📚 Meister Book Club: Shortcuts to Happiness by Tal Ben-Shahar

Joerg Koper

Good afternoon, reading community!

The book Shortcuts to Happiness is about pearls of wisdom that Tal Ben-Shahar was told by his barber Avi. He then combined this wisdom with his scientific studies and turned them into a wonderful book.

Tal Ben-Shahar emphasises that true happiness is not about achieving permanent states of joy, but about living a fulfilled life that includes both positive and negative emotions. He explains that the key to happiness is to find a balance between positive emotions while acknowledging and accepting negative emotions.

The Shortcuts to Happiness is based on scientific findings and personal experience. The shortcuts help us develop a positive attitude towards life and maximise our happiness potential in everyday life.

The book also teaches the importance of mindfulness and consciously experiencing the present moment. Tal Ben-Shahar explains how mindfulness practices such as meditation and conscious breathing can help calm the mind and create a deeper connection to one's sense of happiness.

A further important topic he covers is the ability to deal with setbacks and negative experiences.

My personal conclusion: This book reminds me of many learnings in life and of the time I spent with my Buddhist teacher (a Tibetan Geshe and close confidant of the Dalai Lama). These nice and often philosophic lessons help to reflect many things in retrospect. 

Have a wonderful day!

Jörg

Andrew Lapidus

Thanks a ton for the recommendation, Jörg! We've discussed this before, but I love the integration of mindfulness and other well-being philosophies as a way to overcome the tension between "work-life balance" and find a holistic approach to life. Will check this out!

Best,

Andrew

Joerg Koper

https://community.meister.co/discussion/comment/4791#Comment_4791

I'm sure you'll love this book, as I do Andrew. It's a fun read and a nice opportunity to reflect the wise hints while enjoying a cup of tea 😉

Best, Jörg

Miša Hennin

Seen this in the shop a few times but never checked what it was about.

I'd love to hear more about how Ben-Shahar combined science with philosophy? Do you have an example of the scientific findings or studies he mentioned?

Andrew Lapidus

I actually had a brain-wave about this last night: I read Ben-Sahar when I was in college in a seminar about the field of Positive Psychology. His course at Harvard had just made waves and he had recently published "Happier." The seminar and book had a tremendous impact on me, but I didn't immediately make the connection with your suggestion, @Joerg Koper! So cool!

@Miša Hennin if memory servers, Ben-Sahar's work was very heavily grounded in qualitative/quantitative studies of people's well-being but also engaged philosophically with the troubles of defining "well-being" itself. For example, who can even say someone is or isn't "happy?" Plenty of people report having happy/meaningful lives in circumstances that would be unbearable to us. I think this is the moment where less objective analysis is possible and philosophy takes over.

Miša Hennin

@Andrew Lapidus I finished reading Sapiens last night and towards the end, there's a section on happiness and quantifying it. Harari questions whether all the changes over the years have made Sapiens happier and whether it's even possible for us to assess this. Sounds a bit similar to what you're saying!