The Power of a Happy, Healthy Attitude

I got this email from my old gym today, and thought it was so great that I would pass it along. Remember, it's not stuff that makes you happy, it's the happy people around you!

Happiness Is Contagious
Do you ever wonder whether happy people have something that keeps them cheerful, chipper and able to see the good in everything? It turns out they do, they have happy friends.

New research from Harvard Medical School and the University of California suggests that happiness is influenced not only by the people you know, but by the people they know. The study shows that happiness spreads through social networks, sort of like a virus, meaning that your happiness could influence the happiness of someone you've never even met.

"We have known for a long time that there is a direct relationship between one person's happiness and another's," says study co-author James H. Fowler, PhD, University of California. "But this study shows that indirect relationships also affect happiness. We found a statistical relationship not just between your happiness and your friends' happiness, but between your happiness and your friends' friends' happiness."

They concluded that the happiness of an immediate social contact increases an individual's chances of becoming happy by 15 percent. The happiness of a second-degree contact, such as the spouse of a friend, increases the likeliness of becoming happy by 10 percent, and the happiness of a third-degree contact, or the friend of a friend of a friend, increases the likelihood of becoming happy by 6 percent.

Surround yourself with happy people, because happy friends can make you happy.
Source: webmd.com

Naples: the Proverbial Canary?

The end of the world has come to Naples, Italy: there's no place to put the trash.

The city's garbage has been piling up in the streets since December, when the last landfill was closed. New incinerators are not yet operational, and the residents of neighboring countries are, understandably, not thrilled to take other people's garbage into their own land. People's health is at risk, especially with illegal burnings, dumpings into the ocean, and just sitting there, on the street, rotting.

Although part of Naples' problem can be attributed to politics and organized crime, I'd argue that part of it is the modern lifestyle, with tons of disposable items being used every day, little composting, and the stuff you don't want can just be magically taken away on garbage day.

Our way of living is starting to stink!

Affluenza: Rampant consumerism erodes us - Yahoo! News

There's a new book out by British psychologist Oliver James called Affluenza. That's the same name of a PBS movie produced by John DeGraf in 1994. Based on what I read in this short article Affluenza: Rampant consumerism erodes us - Yahoo! News, it looks like things haven't gotten much better since then:

"Bigger houses, more cars, larger televisions, younger faces
-- these goals are frenetically pursued by middle-class
workaholics afflicted by 'Affluenza.'

'Studies in lots of different nations show that if you
place high value on those things, you are more likely to suffer
depression, anxiety, addictions and personality disorders,' he
said."