Meik Wiking’s concise The Little book of Lykke (Looka): Secrets of the Worlds Happiest People is a practical, quick read, with international statistics and easy to read graphs that gives a nice synopsis of his company’s (the Happiness Research Institute in Copenhagen) analysis and overall synopsis of the worlds happiest people and how not necessarily money, but time allocated and spent, from work schedules, to parental paid leave, welfare, healthcare, commute times, compassion, kindness as well as getting to know your neighbors, and helping others all play important parts in the overall happiness of individuals. Denmark is the place to be if you’re into free higher education, equal pay, equal parental leave, free healthcare, and a work culture and society that promotes walking, riding bicycles, and taking public transportation that is effective and efficient. Well…but you might say I’m not going to move to Denmark or planning on marrying a Dane. Which is good that The Little Book of Lykke gives small and big examples of things to do or changes to make in your daily life.
As an American, one can only imagine, that the United States scores very low in most of these categories, especially some of the more important ones like welfare, healthcare and parental paid leave. I just heard on NPR recently that… “suicide rates have increased in nearly every state over the past two decades, and half of the states have seen suicide rates go up more than 30 percent. In the wealthiest country in the world we American’s are somehow still missing out on how to take care of each other, especially our children and our elderly. Wiking’s book focuses on measuring happiness and he provides tools and encouraging tips on small changes to begin making in one’s daily life. Each chapter has several “happiness tips”. In the promotion of trust and kindness he suggests set time aside weekly to practice “Five Random Act of Kindness to do This Week:
- Leave a gift on someone’s doorstep.
- Learn the name of the person at the front desk, or someone else you see every day. Greet them by name.
- Make two lunches and give one away.
- Talk to the shy person who’s by themselves at a party or at the office.
- Give someone a genuine compliment. Right now.
“The point of all this is that while we can improve trust levels in the short-term by training our empathy muscles and teaching our kids to cooperate rather than compete, there is something we need to address in the long-term to improve trust and happiness…And it is judging our societies not by the success of those who finish first but how we lift back up those who fall.” So perhaps we as individuals are not going to be able to change suicide rates in our state or country, we can however, start making small changes like walking or biking to work one day a week, or being supportive of a neighbor or a co-workers endeavors. Start a community garden. Create a rewards system that promotes those around us that lift other up. Or move to Denmark. That’s what I’m thinking.