Happiness Redefined: Integrating Positive Psychology into Life and Work| TBL007

All right, everybody, welcome back to another episode of The Launch Button where we talk to successful business owners, entrepreneurs, real estate investors that want to go out there and launch their passions, or they've already launched their passions. And they're going to tell you their story of success and their journey, because it's never a straight line. It's never what we think it is to reach that power and that level of what we're doing. And we got a special guests here for you today. My name is Hugh Zaretsky, I'm your host for this. And we're gonna go through lots of questions, make it very interactive. So make sure you hit the hearts hit the lights, type in the chat there. And we've got the chief happiness officer here today. So the C H O of your business, right, Louisa Jewell, and Louisa is going to talk to us today about how she started this business because she didn't know her why she may not have known her passion when she first started. But now she's helping her job is to make everybody happy. How cool is that? Right. So Louisa, tell everybody a little bit about yourself and how you got started on this journey to success.

Well, thank you so much, you and it's great to be here. So my journey started many, many years ago, when I actually found myself in a clinical depression. I had a number of things happen. I suffered through four miscarriages, and that was just so heavy for me that I I found myself in a counselor's office because I just wasn't coping well. And

I'm resorting to trauma that makes us stronger. Right?

Yeah, thank you. Yeah, thank you. And I'm sure there's lots of people who are listening today who probably had similar experiences. And you know, sometimes these experiences can, we can cope well, and sometimes we're just not coping well. And I found that I really wasn't coping very well. And so I went to see a counselor and and he was very, very helpful. And then I think, okay, great, I'm feeling good again, and I'd get back to life, and then something would happen again, and I'd be back in his office again. And finally I said to him, I said, Look, I know when I'm here that you're reframing my thoughts, you're doing something. And I said, I really need to know what you know, because I need to know how to keep myself mentally healthy. So that I don't keep falling into these depressions, again, where I'm not coping well. And so he gave me some books to read. And that's when I discovered that there actually is a scientific study of psychological wellbeing. And it's known as positive psychology. And so I, I've studied with the fields founder. So Dr. Martin Seligman is the founder of positive psychology, and he ran a master's program at the University of Pennsylvania. And I applied, I got in, I read 6000 pages of research, I applied everything I learned to myself, and I never fell into a clinical depression again, that's a man I thought, I need to teach this to as many people as possible. And people also my colleagues, were saying, Well, what is this positive psychology stuff, because this was at least 14 years ago, so and then I had, you know, I invite five people to my boardroom, and then you know, then it was 13 people. And then it was 40 people. And I just had more and more people that kept coming to me saying, we need to learn more about this. And in 2012, I founded the Canadian Positive Psychology Association. And we bring together researchers from all over the world and practitioners from all over the world, in large conferences and small conferences. And what we do is we learn what's new in the science of psychological well being and happiness. And so I help practitioners, I teach practitioners about this so that they can weave it into the work they do you. But I also, besides the association, I also run my own business, where I work with corporations to teach them about psychological well being so that they can promote good mental health within their organizations.

And you can't call it that, right? Because we call it that. So you know, people don't wish right over their head, but you're like, Chief happiness officer, and they're like, Oh, I get that, right. I get that. Let's have fun. Let's be happy, right? Like, and we know happy employees lead to more things and do more things. And we're in the right mindset, right? We don't spend time going down that rabbit hole of thought and process like, for me, it was 911. I was in it and both planes went flying by and then I had sort of had to do that reevaluate re evaluation that I wasn't happy in life. Right? I had the money, I had the career, I had the job, I had all those things, but I wasn't happy. Right? And so we talked about, you know, unfortunately, there's got to be some sort of trauma in your life that causes you to sort of stop reevaluate what that is, and then go down a different path. Right? And so you had that situation and you pivoted into a different Path? Did you ever think you'd be the chief happiness Officer of many companies?

No, I, you know, I guess I, I saw it, you know, early on once I started to do the work around happiness. And, you know, because there's science behind it, it really is very powerful, because people realize, oh, there's research, you know, we want to follow things that have some sort of evidence behind it. Right. So yeah, so I think, you know, creating happy companies also creates more productive companies, you know, higher performing companies, there's less turnover. You know, we at the Canadian Positive Psychology Association, we created the Canadian workplace wellbeing awards. And today, I was talking to two men who were both from an organization they are the chief, they are the employee experience officers at their companies. And, you know, they, they were saying how they don't, they don't actually put out job postings, because their people are so happy at what they do, that they get so many referrals for new people that are a great fit. And I mean, that saves 1000s, if not millions of dollars for some larger companies that they never have to actually do recruiting and post, you know, that people are just coming to them. So, you know, talent and acquisition has become such a huge topic for CEOs these days, and happy companies. You know, that's, that's what happy companies do, that people are singing praises.

So if we take that back to more of an entrepreneur, business owner, mindset, what is something that you know, Tim, something people can, you know, talk about, you know, as they're launching their business, as they're taking them to the next level, to bring happiness into it? You know, because we hear, you know, a lot of people talk about working out and changing the chemicals in our body that make us happy, right? I've been an athlete all my life. So we hear that in the mornings, you know, but what is something from your perspective, right, that truly would make people you know, want to work for them, or bring a little more happiness and joy into their business?

Well, you know, I think if you think about entrepreneurs, you know, people who are running their businesses, you need a lot of energy to run a business, you know, nobody's telling you what to do, you know, nobody's saying, Hey, you have to show up at this time, or you need to have this project done, you need to have, you know, something accomplished by a certain date, everything is you. And the only thing that drives you is your energy. So, you're here, and if you're not feeling happy, in the morning, you're not gonna feel like getting out of bed, you're not, you know, you're not gonna feel like getting that project done that, you know, that you're thinking about for six months down, you know, down the line, right. So your happiness is so important to your energy levels, you know, so having a certain, you know, establish kind of happiness routines, even in the morning is going to be really important to keep you motivated. You know, what are the other systems you put in place, one thing that's really important to happiness is our relationships. And if you're a solopreneur, or stuck at home, you know, working from home and never seen anybody, that's not going to add to your energy. So, you know, having masterminds having a good, you know, connection with other colleagues that maybe are in non competing businesses, you know, that kind of energy fuels you, you know, I have an accountability partner, I'm part of a mastermind group, I'm part of an entrepreneurs group, you know, is people really fuel me on a regular basis to come up with new ideas to keep going to be motivated to be accountable. You know, I exercise every morning, that's another, you know, happiness habit that I have. So that, because the exercise gets my brain going in the morning, I feel great, I feel so much better, it helps with my mental health. So it keeps me healthy and happy. You know, and so these are the things you know, when you think about if you're going to be transitioning into becoming an entrepreneur and starting your own business to think about how am I going to put all these things in place to ensure that I'm successful, and I ensure that I have the motivation and the energy to show up every day and do the things that I want to do to be successful?

I don't know if you guys are all catching all these little golden nuggets that are flying by your brains right now, to some of you guys, when you listen to podcast, you're not fully plugged in, but there's lots of golden nuggets being delivered right now. So I want to make sure we just we just go back and hit a couple of those just for the audience here. And if you're loving it, type the elves in the chat. Go ahead and hit the hearts and the lights hit the Follow button. And one of the things you said is relationships carry a lot of weight in your energy Do I know? And stuff can go all haywire in my business and I find, like, cells falling down, right? Buildings are falling down, whatever. And I'm like, Cool, what if my personal life, my relationships are all messed up? I can't, I don't have the energy for my business. And for some people, it's the other way around, right? Their business is all messed up, they mess up their relationships. So how can you sort of, you know, from that perspective, be like, Okay, I gotta put that in perspective, or I gotta be able to separate the two, is there a way to do that to bring more happiness and joy?

Yeah, well, I think what's important is to know, what is important to you. You know, so if your relationships are very important than that, that has to be kind of the first thing that you think about? Because what is the point of, you know, for me, I have a passion around teaching people about happiness, and how to stay mentally healthy. I'm passionate about that. But what is the point of all that if all my relationships have fallen apart, if my kids don't like me, or my, you know, my partners are not happy to be with me. Right? So, so how do I sorry, I meant to say, partner, not partners, that's okay. Although that probably adds a lot of happiness.

Sometimes there's more stress to keeping one person happy, let alone a whole bunch.

I don't want anyone to get any ideas there. But so far, is that what you want to just do?

You want to have fun with this, right? We're having happy and, and the joy and the little little fun things here. But you know, as we come back to that topic, because, you know, Louise is fun fact was, she didn't want to burden man. And now, you know, we're talking about this, but she went to Burning Man to experience it to do the things right. And as we bring it back here, some of the things that we can do.

Yeah, so you know, in terms of relationships, I think it really is important, you know, to remember, and I think what I do to maintain really good relationships while I'm running my business, because as an entrepreneur, you you can think about your business 24/7. And you know, a lot of entrepreneurs, I don't have a big company, but I have a lot of CEOs that I know that have big companies, and they go to bed thinking, oh my gosh, 150 families are depending on me, and to run this business, and to keep their jobs and keep their jobs going. Keep the lights on, right. So there's so much stress and pressure, sometimes as an entrepreneur, and for myself, I'm so passionate about what I do, I can be thinking about my business and ideas 24/7. So what I do is I practice mindfulness, which is another happiness habit. So when I'm here with you, whew, I'm not thinking about anything else, I'm not thinking about the to do list, I'm not thinking about the Christmas cookies that I need to bake, you know, to have ready for the party on Saturday, I'm not thinking about the report I have to put out for this client. You know, that's due on Friday, I'm not thinking about any of that. I'm here present with you. And then when I go home, I can think about those things. And, and I also do this with my work. So if I, you know, if I'm creating a new I'm like, right now I'm working with the client, they wanted a completely new leadership program that's based in these happiness principles. They want to teach their leaders on how to be how to actually lead in a way where people can be happy and thrive in their organization. So I'm so excited about this program and working with them. And it's a really long program that I'm doing with them. So even when I sit down to create all of those modules, I turn off my phone, I turn off email, I completely shut every other distraction down, so that I can be completely mindful. And in there, and sometimes I'll put the timer on for 90 minutes, because 90 minutes is a good chunk of time research shows that you know, every 90 minutes, good time to take a break. And the other thing is too is that when you do really deep work like that, taking a break brings you into another part of your brain. So sometimes that's when you have your aha moments. Because you're kind of assimilating all the stuff that you just learned. And then you're taking a break it brings you into another part of your brain where you can have those kinds of aha moments I like I'll go to you go to the restroom. That's where I'll have my aha moments because like taking a break,

but everyone have that all the time right when they take a shower like also in the shower and also like oh, that's how I can fix that right? Like because you're not thinking about it, but the brain is processes in the background.

That's what Right, it's a simulated all the stuff you just put all together and then you know, now so so I think mindfulness is really important when you can be fully present with your family, maybe it's going to be an hour at dinner. So put the phone away. You know, research also shows that even just having your phone on the table can deteriorate relationships, because they think, Oh, you're just sitting there, or they're waiting for the phone to be for the person to pick it up and read a text or, you know, and so, so just be present, and have those really good relationships with people, you know,

I understand the principle of focus time, right? focused on you got to focus on here. Now we shift. And that's really hard for a lot of people.

It is really hard. And so you can there are mindfulness practices, you know, meditation practices. So, you know, people think, Oh, I can't meditate, but meditation actually trains your brain on how to focus, that's really all you're doing. You're just, you know, you're you're, it could be a guided meditation, you know, there's all different kinds of meditations. So choose something that fits for you. But then if you're doing even a guided meditation, the whole point is to listen to the guided meditation and just focus on that. And then when your mind wanders, and then you gently say, Okay, come back. And then your mind wanders, and you say, come back. And what is that doing that's training you to focus. And what is actually happening is you're changing neural pathways in your brain when you do that ended. And it helps you to be able to focus easier, it's training your brain to focus. So there are practices like that. And again, I also find, just get rid of the distractions, that you know, your phone is your worst enemy, get rid of it, I even bought a lock box, where you can lock your phone for an hour, if you want to you put a timer and it will not like, unless you're breaking the box open, you can't get it out. Right. So you know, sometimes I'll even do that if I really want to, if I'm really kind of tempted to go to my phone. But you know, our brains were not designed to have little things, things go off all the time, like we are hardwired to look at stuff. So it's not our fault, you know that these distractions bother us or interrupt our work?

Well, I think you're really good points here. And like I said, Guys are getting the golden nuggets type of G in the chat for this, because it really is right, like our brain is wired and fire together, it gets in the same patterns, it does the same thing.

That's you, it does

the same things over and over and over. Right. And so getting that to change the habits, because I see that with a lot of people, they're not able to shift, right? This is this time, that's that time and they're always thinking somewhere else, and they're never present. And so that's one of the big things I learned on my journey was that to be fully present right here, right? There's an I always laugh at people because we're, you know, you're super busy. I'm super busy. But some people are like, well, I can't put my phone down. I was like, if if we can, you can write like, it's just getting used to that habit of being able to do that. And I'm sure you see that with a lot of the CEOs and the high executives. They're like, Oh, I can't What if somebody? Well, you can train your people and when to respond to you and how to respond to you, right? And so to make sure you're happy.

Yeah. And I always say to CEOs, if you don't have time, for stuff, that's a problem. You know, it's time to rethink how you're approaching your business, you know, so that you have the time to do what's important to you, you know, if these important things are falling off in your life, then it's time to rethink, you know, how you're running your business. I had a great interview with the CEO. And I said, What do you recommend, you know, for happiness for CEOs. And she said, Write yourself a letter of what you want your life and your business to look like 30 years from now, what do you want your life to look like? Design your business today for that. And I, you know, put in there all the important things you want. You want to have family, you want to have time with your grandkids, you want to have time with your kids, you want to be traveling, think of all of that, and then design a business today, that will make that a reality. And I really liked that idea.

That was a great idea. Thank you for sharing that with our audience. And I know you guys are getting lots of great information out of this. And we're going to show you how you can connect in the future with Louisa here and be able to do that we're going to have some links in the show notes. So go ahead and take a look at those on how we can connect and how we can continue this because I became a little bit of a nerd on the neuroscience during COVID. And understanding how people react to different situations to people. So with all my students and all things just watching them as they react to the different situations here to see that so I'd love to continue to further this conversation in the future, to be able to see how we can do that and bring some of your work for We're not just in Canada, but internationally now as we do this, and we've got lots of speaking opportunities and different things like that, that we can talk about in the future. Well, for you guys on the podcast here, all you got to know, kept the show notes, hit the links. Now, as we go to wrap up here, is there any quotes anything you'd like to end with or anything you want to share on the happiness principle? Or how to be a little happier in their life? And I think you hit some really major points already.

I think, yeah, I think we've hit some major points. But I think one of the things that I'd like to leave is that it is possible to do things too, you know, sometimes we think that we are a victim, or were either born happy, or we're not. And I just want to leave people with the note that it is possible for you to change your happiness levels. And it doesn't mean you need to be happy all the time. Sometimes it's appropriate for you not to be happy when things are going on in your life. But if you want to have lasting happiness and well being it is possible to do things to to make a lasting change.

Now, I know we're gonna wrap up right there. But one more question for you guys, as you were saying that, right? Like, a lot of people see, they do have negative first versus positive first, to see the impact of people going positive. First, being much happier in life and being able to achieve those things. You know, some people don't Whoa, whoa, me, it happened to me versus okay, it happened? Like, how can I turn this into a win?

Well, but what do you think is really important, if you are ignoring something that's actually really bothering you, then you're suppressing something, and that's going to affect you, that will affect your energy that will affect your happiness levels that will affect your life relationships. So if you're suppressing something, that's not great, if you know, strategies that help you bounce back quickly, you're not suppressing, you're actually getting right into a solution and processing and moving into a more positive space. That's where you want to be. Now some things are going to be harder to process than others, right. And you know, if your good friend dies of cancer, that's can be devastating. So of course, to be self compassionate, and to say, you know, this might take me a while to come out of this, I'm going to do all of these, I have a friend who's going through a very difficult time, and she's doing going to the saunas, and she's exercising, and she's got community and she's got, she's getting massages, and you know, like, she's doing a million things to take care of herself as she goes through this really, really challenging time in her life. And I think that's really important to do to you. But you need to recognize when things are really difficult, and take care of that process. Well, you know, and then that can help you come come out of it, as well.

Awesome. Well, we appreciate your time here today, as we said to people, you know, as we wrap this up, always take one more step. One more, see the happiness in on the happiness journey as we're here with Chief happiness officer and see the bright side of any opportunity. When a door closes, another one opens. All you got to do is take one more step in don't give up on your journey to success and you'll be able to launch to wherever you want to be in life. And we'll see everybody next time on the launch button podcast. Go ahead, hit the hearts hit the likes, hit the follow. And we'll see everybody soon.