Happiness Shawn Achor Quotes & Sayings

Happiness implies a positive mood in the present and a positive outlook for the future. — Shawn Achor

When our brains constantly scan for and focus on the positive, we profit from three of the most important tools available to us: happiness, gratitude, and optimism. — Shawn Achor

It's hard to find happiness after success if the goalposts of success keep changing. — Shawn Achor

This is why Sonja Lyubomirsky, a leader in the scientific study of well-being, has written that she prefers the phrase "creation or construction of happiness" to the more popular "pursuit," since "research shows that it's in our power to fashion it for ourselves."13 — Shawn Achor

Happiness is a mindset for your journey, not the result of your destination. — Shawn Achor

Remember, happiness is not just a mood - it's a work ethic. — Shawn Achor

Happiness is not the belief that we don't need to change; it's the realization that we can. — Shawn Achor

Research shows you get multiple tasks done faster if you do them one at a time. It also decreases stress and raises happiness. — Shawn Achor

As Harvard Business School professor Peter Bregman advises, 'Don't write a book, write a page...Don't expect to be a great manager in your first six months, just try to set expectations well. — Shawn Achor

Our daily decisions and habits have a huge impact upon both our levels of happiness and success. — Shawn Achor

Study after study shows that happiness precedes important outcomes and indicators of thriving. — Shawn Achor

One study proved just how powerful exercise can be: Three groups of depressed patients were assigned to different coping strategies - one group took antidepressant medication, one group exercised for 45 minutes three times a week, and one group did a combination of both.33 After four months, all three groups experienced similar improvements in happiness. The very fact that exercise proved just as helpful as anti-depressants is remarkable, but the story doesn't end here. The groups were then tested six months later to assess their relapse rate. Of those who had taken the medication alone, 38 percent had slipped back into depression. Those in the combination group were doing only slightly better, with a 31 percent relapse rate. The biggest shock, though, came from the exercise group: Their relapse rate was only 9 percent! In short, physical activity is not just an incredibly powerful mood lifter, but a long-lasting one. — Shawn Achor

As we got more interested in time management and productivity, we lost the individual, and with that individual loss, we lost happiness as well. So I think the world has actually been malnourished as we've focused so much on productivity and ignored happiness and meaning to our own detriment. — Shawn Achor

So when a colleague stops you in the hallway at work to say hello and ask about your day, the brief interaction actually sparks a continual upward spiral of happiness and its inherent rewards. — Shawn Achor

Happiness is actually an individual choice, even in the midst of negative circumstances. It's not something our employers can give to us, though they can limit and influence that choice. — Shawn Achor

So many people are struggling to create happiness while their brain is inundated by noise. If your brain is receiving too much information, it automatically thinks you're under threat and scans the world for the negative first. Because the brain is limited, whatever you attend to first becomes your reality. — Shawn Achor

What was going on here was that like so many people in contemporary society, along the way to gaining their superb educations, and their shiny opportunities, they had absorbed the wrong lessons. They had mastered formulas in calculus and chemistry. They had read great books and learned world history and become fluent in foreign languages. But they had had never formally been taught how to maximize their brains' potential or how to find meaning and happiness. Armed with iPhones and personal digital assistants, they had multitasked their way through a storm of resume-building experiences, often at the expense of actual ones. In their pursuit of high achievement, they had isolated themselves from their peers and loved ones and thus compromised the very support systems they so ardently needed. Repeatedly, I noticed these patterns in my own students, who often broke down under the tyranny of expectations we place on ourselves and those around us. — Shawn Achor

Turns out, there was one - and only one - characteristic that distinguished the happiest 10 percent from everybody else: the strength of their social relationships. My empirical study of well-being among 1,600 Harvard undergraduates found a similar result - social support was a far greater predictor of happiness than any other factor, more than GPA, family income, SAT scores, age, gender, or race. In fact, the correlation between social support and happiness was 0.7. This may not sound like a big number, but for researchers it's huge - most psychology findings are considered significant when they hit 0.3. The point is, the more social support you have, the happier you are. And as we know, the happier you are, the more advantages you accrue in nearly every domain of life. — Shawn Achor

Scientifically, happiness is a choice. It is a choice about where your single processor brain will devote its finite resources as you process the world. — Shawn Achor

For the most part, our jobs require us to use our skills, engage our minds, and pursue our goals - all things that have been shown to contribute to happiness. Of course, leisure activities can do this too, but because they're not required of us - because there is no "leisure boss" leaning over our shoulder on Sunday mornings telling us we'd better be at the art museum by 9 A.M. sharp — Shawn Achor

Success does not mean happiness. Check out any celebrity magazine to look for examples to disabuse you of thinking that being beautiful, successful or rich will make you happy. — Shawn Achor

[It's] the lens through which your brain views the world that shapes your reality. And if we can change the lens, not only can we change your happiness, we can change every single educational and business outcome at the same time. — Shawn Achor

Happiness is a social creature. If you try to pursue it in a vacuum, it's very difficult to sustain it. But as soon as you get people focused on creating meaningful connections in the midst of their work, or increasing the meaning and depth of their relationships outside of work, we find happiness rising in step with that social connection. — Shawn Achor

The way we define happiness is the joy you feel striving toward your potential — Shawn Achor

studies have determined that happiness functions as the cause, not just the result, of good health. — Shawn Achor

I've worked with farmers in Zimbabwe who've lost their lands. I've worked with people in Venezuela, under threat of kidnappings, whose external world is unstable. But they have very strong social connections with their family and friends. And as a result, they're able to maintain a greater level of happiness and optimism than I've seen from bankers, consultants, or salespeople who are on the road all the time, who follow jobs separated from their families, and, as a result, find themselves missing out on the happiness that comes from those very connections that they severed. — Shawn Achor

Happiness inspires productivity. — Shawn Achor

Happiness is such an incredible advantage in our life. When the human brain is positive, our intelligence rises, we stop diverting resources to think about anxiety. — Shawn Achor

happiness is the precursor to success, not merely the result. And that happiness and optimism actually fuel performance and achievement - giving us the competitive edge that I call the Happiness Advantage. — Shawn Achor

Most people keep waiting on happiness, putting off happiness until they're successful or until they achieve some goal, which means we limit both happiness and success. That formula doesn't work. — Shawn Achor

Happiness is the joy we feel striving after our potential. — Shawn Achor