The Pursuit of Happiness 尋求快樂

http://www2.oprah.com/tows/pastshows/200704/tows_past_20070411.jhtml

Are you truly happy? If you were presented with a group of people you've never met, could you determine who was really satisfied with their life? A panel of five people took a test to see how happy they really are. See if you can tell who is the happiest, and then take the test yourself!

你真的快樂嗎？假如你在一群你從未見過的人中，你能認出誰在這群人是對自己的生活是滿足的。這有五個人，你來猜猜看誰是真的快樂的人。再來你也做快樂測試。

How satisfied are you? To find out, read the following five statements. Then, use the 1–7 scale to rate your level of agreement and add your answers together.

你滿足嗎？請回答下列五個問題，由你的滿足程度選1﹣7，最後合計總分

1 = Not at all true=從不認為是真的

4 = Moderately True﹦可能是真的

7 = Absolutely True﹦絕對是真的

   1. In most ways, my life is close to ideal. 我的生活大都接近圓滿。

       1   2   3   4   5   6   7

   2. The conditions of my life are excellent.我生活的狀況是好的。

       1   2   3   4   5   6   7

   3. I am satisfied with my life.我滿足我的生活。

       1   2   3   4   5   6   7

   4. So far I have gotten the important things I want in life.到目前為止我認為我擁有人生重要的東西。

       1   2   3   4   5   6   7

   5. If I could live my life over, I would change almost nothing.假如人生再來一次我會幾乎不用改變任何事

       1   2   3   4   5   6   7

Peggy is a 44-year-old married mother of two teenage boys who works as the bookkeeper of the family business. Last year, both her father and her sister died, and her mother has been diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease.

Noreen is a 52-year-old divorced mother of two college kids. She's an avid swimmer and works in the operations department of a major airline.

Lachelle is 27 years old, married and has no children. She works two jobs and has two dogs. Last year, four of her friends and two of her family members died within six months of each other.

David is 53 years old, and he's been a funeral director for 30 years. He is married and has two sons.

Lorrie has been married for 15 years and has six children. She works in retail and also serves as the vice president of her PTA.

Peggy, David and Lachelle scored the highest on the satisfaction scale, while Noreen and Lorrie scored the lowest.

貝基，大衛和拉雪兒在滿足測試中得分最高，挪瑞恩和羅瑞得分最低。

Satisfaction for Peggy is achieved by surrounding herself with happiness. The most important thing? Her husband. "He is there for me. He doesn't only love me, he appreciates me and makes me feel good," Peggy says. Happiness doesn't depend on money, she says. It's about enjoying the simple things. "Every morning I have a ritual. After the boys have left, [my husband and I] get in the hot tub, and it's our time. We talk about what is going on for the rest of the day. It is just our quality time just to stay connected."

貝基儲存快樂在周遭環境的方式來獲得快樂，對她而言最重要的是她的先生。“他在我身旁，不只愛我，他讚賞我，讓我知道（感覺）我的好“貝基說。快樂的來源並非金錢，它是一種享受簡單的是。每天早上在我的兒子們上學後，我做一項儀式，我先生和我一起浸熱水澡，享受我們的時間。我們告訴對方一天的行程，一種真正屬於我們的時間，來連接我們。

David, the funeral director, says he's developed phrases that help him keep a positive outlook. "I will say, 'It's a marvelous Monday. It's a terrific Tuesday,'" he says. Although he deals with death daily, David says his job is anything but depressing. "Most people look upon funeral service as a sad profession. I look upon it as a profession where I'm helping people at a very difficult time in their lives," he says. "Being successful in life is not what really matters. Being significant in life is really the core root of what matters."

大衛是殯儀館的執事者，他說他創了一句讓自己積極好的俗諺給自己“奇妙的星期一和完美的星期二“雖然他每一天面對死亡但他的工作是沒有悲傷的。“大部分的人認為殯儀工作是不好的職業，但我認為它是一項可以幫助他人渡過難過時期的職業。“ 他又說“生命上的成功不是事態的發生，生命的偉大在於事態的重心影響。

Lachelle says she lives by the philosophy, "Negative out, positive in." She says she believes happiness is a conscious effort. "It's about claiming what's yours. If you want a positive life, you need to think positively and act positively," she says. "I do my best not to compare myself with others. I've always felt that what one person has may not be destined for me."

Dr. Robert Holden has dedicated his life to studying the pursuit of happiness. The psychologist is the founder of the Happiness Project in England and the author of 10 best-selling books, including Happiness Now!

Dr. Holden says those looking for happiness often don't realize they already have it. It's a lesson that he says he was lucky to learn at age 18 from a spiritual teacher. "He said, 'Look, actually, Robert, you're already happy.' And I said, 'Well, that's great, but I don't feel it. So tell me, what do I have to do?'" Dr. Holden recalls. "And he said, 'You have to understand that the pursuit of happiness is a mistake. It's like, you don't chase happiness out there. You learn that you're happy inside you and then you go running. Then you go into the world.'"

When looking at the guests who scored the highest on the happiness scale, Dr. Holden says he instantly recognizes the keys to their satisfaction. For David, it's his job. "Your job just helps you to have a great perspective on life, which is, 'We're just here for a short spell, and it's really important to make the most of it,'" Dr. Holden says.

Lachelle uses the law of attraction to stay happy, Dr. Holden says. "Lachelle, basically what I see is that you've chosen to be an optimist. You have had some difficult times in your life and you've had bad circumstances, but you've made great choices. And this is how the law of attraction works," he says. "What I found is that basically we have beliefs about life, and our perception gathers evidence to prove that our beliefs are right. So an optimist believes that good things can come from bad situations."

Weeks ago, the biggest complainer Oprah knows—her makeup artist Reggie Wells—agreed to take Pastor Will Bowen's complaint-free challenge. Reggie wears a purple wristband and every time he utters a complaint, he has to change the wrist he wears it on.

How's he doing? Oprah says Reggie "complained so much that he was getting whiplash from changing [wrists]." For some extra help in looking on the bright side, Oprah sends him to a class in "laughing yoga."

First developed in India, laughing yoga is now practiced in 53 countries around the world. Reggie's instructor, Jeffrey Briar—one of 48 certified laughing yoga instructors in the United States—says laughing yoga's positive effects are no joke. "Laughter relieves all the negative effects of stress," he says. "It strengthens the abdominal organs and help you get those six-pack abs we're all looking for. It oxygenates the bloodstream. It releases endorphins, the body's natural painkiller."

The class starts cold and Reggie remains cynical. "We're going to start with nothing and laugh for no reason, and you'll feel better," Jeffrey says. But as they move on to more advanced moves—like lion laughter, naughty naughty, and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde—Reggie really starts to catch the laughing bug. Reggie says that before his laughing yoga class, he was depressed. It was the Saturday before Easter, he was lonely and he doubted the class would do much to change that. "It was very goofy in the beginning … but you can't fake a laugh," he says. "Once you get into it … the stress lifted from my soul, it lifted from my body."

Dr. Holden says that chronic complainers like Reggie actually live in fear of happiness. Their condition—which he dubs "happy-chondria"—is based on a belief that any happiness carries an eventual fall and price.

"Rather than have everything be perfect and full, I'll have it be quite good and complain," he says. "Reggie's got to dare to let life be great, and trust that happiness can happen and that it can last.” By the time she was 29, Liz was a successful banking executive on Wall Street. She made vice president in her division and earned a healthy salary. She says she had "a traditional definition of success that had a lot to do with material things," but after eight grueling years in business, Liz says she knew she was not on the road to happiness. "I felt proud, but the work was not inspiring me. I didn't have passion for that work. I felt like I had to stifle parts of myself in order to be what Wall Street wanted from me. I felt like I was playing a corporate character, like it wasn't coming from inside of me, who I really am," she says.

Liz knew that making a big change meant taking an even bigger risk. "I was about to turn 30 and I realized it was time for me to live the life I wanted for myself, not the life that other people wanted for me," she says. "It's not making me happy to sit here at this desk anymore. I cannot blame anyone else for my unhappiness. I completely believe life is short. You do not get a second chance. I was standing at an edge, and for me it was time to jump."Liz took a 90 percent pay cut and traded the high-wire act of finance for a career as a trapeze artist!

Following her dream is "like laughter in my heart," she says. "It's hard to quantify that fulfillment that comes with it, but it greatly exceeds the compensation that I sacrificed."Dr. Holden says the key to being happy is overcoming "destination addiction," which he defines as "living in the not-now."

"It's always about tomorrow, so you're chasing 'more,' 'next' and 'there,'" he says. "You promise yourself that when you get there, you'll be happy. And I promise you, you won't, because you'll always set another destination to go for."

Instead, Dr. Holden says if you are unhappy with your life or looking to improve your score on the satisfaction test, there are two things you can do. "We have to learn to let go of our past, we have to give up all hopes for a perfect past. Let the past go, it's gone." After that, he says, "Take a vow of kindness. Be kinder to yourself and to others.

"It's never too late to be happy," he says.