quite interesting.
Happiness is a fuzzy concept so we need to make it a bit more concrete. One way of doing that is to divide it into pleasures and gratification. Pleasures are those short-term satisfactions that give one the raw feeling of pleasure, such as enjoying a good meal, getting a neck rub, or seeing a sunset. The pleasure lasts only as long as the stimulus. As soon as the sun has set, the pleasure is gone. Gratifications, on the other hand, are long-term benefits that do not necessarily bring a feeling of pleasure but are meaningful. Gratification comes from recognizing that you have done a particularly good job, from helping someone, from spending time with a good friend.
The researchers found that there is a high correlation between people’s happiness at work and at home. These researchers saw that if either pleasure or gratification were low in one place, it would reduce overall satisfaction. This means that professionals don’t increase their overall satisfaction either by being a “martyr” or by just having fun. Happy at work equals happy at home.

Here are their suggestions for a happy life:

• Reduce TV watching. It's stimulating but doesn't increase overall satisfaction with life—at work or home. In fact, when 824 American teenagers were queried, watching TV caused apathy 37% of the time and pleasure only 14% of the time. The mood state when watching TV, on average, is mildly depressed.

• Cut back on surfing the Web for non-professional reasons. It's negatively correlated with the experience of both happiness and meaning for much the same reason as watching TV. It is passive and solitary rather than engaged with other people.

• Do as few chores as you can (whatever that word means to you).

• Spend time exercising and with people you love (respondents who did this had more satisfaction with life at work and at home).

• Feeling challenged is linked to greater satisfaction, so challenge yourself.

What did you get for Christmas?

2009-12-24T18:08:00.000-08:00

I really hope you got what you wanted for Christmas. But let me ask you the same question I asked a friend. If I gave you what you wanted for Christmas, would it make you happy?

My friend's answer was not a simple yes or no. He said that it would make him happy to get a present from me no matter what the present was. He would enjoy the surprise of seeing what it is, and he would be even happier if I had understood him well enough to get him just the right thing.

No doubt, getting presents can make you happy for more than one reason. Now let me ask another question. How long does your happiness last? We know that little children enjoy opening the package more than they enjoy the gift itself. I believe that can be true for adults too. That would say that the enjoyment is very momentary. But what if it is something that really delights you? How long does that enjoyment last? Not very long. If you think about it, for example, if you put on that necklace you got, you can renew the enjoyment, but again, the enjoyment will be very short lived.

This is a very important phenomenon to understand. For all the things we wish for, all the things we want, all the things we save our money to buy, the happiness we derive from them are brief. It does not last. Why is that?

It is because we very quickly adapt to new situations. When the present is new, we are delighted. But very quickly we adapt to the situation have having the item. It is no longer a source of delight. To be delighted again, we need something novel. No wonder consumerism is alive and healthy.

So let me give you some advice about how to prolong your enjoyment of the gifts you received for Christmas. Savor the delight, the pleasure, the enjoyment you derive from the gift. Let it linger, as you let the taste of a fine wine linger on your tongue. And as much as you can, each time you take up that gift, recall who gave it to you and enjoy all over again the fact that the person who gave it to you thought enough of you to give you just this gift.

What’s in a smile?

2009-12-10T13:18:00.000-08:00

“Say cheese.” We’ve all heard that and the result for most of us is
that we have a photo in which we look rather strange. I think I look
like I’m sneering when I say cheese and smile.

Try this little experiment. First, take note of how you feel right
now. Notice how happy you feel. You might even want to quantify it
on a 0 to 10 scale. Now say cheese and smile. Do you notice any
change?

Actors know a secret. Smiling is not the corners of the mouth pulled
upwards. Smiling is in the eyes. You’ve seen those little smile
crinkles in the corner of some people’s eyes. If you smile with your
eyes and let it spread to the rest of your face, the result is very
different.

Facial expressions are hard wired into us differently than other
movements. In fact, under general anesthesia when a person is
completely paralyzed with medication, the face will still register
emotions such as pain. A person who has a stroke or Guilliun Barre’s
Syndrome in which they cannot move anything will still register
emotions on the face. It is called a limbic smile. It is a real
smile that comes directly from the emotional brain and energizes the
face. The limbic smile starts in the eyes and then to the mouth.
What happens if we work this in the other direction? What happens if
we smile with our eyes and let it spread to the rest of our face?
Will it cause us to feel any differently?

Try it. First take not of how you feel right now. Now smile with
your eyes. If you can, let the rest of your face become engaged in
the smile. Now notice how you feel. Any different? Research has
show that most people feel a bit happier when they smile. How about
you?

I wonder what would happen if you made it your habit to smile with
your eyes at everyone you meet. Could it affect how you feel at each
of these meetings? Maybe you’d feel just a bit happier and thus a bit
more self-confident. I wonder what would happen if you smiled at
other times and for no particular reason. Would you begin to train
your brain to be happier? Research suggests that it would.

Relationships are for enjoying

2009-11-08T19:01:00.000-08:00

In my earliest years I was reared mainly by my grandmother as my parents both worked. For my grandmother, raising kids and raising dogs was much the same process. Punishment came until the desired behavior was achieved, and good behavior was maintained by the threat of more punishment. That's the way it was done in those days and most of us experienced our childhood like that.

We tend to bring the same need to control our partner and the same method of control into our relationship. No matter how compatible two people are, there are always going to be moments of disappointment and differing, even contrary needs, particularly needs for togetherness and separateness. If you try to teach your partner, to control your partner, to use anger or punishment, you are unlikely to get what you want and may simply drive the other person away.

What is this relationship about anyway. It is not to make you happy. You may well be happy, but you won't be if you are frustrated and angry. The relationship is for your growth. One of the ways you will grow is to grow into being a well functioning team, and that takes time. As you would do with your tennis or beach volley ball partner, you can make mention of things that didn't go well but you will play better as a team if you are your partner's cheering section and backup. You are where your partner can't be. You make little of the inevitable errors and your partner does the same for you, each egging your partner on to play better and better.

In the end, what we want is to be enjoyed. This is a point I am likely to return to time and time again. If you will focus your attention on what you enjoy in your partner both you and your partner will be changed. Your frustration and anger will subside and the things your partner does or fails to do that anger you will disappear once you make a non-emotional mention of them.

Relationships are not for correcting someone or making someone different. Relationships are for enthusiastically enjoying someone and being enjoyed.

Now go love and be happy.

I'm getting old

2009-10-07T17:50:00.000-07:00

The truth is, I'm getting old. Like aging, there are many things we just can't change. I can be eaten up by anger and frustration but maybe there is another approach that works better and keeps me happier.

Some of the things we can't change are more of an illusion than reality. "I'm a failure." "I never win." "It doesn't go my way." You know. All those things we tell ourselves that seem to be real when we say them but on inspection may not be the whole truth. Some things are simply a judgement. "I'm not good looking enough." "I don't have much courage." "I'm not good enough." When it comes to a matter of taste or preferences, there is very little truth except an individuals ideas. But these ideas, based in illusion and judgment, can be vexing and even painful. Worse yet, they can bring what should be a full, rich life to an early stand-still with a bleak outlook for the future.

I've found that there is very little that we can't turn into a celebration and thus turn negatives on their heads. I celebrate getting older. I celebrate being old. After all, Seniors Rule! It is the attitude of celebration that shifts the feelings about things. Instead of getting mad at someone on the phone who is supposed to help you but doesn't, you can become friendlier and more playful, start having a good time. Imagine how the other person will react to that as compared to having to deal with your anger. And you'll feel better too.

Here is what a friend learned from his kids: "Six months ago, I learned that my oldest son does something very interesting with traffic. What he and the younger kids did when traffic started slowing down was get happier and happier, kind of like “Opposite Day” (parents know what I’m talking about) until, if they came to a complete stop, they burst into cheers like they won the lottery! I marvel sometimes at how my children teach me profound things. They actually derived pleasure from traffic jams!"

It becomes a game to figure out how to turn negatives into their opposites. In the process, instead of being frustrated, angry or sad about things you can't change, you can be a whole lot happier.

Charter for Compassion

2009-10-07T17:48:00.001-07:00

Charter for Compassion

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The Beginning

2009-10-03T10:15:00.000-07:00

For more than twenty-five years I have been taking care of people with everything from chronic mental illness to every-day problems, from growing pains to devastating losses. It takes a long time to develop the skills to be able to do this well. It takes a long time and a lot of study to understand the complexities of the human mind and brain well enough to be able to make effective interventions. It is not enough, at least not for me, to be kind, patient and sympathetic. I want to be effective and efficient.

One of the reasons I continue to enjoy my work is because nearly every day, it seems, I make some discovery or I'm awed by something I've observed. This blog is a place for me to think out loud and to share what I'm learning. My hope is that my musings will interest others who can add to my thinking so that we all benefit. Now is the time to begin.