Ask a dozen people what they want out of life and chances are, among the top 10 desires will be to achieve happiness. Even though happiness is free, it eludes many.
The number of people who grumble about or feel trapped by varying circumstances in their life is what led Alice Inoue to launch Happiness U, which opens next week. She believes that happiness, like learning to read or ride a bike, can be taught. But you don’t need to travel the world to find a guru when the formula is no more difficult than: balance + positive thinking = happiness.
"People want life to make them happy instead of making themselves happy and end up waiting their whole lives to be happy," said Inoue, who has given herself the title of chief happiness officer. Some people may not even recognize happiness because it is a state of mind unattached to any "eureka" moment.
"It’s not like climbing to the top of a mountain and suddenly realizing, ‘I’m happy,’" she said. "But, you can climb your way out of wherever you are and move yourself to a better place."
Like many people, Inoue grew up believing that people are born with negative or positive dispositions that determine how much happiness they can achieve. Her own experience has taught her that happiness is a choice, and that the brain can be rewired to seek out and embrace the positive in life. She knows because she’s turned her own life around with positive thought and action.
This idea has been backed by research and is the subject of a 2012 book, "Rainy Brain, Sunny Brain: How to Retrain Your Brain to Overcome Pessimism and Achieve a More Positive Outlook," by Elaine Fox, a psychology professor at the University of Essex in England.
Those who know Inoue see her as a buoyant and effervescent individual with a ready smile and infectious enthusiasm, but that wasn’t always the case. She said she grew up in a strict household with "a strongly abusive father" and a mother who was ill. From the time she was 10, she had to care for a younger brother and a sister with Down syndrome. On top of that, she was overweight throughout her teens.
"I hated my life. I never got to go out. No one liked me and I wanted everyone to like me," she said. "I’d put on a smile on the outside but inside I was very unhappy, to the point where I thought of suicide. But deep inside, I felt happiness was out there, that life had to be better than this."
After graduating with a degree in biology from the University of California at Santa Cruz, she traveled to Japan to teach English. Learning the Japanese language helped her when she moved to Hawaii in 1989. This marked a turning point in her life when she decided to let go of negative emotions and go with the flow of life. She found herself unexpectedly entering the world of media, becoming host of her own weekly Japanese TV show. Her television exposure led her to a secondary career as spokeswoman for several national and international companies.
"Life was good but I was missing purpose," she said.
She embarked on a spiritual path, studying feng shui and astrology. She also became an ordained minister with the purpose of marrying couples and setting them on a path of happily ever after.
"I read about 300 books, thinking that if I focused hard enough, the right information would come to me," she said.
And what she realized, after about 12 years of guiding individuals with feng shui consultations and astrological readings, was that everyone who came to see her — no matter the circumstance — in the big picture was looking for happiness.
Toward that end, classes at Happiness U will address well-being in four categories: physical, emotional, mental and spiritual.
The easiest to tackle is the physical, dealing with such day-to-day stressors as environment and finances, with classes titled "Get Unstuck," "Feng Shui 101" and "Healthy Money Mindset."
On the emotional level are classes like "Goodbye to Guilt," "Get Over It 101" and "Irritating Relationship Clarity," addressing the irritating people around you. In the third instance, Inoue says the solution is simple: "Those people are not going to change, so you have to change your reaction to them."
The aim is to overcome basic physical and emotional issues to reach the spiritual level of defining and realizing one’s life purpose and ultimate grail, the meaning of life.
American culture is not conducive to happiness because of the weight placed on consumption and individual achievement, but long-term happiness is not incumbent on rewards or material goods.
"We think we will get to a certain place and we will feel happy. We put success ahead of happiness, but I’ve found happiness comes first," she said. "It’s a precursor to success and we need to change our thinking to recognize that ‘bad’ things don’t happen to you. They happen for you. Everything that happens helps you grow in some way.
"It’s all good. On my journey of building this business, I thought I would have a lot of headaches, and I have had them, but I’ve learned to flow with life instead of fight it. When you stop wishing for life to be something it’s not and accept it for what it is, you are on the path to happiness."
Tangible benefits come with happiness. Laura Kubzansky, an associate professor of society, human development and health at Harvard University School of Public Health, is at the forefront of such research. In a 2007 study that followed more than 6,000 men and women ages 25 to 74 for 20 years, she found that emotional vitality — a sense of enthusiasm, hopefulness, engagement in life, and the ability to face life’s stresses with emotional balance — appears to reduce the risk of coronary heart disease as well as help people avoid or manage heart attacks, strokes, diabetes and depression.
Kubzansky has also shown that 7-year-olds able to stay focused on tasks and maintain a positive outlook report better general health and fewer illnesses 30 years later. She has found that optimism cuts the risk of coronary heart disease by half.
Before going to bed, Inoue suggests, make a habit of thinking of three good things that happened that day. Consistency helps create new neural pathways to view situations in a positive light.
"Finding happiness is a gradual thing. It’s not like one day you wake up and say, ‘I’m happy.’ But I can look back five years, and 10 years, and see I’ve come a long way."
