The Gross National Happiness Scores for 2017 are here and the news is not good. At first we were suspicious of the low scores: maybe most of the people who took the survey were unhappy because of the current political situation We decided to test our data. It turns out that we are not the only ones finding that people's happiness in 2017 took a dip. Gallup, a consultancy group that randomly polls, corroborates our findings, but also affirmed our suspicions: people who do not feel aligned with the current regime in the U.S. White House are suffering.
Who is taking the Happiness Index Survey?
About 900 people a month take the Happiness Index survey. A little over half are women. The majority are between 25-65 years of age. Over 95% are from the U.S.A. although groups of people in Beirut, Kuwait, Japan, and Canada used our survey in 2017. Many educators also use it. (Anyone can, by signing up. It is all free).
That said, most of the people who took the survey learned about it from a google ad, as we are the recipient of a grant from google. Our plan for 2018 is to expand our reach to include people we had not reached before.
We will have more information about who took the survey and how happy (or unhappy) they are throughout the year.
The bad news: where it hurts the most.
The bad news about our happiness scores is that we are unhappy where it hurts the most: our psychological well-being and our satisfaction with life. Psychological well-being is measured with a flourishing index that includes questions about purpose, optimism, and positivity. Satisfaction with life gets at the question: are you are living a life that is right for you. Historically, Americans score high in these areas even when they score low in the other domains of happiness.
This is concerning, because when we are hurting psychologically, there are impacts on our health, families, engagement in community, job performance, and other aspects of our happiness and well-being.
There is a strong message right now coming from the field of positive psychology that your psychological health is in large part under your control. The message goes something like this: "If you practice mindfulness, gratitude and generosity on a regular basis, you will be happier. If you don't, it's your own fault you are not happy."
We at the Happiness Alliance say that while you do have a choice about how you feel, it is only to a certain extent. The conditions of your life, also called the domains of happiness, have a big impact - particularly big when they are depleting instead of supporting your psychological well-being and satisfaction with life. So while it is good to develop your happiness skills, it is also crucial to do what you can to bring about the exterior circumstances that support your well-being. Having conversations about life's circumstances and the implications on your happiness and the well-being of others is the first step towards changing those conditions that are causing you to hurt. Then comes activism. You can use our happiness index to spur these conversations and inspire action. You can use our policy tools for taking action in your community for system change.
The good news
One area that our scores have increased is in lifelong learning. This is great news because it means we are engaging in ways that are increasing our capacity for taking action.
Learning is something we do throughout our lives. We learn on many different platforms. Ken Wilber called them "modes of development." They are kinesthetic, strategic, emotional, interpersonal, intrapersonal, social and cultural, intellectual, artistics, moral, and spiritual.
Learning is something we do throughout our lives. We learn on many different platforms. Ken Wilber called them "modes of development." They are kinesthetic, strategic, emotional, interpersonal, intrapersonal, social and cultural, intellectual, artistics, moral, and spiritual.
Learning empowers us to make change happen.
More about our happiness scores in our next newsletter
We will send you more information about our happiness scores in our next newsletters. And...we welcome collaboration. If you are interested in joining our team or using our data for your research, email us at info@happycounts.org.
And you can always use our index for free - because we believe strongly that to see the change you have to be the change, and so our index for a paradigm shift in our economy, society and government will always be free.
Join our newsletter
Join our newsletter
 |
| Click to join our newsletter or use the URL below. |
No comments:
Post a Comment