How Does It Feeeeeeeeeel

Stop Asking Kids (and everyone else) How They Feel

Well worth reading.

“Asking somebody ‘how are you feeling?’ is inducing negative feelings. You shouldn’t do that,” said Michael Linden, an expert in mood disorders and a professor of psychiatry at the Charité University Hospital in Berlin. Why? “Nobody feels great,” he explained. “Never, never ever. Sit in the bus and look at the people opposite from you. They don’t look happy. Happiness is not the emotion of the day.”

(Stop laughing because he’s German.)

I learned this from Laverne’s Pop on LAVERNE AND SHIRLEY a long time ago. NOBODY’S HAPPY!!!!

Whew, that’s a relief.

Seriously, the point of the article is to stop with the emotional check-ins. They never once use the word “mindfulness”, but it certain feels to me like a refutation, and a sorely needed one. Maybe not for everyone all the time. Maybe mindfulness works for you and that’s OK!

But some of us are systems thinkers, which is an excellent strategy, both for achieving goals and for sprouting happiness as an unintended byproduct.

Weight Watchers makes a perfect case study for what is meant by systems thinkers. Say you join WW with a typical goal. “My goal is to weight 120 pounds. And I will achieve it by following this diet whereby I eat 28 points a day, until I weight 120 pounds.” Then every single day you are on the diet, you fail. You haven’t reached your goal.

Say you join WW with this attitude. “My goal is to eat 28 points a day every day until I weigh 120 pounds.” Then every single day you are on the diet, YOU WIN. You ate 28 points that day? You win. You’re a success.

I maintain the latter person is more likely to reach 120 pounds. I maintain the latter person will be ‘happier’, though happiness was by no means the goal. I maintain the latter person will also be healthier even if 120 pounds never happens, because the first person will eventually quit, but the latter person will be having so much fun being a success every day.

Some of us just fit into systems thinking like a groove. I realize it’s not for everyone at all times. But you never hear about it out there in popularland. You hear about mindfulness CONSTANTLY. Screw mindfulness.