Happy Guide will empower you to become happy and healthy if you put your attention to it.
The best way to start is to read Happy Guide over and over until it crystallizes in your mind. It’s been kept as short as possible without leaving anything out. One read won’t do it, knowing is not enough, you have to mentally own it.
The more you read it, the more it will sink in, the more your whole vision will clarify… Continue reading “Faith in the finish line”
Happy Guide is about the BIG STUFF and there’s not much you can do that will give you a bigger reward for no effort than QUALITY SLEEP.
It’s LITERALLY re-charging your batteries, so if you want full charge, be sure to leave yourself charging for the whole night!
There’s lots of reasons why we struggle to simply GET TO BED ON TIME…
Your body ADORES rhythm. It adores knowing what’s coming and that includes the types of foods it’s going to get and when, when it’s going to exercise and most importantly when it’s going to SLEEP… Continue reading “The number one tip for refreshing sleep”
If you want to get somewhere, you need a map.
Simple.
A map will tell you where the end destination is — and the quickest route…
If you want to be happy and healthy you also need a map.
The end destination is “happy and healthy.” Simple enough. But if you try to get there without a map I can tell you from experience, it’s a rocky road with many obstacles and pitfalls…
It took me a LONG TIME to figure it all out. Continue reading “X marks the spot”
A heart rate monitor is great because it tells you how hard you’re working.
It’s a doddle to use — put the strap around your chest and press a button on the watch and hey-presto, you can see how fast your heart is beating at a glance!
It’s great for you because it means you can exercise in your comfort zone AND get fit at the same time. It’s great for your body because it means you won’t push it into overdrive and you won’t be so laid-back that you’re not getting a benefit.
In short — it’s great because you work at the right level for YOU… Continue reading “Why use a heart rate monitor?”
You are not a car.
Your body parts don’t break and need fixing like a car. Your body is incredibly complex and works as a whole.
So whatever your health problem, you need a whole solution. Health isn’t one thing, it’s everything.
Address your whole lifestyle: nutrition, sleep, stress levels, drug and stimulant intake — and many other critical parts of the whole health equation…
But underlying these “what to do” parts is something of greater and more profound importance. And that is your habits… Continue reading “You are not a car”
Taking a break and doing a bit of reading, I came across this, from the famous book I AM THAT.
It’s a kind of beautiful summary of what the “Live in the Moment” chapter of Happy Guide is about.
Interestingly, he repeats over and over in the book, that all one need do is enquire “Who am I?” or simply go to the feeling “I AM.”
This is where you get to by using the Happy Guide method of “listening” and then paying full attention to your doing, your flow. It took him only 3 years of dedication to “I AM” to realize the truth, as outlined below… Continue reading “How to live in the present moment”
Max asks…
What does meditation do for you and what do you mean ‘go straight to the end state?’ I mean, if I could I would… isn’t that what I’m trying to do? How do I get there right away?
If I had to sum up the benefits of meditation in one word it would be this one: SANITY. You can break that down to…
Happiness is HAPPEN-NESS, playfulness is in the moment, love is who you are under the mind-chatter.
Once you’ve tried meditation for a while, you’ll see clearly that the way you were before was kind of like a bad dream, a bit mad, a bit insane.
The bad dream is the dream of ego — a false sense of self, caused by rapidly firing thought-habits you identify with.
In a practical sense, the end state of meditation is a perfectly still mind. That’s the condition for all that love, joy and happiness. There’s a wonderful line right at the beginning of the famous Yoga Sutras by Patanjali that simply says; “Yoga is the cessation of mind.”
I recommend going straight to the end-state — why? Because you can.
You can just do it right here and now and there’s nothing difficult to understand about a still mind, you can do it. I know you can do it right here and now, because I once tried out the Happy Guide method for stilling the mind (listening for the next thought to pop) on someone in a highly agitated anxious state, and it worked right away. If it can work for someone in that state, it can work for you.
The beauty of the Happy Guide method of listening is that the method is so easily dropped… it’s the tiniest step from listening as an “activity” to just being — an effortless awareness. Other methods can be problematic in that their effect is temporary (you end up relying on the method) or they’re not easily dropped (they become habits themselves).
All those rapidly firing thought-habits you identify with have momentum. At first, having a still mind is hard to maintain for more than a few seconds at a time. Yet, the only other thing you need is a persistence to keep applying the very simple method, and trust that the benefits I said can be yours will be yours.
Habitual mind-chatter is a bit like being dragged along and pulled under by a fast-moving current. And when you apply the listening method for a few seconds, you’re able to bob your head up out of the water before being swept under again. It’s hard to maintain awareness for more than a few seconds because of momentum of the mind. But as you commit to the method more and more, you’ll be able to keep your head out more and more until soon enough, it’s natural to you, you’re free — you’re home.
Michael Kinnaird is the author of Happy Guide, the result of a 20 year exploration into what works for health and happiness.
Read Chapter 1 “The Happiness Secret”
Or get the paperback…
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It’s just a decision but a decision with a difference — it’s unshakable!
It’s the kind of decision we would make for our children — calm, sure, solid, good decisions for the best outcome.
And that outcome — the thing we want for our children is not necessarily what they want right now.
So they can kick and scream! Not unlike our own minds when we try to enforce a decision on ourselves!
With our children we have unshakable calm resolve. The big picture is crystal clear and of course it’s not us having the tantrum :-) But following through with our own decisions isn’t always so easy… Continue reading “Your pact — a sure-fire step to a new you”
I wanted to tell you about what happened to a Happy Guide reader called Matt because it’s a great case study, showing how quickly things can turn around.
It shows what’s possible when you start giving your body what it needs!
Here’s what happened…
We first heard from Matt when he left this comment on Mike’s unwanted thoughts article…
Today I realized how out of control my mind has become. Over the last few months It feels as though I’ve lost control of my thoughts and I’ve slowly slipped into the beginning of a deep depression. I spent much of my teenage years in that rut so I don’t want to go back. Somehow I got over that, but it took years. I can feel the darkness once again and it is almost enough to make me want to knock myself out and not wake back up.
Reading what you have said on how to stop the problem has given me that hope that I can stop it before it destroys me again. I was doing exactly what you said not to do to try and stop it. I was so terrified I was going to get taken down again and this time not get out. Just seeing how I am suppose to help myself in print makes it a lot easier for me to believe that it can actually help me. You and your website and the methods you explain are my weapon against my unwanted thoughts. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Matt, 29 August
Although I was pleased that Matt had found the article so helpful, I was well aware that in terms of lifestyle, everything affects everything else. This was just one of the six lifestyle elements for a happy, healthy life.
I knew he would need to get his biochemistry right if he was going to see the back of depression for good. So I emailed him, and Matt has kindly allowed us to post the resulting conversation here… Continue reading “Case study — from depressed to happy in 11 days”
One of my favorite subjects — spirituality. Just who are we? I’ve been reading and practicing for over 20 years and I can tell you that this is really all you need to know about it. It’s one line from the Tao Te Ching translated by Stephen Mitchell… Continue reading “All you need to know about spirituality”
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