Practicing everyday happiness to boost your success.

Muhammad Arif Azim
Aug 26, 2017 · 2 min read
Shawn Achor’s 5 rules for happiness

In the past I had negative thoughts, whenever I had a bad gpa in a semester. Apart from that, I faced depression when I missed my physics practical exam in my 12th grade, and my whole year was wasted because of it. I used to hear a lot of things from my friends and family and it all resulted me going in a depression mode and hence it decreased my productivity. Another time would be when I faced a friend in my university who used to do tease me and do sarcasm all the time. This all made me frustrated a lot.

Shawn Achor, The psychology professor at Harvard University emphasizes that you perform significantly better when you are happy, he calls it the happiness advantage. He also emphasizes that the usual formula for success is outdated, which is that hard work results in success, and success results in happiness. He emphasizes that if you are happy at the present moment, then your chances of success increase significantly. So, he suggest us five steps which will help us become more happy and thus more successful.

Increase in results because of happiness advantage

I believe that if I had a more positive mindset and if I would have changed my lens by which I see and process the world, the outcome of my above mentioned problems would have been different.

The three principles which I applied from the 5 principles mentioned by Shawn Achor was (a)Exercise and (b)Random Acts of kindness and (c) meditation. All these three steps have helped me exceptionally. I had multiple activities scheduled throughout the previous week like an assessment test, couple of interviews , Amal project work and also Family and other commitments, and I saw some great improvements in my productivity just by following those 3 steps.

“Happiness inspires productivity”.
-Shawn Achor

These things in addition to previous courses like secret of getting things done, how to solve problems etc helped me retain my focus for a prolonged periods of times and also they helped me getting things done on time and to follow deadlines. I truly believe that these tips have helped me enormously. I am definitely feeling more happy, positive and motivated.

)
Welcome to a place where words matter. On Medium, smart voices and original ideas take center stage - with no ads in sight. Watch
Follow all the topics you care about, and we’ll deliver the best stories for you to your homepage and inbox. Explore
Get unlimited access to the best stories on Medium — and support writers while you’re at it. Just $5/month. Upgrade