Comments on: Happiness without drugs or gods.

Question: Happiness without drugs or gods.

Afroblanco — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 19:26:58 -0800

Are there any sort of useful self-improvement systems that don't rely on a bunch of god stuff or pharmacology?

I'm in need of a new direction, and am willing to go anywhere but there.

By: kcm

kcm — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 19:28:58 -0800

you may want to direct this towards the areas you'd like to improve and what hasn't worked for you, to avoid this becoming ChatMe..

By: DirtyCreature

DirtyCreature — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 19:40:24 -0800

Peace
Wealth
Happiness
Power
Pleasure
Penis Size

By: DirtyCreature

DirtyCreature — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 19:41:34 -0800

That should keep you suitably self-improved for a while.

By: evariste

evariste — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 19:57:22 -0800

Cognitive Behavior Therapy

By: Afroblanco

Afroblanco — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 20:01:53 -0800

kcm - The question is intentionally broad, as I am hoping for a wide variety of answers.

I'm looking for ways to break habits and set patterns that are more in line with what I really want and need.

By: meehawl

meehawl — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 20:03:08 -0800

Bach.

By: tkolar

tkolar — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 20:05:51 -0800

Buy a copy of "Don't Shoot The Dog". Use the training methods inside to train yourself from old habits to new.

In the mean time, learn to meditate. The physiological and psychological effects of a calm mind and an aware body cannot be overstated.

By: evariste

evariste — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 20:08:21 -0800

Lucid Dreaming

By: gauchodaspampas

gauchodaspampas — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 20:08:56 -0800

Excercise every morning. It makes you healthier physically. And it also gets your endorphine levels up for the rest of the day. You can excercise later in the day too, but in the morning is best if you have time. If the habbits you talk about include smoking, if you really commit to excersizing, it will help you commit to not smoking as well.

Start a new hobby/revive and old one. It will keep you occupied. It may give you a chance to meet new friends if you join any groups related to said hobby.

By: jsonic

jsonic — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 20:15:46 -0800

The core concepts of Buddhism, The Four Noble Truths and The Noble Eightfold Path, are essentially an age-old method of figuring out what causes unhappiness, and learning how to overcome it.

This core portion doesn't rely on any diety worship or belief in unsupported concepts like karma, reincarnation, energy....all of that is baggage that has been added-on over time to these core concepts.

If you're looking for something to read, there is a book named "Buddhism Without Beliefs" by Stephen Batchelor that discusses Buddhism from a rational/agnostic perspective.

By: evariste

evariste — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 20:22:27 -0800

Marry a good woman.

By: scottreynen

scottreynen — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 20:47:17 -0800

I'd second jsonic. If you're looking for a guide to happiness without gods or drugs, Buddhism is the standard.

But DirtyCreature also has a good point. If wealth is an option for you, maybe try that first. I've heard good things about wealth.

By: sien

sien — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 20:48:02 -0800

The online text Psychological Self Help text is good. It doesn't seem to use extended belief systems in order to provide answers.

By: R. Mutt

R. Mutt — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 20:48:12 -0800

Art School.

By: evariste

evariste — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 20:57:11 -0800

Scientology.

ok, not really

By: Gyan

Gyan — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 21:01:02 -0800

Conext is everything. What's specifically wrong now?

By: Gyan

Gyan — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 21:01:14 -0800

*groan*

By: evariste

evariste — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 21:15:50 -0800

Tantric sex.

By: tkolar

tkolar — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 21:41:19 -0800

scottreynen wrote...
If wealth is an option for you, maybe try that first. I've heard good things about wealth.

Wealth is more of a mood enhancer. If you're basically happy, wealth will make you happier. If you are basically a stress puppy, wealth will make you even more of a stress puppy.

By: scody

scody — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 22:27:42 -0800

Buddhism, yoga, and CBT are working wonders for me. No god stuff (though I'm reconnecting with a sense of the spiritual), and I'm in the process of coming off the meds.

By: russilwvong

russilwvong — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 22:51:03 -0800

Stoicism: how to deal with adversity. A philosophy advocated by slaves (Epictetus) and emperors (Marcus Aurelius) as well as modern self-help writers (M. Scott Peck).

I'd recommend The Road Less Traveled. The first sentence: "Life is difficult."

By: hortense

hortense — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 23:50:05 -0800

write the word 'breathe' upper left, the word 'smile' upper right, on the mirror, where you brush your teeth in the morning,

By: chrissyboy

chrissyboy — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 23:50:53 -0800

This served the purpose for me, along with a couple of sessions with a good hypnotherapist.

Not totally related, but FWIW, I'd steer well clear of 'life coaching'.

By: teleskiving

teleskiving — Thu, 23 Feb 2006 01:02:12 -0800

If you're positive that you are not depressed then I would go with the recommendation for meditation. In particular mindfulness meditation is good for spotting where your habits are working against you.

Not everyone will agree with me here, but in my opinion if your brain chemistry is out of whack you're going to find it very hard to acquire and maintain control of yourself without tackling the problem directly, in a physical way. Since you've ruled out drugs (which I think is a reasonable initial position, almost nobody likes the idea), you're left with nutrition, exercise, and light.

Light therapy is obviously something that most people think of as a treatment for SAD specifically but it is increasingly being tried out for other types of depression and seems to be useful (IANAD). It's certainly helping me. So my unconventional suggestions would be: 1) Try to maximize the amount of natural light you get. 2) See if you can get a free trial of a light box and/or dawn simulator and see if they help.

In fact, as I said I do support most of the suggestions above - they do work. What I'm suggesting is that you really need some kind of basic feeling of physical well being to work with first.

By: blueyellow

blueyellow — Thu, 23 Feb 2006 05:11:01 -0800

Using your brain for a change ...

By: jefeweiss

jefeweiss — Thu, 23 Feb 2006 07:05:28 -0800

I also liked Using Your Brain for a Change. I was fascinated by Neuro Linguistic Programming for several years, and it seemed to have some fairly profound effects on the way that I think. Although, I would have a tough time telling you exactly what those effects are.-

By: Rubber Soul

Rubber Soul — Thu, 23 Feb 2006 09:51:14 -0800

Affirmations

By: KayTerra

KayTerra — Thu, 23 Feb 2006 12:53:22 -0800

I can think of quite a few systems - out of which I would recommend the work done by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in his seminal work Flow, or alternatively you could look at something like the Fourth Way doctrine as defined by P.D. Ouspensky in The Psychology of Man's Possible Evolution and The Fourth Way.

Between the two systems, Flow is defined as means of understanding happiness and then inducing it on a more regular basis into your life whereas The Fourth Way is a self-improvement doctrine partially based on the work of G.I. Gurdjieff.

By: Afroblanco

Afroblanco — Thu, 23 Feb 2006 17:16:34 -0800

Thank you all for your help. This was exactly what I needed.

By: stilgar

stilgar — Thu, 23 Feb 2006 20:24:19 -0800

read the book dune, and read the book the tao of pooh...read them both again, read dune one more time. think really hard. you will be fine.

By: archae

archae — Thu, 23 Feb 2006 21:03:34 -0800

I recommend Getting Things Done
It's more of a meta-improvement system. It doesn't recommend specific things for you to do to improve yourself, but is instead a general "system" for being more effective at accomplishing any goals and fulfilling your purposes.

By: softlord

softlord — Fri, 24 Feb 2006 06:11:31 -0800

I've always thought the pursuit of 'happiness' is mostly about breaking our own internal habits that steer us away from that path.

To that end, n+1 for mindfulness meditation, and my umpteenth recommendation for Feeling Good : The New Mood Therapy. Mainly geared toward people feeling depressed, but wholly helpful in identifying behavior patterns that are less than productive and more importantly learning to eliminate them.

Good luck!