Week 1 — Introduction

• The world is in a tough spot right now in terms of happiness and wellbeing: we prescribe antidepressants at 400x the rate of 20 years ago and recent graduates are increasingly unhappy.
• A critical component of cultivating happiness and wellbeing is overcoming “The GI Joe Fallacy”. GI Joe is a carton character who used to say “knowing is half the battle”. Just knowing is NOT enough to change behavior. Most of us know what we should do for happiness (eg lose a few pounds, sleep more, stay off screens more) then we fail to do it. The ability to control your behavior is foundational for happiness. We must understand and prioritize rewiring habits.
• Here is a comprehensive survey / model for happiness assessment.
  • Positive Emotion
  • Engagement
  • Relationships
  • Meaning
  • Achievement
  • Health
  • Negative Emotion
  • Loneliness
• Deploying your unique strengths is a final source of happiness: it draws on engagement, meaning, and achievement above. Use the VIA Strengths Assessment tool to get your top 5 character strengths and start to consider how you could use them more in daily life.

Yale University’s The Science of Wellbeing with Laurie Santos - Week 2