The Key to Happiness

Denmark is often said to be the happiest country in the world. That’s down to one thing: hygge. ‘Hygge has been translated as everything from the art of creating intimacy to cosiness of the soul to taking pleasure from the presence of soothing things. My personal favourite is cocoa by candlelight…’ You know hygge when […]

In Western culture, we have become addicted to positivity. We try to eradicate pain through medication and by insulating ourselves and our children from risk, even though we are the safest generation that ever lived, and often view difficulty as a personal failure. Yet in his research renowned social psychologist Brock Bastian has found that […]

The world has reached unprecedented levels of wealth, but while we have succeeded in getting richer, we have failed in getting happier. While many people live lives of quiet desperation, a few people find themselves at the very top of the scale when it comes to happiness. Their behaviour is different. Their outlook is different. […]

Ikigai translates as ‘a reason to live’ or ‘a reason to jump out of bed in the morning’. It’s the place where your needs, desires, ambitions, and satisfaction meet: a point of perfect balance, and perfect fulfilment. On the Japanese island of Okinawa, people live longer than anywhere else in the world. There, finding your […]