The Hindu Business Line : Happiness should be the natural state

To live positively, here's help from Edward de Bono: H+ (Plus). The book, published by Vermilion (www.randomhouse.co.uk), is about what may be `a new religion', comprising happiness, humour, help, hope and health. "The emphasis is not on sins that are to be avoided but on things that are to be done," writes de Bono on the positive emphasis of H+. "It is not enough to sit in a corner and perfect yourself," he urges. "You perfect yourself only by contributing to your fellow human beings and the world around."

Positive actions are `pons', such as helping an old lady across the road or teaching a child to read, says de Bono.

"H+ is more than thinking good thoughts and having good intentions. H+ requires positive action that makes a positive difference in the world around you." Which is why, `pons are central to H+'. Have a series of pons to carry you through the day, and they become `pontoon'! Remember that pons are usually `not planned in advance'. They are `small, spontaneous acts of help and contribution'.

The first H is `human', shorn of negative aspects such as `fear, violence, aggression, and deceit'. In the H+ framework, `the only thing you hate is hatred itself.' Make happiness a deliberate habit, `not just the feeling when everything is perfect,' advises de Bono. "Happiness should be the natural state and unhappiness an interruption, just as a cold or a headache are interruptions in your normal state of health."

Thinking is the most fundamental human skill, says the author. But our traditional thinking habits are judgment based — to recognise a situation and provide a standard answer. "Judgment brings the past into the future." Instead try design, to bring the future into the present. "You can analyse the past but you have to design the way forward." Amazingly, "teaching thinking to unemployed young people increased the employment rate five fold." Also, it reduced the crime rate.

To the author humour is important because it is `a key lubricant of life'. It is a social glue, the best anti-arrogance device, and the best for anti-despair too. "Humour is all about the possibility of looking at things in a different way." Don't lose heart when you find enemies to humour. For, "Anything that can be threatened by humour deserves to be threatened."

Talking about hope, one other ingredient of H+, writes de Bono, "Even when hope is completely deluded, it is always worth having hope." How does it help? "With the hope in H+ you seek to make things better. You also learn to `shrug' and become less of a hostage to the world around."

There is a saying in Tamil, Suvar irundhal thaan chittiram, which when translated reads, `You can draw only if there is a wall'. Means, you can do things only when you are fit. Echoing this, perhaps, is a snatch from de Bono's book: "Health is a baseline on which everything else is built. If you are not healthy you are not able to help others and may absorb help that could be better used elsewhere... If you are capable of being healthy, it seems careless not to try to be healthy."

A way of life worth trying out!

(Send in your health queries to BillOfHealth@gmail.com.)

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