1. What exactly is happiness?
“I always say: it’s about feeling good and operating well. That varies a lot from person to person, but everyone knows whether they feel happy or not. That’s why we always ask people to rate their level of happiness, and that works very well. Then you notice that people do a lot of things because that’s what’s expected of them. Consider simple leisure activities, such as book clubs, yoga classes, or the idea that you “have to do sports.” No, you have to keep moving – that’s healthy. But you don't have to do sports. Or: “I need to have a social life.” Yes, connection is important, but some people want to speak to one person on a daily basis, while others want to be out six evenings a week.
2. What do you have to do to be happier?
“Happiness is partly hereditary: some people feel happy more easily than others. But just because you’re unlucky in your predisposition doesn’t mean you can’t increase your happiness rating a bit. To be happy, you must meet roughly three basic needs: connection, trust and security. And the most important thing is to realise that everyone is different. So what makes me happy doesn’t make you happy, and vice versa. So get to know yourself and stay true to yourself: you are who you are, and if you try to fight against that, it won’t work.
“In practice you can do a number of things that in general are likely to contribute to your feeling of happiness. For example, count your blessings: think about what you do have instead of what you don’t. And work on optimism: turn something negative into something positive. The past has happened, and you can dwell for hours on what went wrong, but you can also think: ‘Okay, this happened, what have I learned from it?’ There’s often something to learn. Or think about your reaction to an email, changing it from: ‘Oh, that’s going to be complicated,’ to: ‘Gosh, what an interesting challenge.’ Although optimism is a lot easier for some than for others, you can get better with practice. But remember: training mentally is just as hard as training physically. Practicing happiness is just as demanding as training to run a marathon, for example. It takes time and focus.
“The feeling of happiness also partly depends on the extent to which you fit into society. Some people meet the expectations very well: if you tick all the boxes that people expect of you, you feel good. But if you don't meet those requirements, you won’t feel so good. I think we need to flip it on its head and start with people’s well-being. No ticking boxes, in other words. Then I think everyone will be a lot happier.”
3. But in this society we have to meet all kinds of expectations, right?
“Yes, and we have to change that, but it’s not easy. It starts with our school system, where we all have to jump through the same hoops, especially until you’re 16. Schools, and our economy, are now primarily focused on performance, rather than on well-being. But well-being is a huge catalyst: when you feel good, you get a thousand times more done than when you don’t. Yes, you have to go to school. Yes, you have to be able to read and write and do arithmetic. And of course it’s good if you know something about history, but do you really need to know everything about the Romans to operate in our society? If children learn in primary school that everyone is different, that they can be who they are and do what they want, very different dynamics will arise when they get older.”
