Making a Positive Portfolio (E87)

Happiness for Cynics podcast

This week, Marie and Pete talk about how to reinforce your happiness by making a positive portfolio highlighting positive emotions.

Show notes

Positive Portfolio – 10 emotions (according to Barbara Fredrickson)

• Gratitude,
• Serenity,
• Interest,
• Hope,
• Pride,
• Amusement,
• Inspiration,
• Awe,
• Love, and
• Joy.

Transcript

[Happy intro music -background] 

M: Welcome to happiness for cynics and thanks for joining us as we explore all the things I wish I’d known earlier in life but didn’t.  

P: This podcast is about how to live the good life. Whether we’re talking about a new study or the latest news or eastern philosophy, our show is all about discovering what makes people happy.  

M: So, if you’re like me and you want more out of life, listen in and more importantly, buy in because I guarantee if you do, the science of happiness can change your life.  

P: Plus, sometimes I think we’re kind of funny. 

[Intro music fadeout] 

M: Hey, hey!

P: Hello happy people!

M: I’m happy today. Are you happy today?

P: I am happy today. I have one more day to reach before the end of term and then I have a week of no lectures. So, I’m feeling very positive.

M: Whoop, whoop!

P: Oh yeah, laugh.

M: I make an online purchase –

P: Oh!

M: – for my cats, a scratching post. So, it arrived yesterday and took it out of the box. I put it right next to where they love to hang out. And they have spent 24 hours non-stop… playing with the box.

P: Laughter! It’s like a two-year-old at Christmas.

M: Laugh, it is! Playing with the wrapping paper.

P: Laugh!

M: They’re enthralled, I even put a ball into the box and that just kicked off a whole other round of games.

P: Wow, laugh. What about the scratching post? Where did you put the scratch post? Laugh.

M: It’s just sitting next to the wall, hasn’t been touched. Laugh, unfortunately.

P: Hilarious.

M: But that is joy and play,

P: Mmm.

M: and they’re loving it.

P: Laugh.

M: So, that brings us to what we’re talking about today.

P: Which is…

M: Positive portfolios and how to make a positive portfolio. I am studying at the moment, it’s a year-long course at the Happiness Studies Academy and it’s run by Tal Ben Shahar, who’s the Harvard professor who wrote the book Happier.

M: And last week we covered off positive portfolios, the why, the science and what to do with it. And I just have to share this week –

P: Laugh.

M: – because I’ve gotten started on pulling it together, and it is such a simple thing that can bring so much emotion. I won’t say which ones yet, because we’ll get to that later.

P: Ok.

M: So much good and positive emotion into your life and either for yourself personally or with others. And it’s not something we do that much anymore. In a world of digital lives, we’re not creating tangible portfolios of things in the way that we used to.

P: Are you talking about scrapbooks?

M: …Yes. What was it that women used to make? Some mothers and grandmothers used to make boxes to give to their granddaughters for their wedding day.

P: Oh, the glory box?

M: Yes, Glory boxes!

P: Yes, yes. The glory box is a story.

M: It’s a box of emotions.

P: Ooh.

M: Yes.

P: I’m getting all sorts of images now. Like a little camphor box. My sister had a glory box. It was a camphor thing, and it was huge. All the treasures, all the generational treasures went into it so that when she married.

M: All the hand me downs, keepsakes, all that kind of stuff.

P: Mmm, yeah.

M: So, positive portfolios is what we’re talking about today. This idea came from James Pawelski and Alain de Botton, who are both pioneers in the field of happiness. And I’d actually read one of Alain’s books ages ago on philosophy, and one of the great things about Alain is he’s so well read.

P: Mmm.

M: And he brings together philosophy and psychology and sociology and history and brings them together in so many different and interesting ways. And we’ve got a couple of quotes here from James Pawelski, but really, what we’re talking about and what both of these positive psychology or happiness pioneers are talking about is positive portfolios, and all that is, is a bunch of things that you collect to reinforce an emotion.

P: It’s like picture books. You sort of go back over your picture books to remember events in your life.

M: Mmm hmm.

P: It’s why, before we had the digital age, I remember putting things into photo albums.

M: Yep.

P: And then you’d pull them out when you were having friends over for dinner and go, “let me take you through my trip to Italy.”

M & P: Laugh.

P: Bore everybody for hours, laugh.

M: And then you’d get a slide projector out.

P & M: Laughter!

P: Yes! Slide nights. We had slide nights. They were hilarious.

M: Or do you remember when you were little, burying a time capsule?

P: I never did that. They never got a chance to do that.

M: Things that were important to you.

P: Mmm, mmm. I like the idea, though, pulling something out of 50 years-time.

M: Of things that mattered to you then.

P: Mmm, mmm.

M: There were a couple of quotes you were going to share with us from James Pawelski.

P: There was. So, he’s talking about positive portfolio in the first one, and this one is that it’s a target for a group.

“Brainstorm what music, poems, pictures, letters, emails, cards, objects, and the like you could include in your portfolio. Place your portfolio in whatever binder, folder, or container works best given its contents.” [– James Pawelski]

P: So, that’s the instruction. But then he talks about the positive portfolio is intended to be a verbal, visual and auditory collection of materials conducive of a particular effective state. First, select what particular effective state you would like to practise. Be it Joy, Gratitude, Serenity, Interest, Hope, Pride, Amusement, Inspiration, Awe, or Love.

M: I love it. And those emotions that he’s mentioned there are from Barbara Fredrickson’s 10 big emotions. They’re the big things that are super cool. So, it’s saying again we’ll go again because we’re going to make you guys at home do this. And Pete and I both gotten started on doing this.

P: Laugh. Which is rather fun, I’ve got to say. I actually quite enjoyed this little task. Yeah, it did bring me a lot of joy to be honest. It was like, ‘Oh, this is kind of inspiring.’

M: I’ve loved it as well. So, what emotion did you pick, Pete?  

P: Well, I chose two, but I’m going to choose the one that I did have, which is love. So, a love portfolio.

M: So, the emotions you can pick, the 10 big emotions, according to Barbara Fredrickson, positive emotions, are:  

• Gratitude,
• Serenity,
• Interest,
• Hope,
• Pride,
• Amusement,
• Inspiration,
• Awe,
• Love, and
• Joy.

P: What’s interest, Marie? What would you put in that?

M: For me, it would be all of these books on positive psychology.

P: Laugh.

M: The practice of doing this podcast just shows my interest in this topic. I went on a bent a while ago with philosophy, which is where I first discovered Alain de Botton.

P: Mmm.

M: And then before that, I went on a classics… and so Jane Eyre and…

P: Oh, wow.

M: Everything that’s on the top 100 books you should read in your lifetime. I read the whole thing.

P: Like I said, you devour books.

M: Laugh, I do. Sometimes it’s been baking and learning how to do the fancy baking. Not so much since I found out I’m gluten intolerant and dairy intolerant because that really limits how much baking you can do.

P: It certainly does limit the baking you can do.

M: Laugh.

P: Yeah, gluten free flours doesn’t behave the same, I’m sorry. Laugh!

M: No, and neither does almond milk compared to normal milk.

P: Laugh, no.

M: Not the same at all. But there are so many things out there, and we talk about nowadays the importance of lifelong learning and having interest. And recently I’ve been really interested and looking into van life and tiny home.

P: Laugh!

M: So that’s been what’s on my YouTube video watching.

P: Ok, yeah, right.

M: So, look I’m one of those people that’s like ‘Ooh, something shiny!’

P: Laugh.

M: And off I go. And at the moment for you, I’d say a lot of what you’re probably finding interesting is through your studies.

P: Oh, completely. Yeah, I’m totally obsessed and a huge nerd. It’s ridiculous. I know everybody in my classes.

M & P: Laugh.

P: [Whispering class-mates] ‘Shut him up!’ Laugh.

M: It’s not about them. It’s all about you.

P: Laugh, I can be selfish? I did. I did make that choice this morning, so we were about to do our lecture and usually I try not to answer all the questions. And my lecturer sent me a private message, and he could see me mouthing the words. He said, ‘Peter, your muted.’

M: Laugh.

P: And I wrote back to say, ‘There’s a reason I’m muted, I don’t want to appear like a Hermione Granger.’

M & P: Laugh!

P: And he wrote back saying, ‘We love Hermione Granger’s!’ So, today I decided to be a Hermione Granger and just answer every single question as it came up, and we got through the lecture in an hour and a half that’s supposed to take two hours.

M & P: Laugh.

M: And you know what, everyone else in the room would have been like, ‘Woo hoo, 30 minutes back!

P: Laugh! There you go.

M & P: Laugh!

P: But we digress. Back to positive portfolios.

M: So, you picked love?

P: I did.

M: And I picked joy.

P: Mmm.

M: So, really keen to just share.

P: Share?

M: We’ve actually had some really great feedback from quite a few of our listeners who, I cannot thank you enough for bothering to listen to little Pete and me.

P & M: Laugh.

P: Always feels a bit embarrassing when people say ‘Oh, I love your podcast.’ And I’m like, ‘Oh, really?

M: Oh, shit. What am I going to say?

P: Laugh. We just chat.

M: Laugh, so this is time for us to share a little bit. So, I’m really keen to understand what your portfolio would look like. So, would you put it in a binder, or is it in a drive or a folder on your computer or is it a physical thing?

P: I think I would have to be a physical thing. Yeah, mine would have to be like a suitcase that you would unpack, and I put items out on a table so that everyone could sort of see what represented, what was representative for me, but also maybe bring their own meaning to it.

M: I love it. So, what would you put in your [love portfolio]?

P: All right. So, the first one, you’re going to laugh at, is massages.

M: Oh, we know that your love language is touch.

P: Laugh, yeah.

M: So, giving or receiving massage?

P: Both. I’ve always said this, and it’s very interesting now that I am studying a different degree and looking at doing a career change. There’s a lot of my long-term clients that are like, ‘are you still gonna massage when you’re a physio and I’m like, Yeah, I’m pretty sure I will, because I love that space. I love the intimacy of it. I love the investment in it. It’s the quiet space. And it’s a non-verbal activity, which I just adore because to me, the body doesn’t lie, laugh.

M: Hold on. So, when I come in and get a massage and just ramble the whole time, you’re like, ‘far out…’

P: Laugh.

M: ‘Shut up.’

P: Laugh, well, you listen to Disney in your massages, so that’s okay.

M & P: Laugh.

M: Okay, So massages in your love portfolio.

P: Definitely.

M: So, what else?

P: Cuddles on rugs, so rugs are a part of it because it’s textural. It’s like I have thick rugs in my house.

M: Tactile.

P: Yeah, very tactile. Big thick shag pile rugs and cuddles on rugs, there’s something about lying on the floor because you’re not incumbered by a defined space. You can roll everywhere, and you can be really physical, and you’re still on the rug. I mean, I have big rugs, so that kind of work for me.

M & P: Laugh.

P: Dinners or picnics, food. Food is very much a part of my love category.

M: You love cooking.

P: Yes, definitely. To cook and sit with a dinner with a loved one is very special. It’s there’s a, there’s a chemistry in it, there’s a visceral partaking of so many senses that are involved with dinners and so forth that I love.

M: So, make sure you keep an eye on your portfolio, so it doesn’t go mouldy.

P: Laugh. That’s all right, every time I open it, I have to cook a new dish that works for me.

M: All right, they don’t stay in the portfolio.

P: Laugh.

M: They get consumed and then logged in words.

P & M: Laugh!

P: Then there’s vistas, so, awe inspiring nature scenes, whether it be an ocean, a mountain. One thing that I’m really missing at the moment is going for a drive in the mountains, and I think that’s a real, that’s something that I would share with love and include in love simply because of the amazing depth of feeling that I get from being out in nature.

M: Would you have to share that with someone for it to fall in your love portfolio?

P: No, definitely not, it’s something that you can do solo that is still involved in love. Yeah, it’s definitely both.

M: Is it self-love? Is that what you’re talking about?

P: Yeah.

M: Freedom for yourself.

P: Yeah, for sure. Yeah. Going for solo drives is a is a bit of a passion of mine. And I’ve done it in Sydney with this lovely Royal Botanical Park, which is down south. And when I first bought my little red convertible, I drove down there with opera playing and the top was down and it was sunny, and I felt so ebullient. It was, it was like I was in a movie set.

M: Mmm.

P: It was so good. And that’s self-love for me. Real treats.

M: Love it.

P: Wine, of course.

M & P: Laugh.

P: More food. Me and my wines. I’ve actually yes, I’ve actually been rediscovering my passion for wine, and it’s, uh yeah, it’s I get inside wine, and I want to get involved with it. Try different things and the colours and the flavours and so forth.

M: Mmm.

P: Linen tablecloths. Again, it’s a textural thing.

M: That mean love?

P: Yeah, that means love for me, because I have the tablecloth, which is a damask tablecloth from my mother that was given to her by her mother when she was 18.

M: See, there’s the love.

P: Yeah, So that’s a love thing.

M: The meaning.

P: Definitely. Yeah. totally. And it’s funny that Mum, I don’t think she ever used it. It sat in the cupboard for years, and she gave it to me, and I used it straight away. I was like, Dinner party, let’s come over and, you know someone spills a red wine stain on it and I’m like, ‘Meh, that’s fine, that’s what bi-carb’s for.’ Laugh.

M: And that’s love. There’s a story behind it now. And you know what? Our parents and our parents, parents, had the good set and the not so good set.

P: Yes! I don’t get this! It doesn’t make sense.

M: It doesn’t make sense to us, because it all costs the same now. And it’s cheap as chips. But for them, you know, you don’t want the kids ruining your fine China when it costs… You know, you get one set for marriage, and that’s it.

P: Yeah. Yeah, I get that it’s precious but.

M: We’re the throwaway generation.

P: Yeah, alright we are.

M: Yeah.

P: But I think I think a good a good cracking of China on a good story because someone got so excited when they were talking about Shakespeare, and they threw the plate against the wall. Well, I think that’s a story, laugh.

M: Yeah, but it never happens that way. It’s that Bob put his elbow down on the edge of the plate and I went flying.

P& M: Laugh!

M: That’s the reality.

P: Laugh, there’s always a Bob.

M & P: Laugh!

M: Yep.

P: Maybe we have different dinner parties.

M & P: Laugh.

P: I have people throwing things at walls, laugh. I do remember a rather wonderful dinner party I hosted in Townsville in my first job. And it was a four-course roast dinner in Townsville, which is, you know, 45 degrees at the best of days.

M: Mmm hmm.

P: And we had cigars and we were smoking and having red wine. And the three of us were getting into a bit of an animated discussion, and Avril stood up on the chair to make a point. So, then Benjamin stood up on the chair to make a point as well. And I went ‘Oh, bugger this, if you guys are getting up, I’m getting up.’ So, we all stood on chairs and battered out this argument.

M: Laugh, I was waiting for one of you to fall through the chair, but no?

P: No, completely fine. Laugh.

M: All right. Last one?

P: Sunsets.

M: Oh. I’m glad you said sunsets and not sunrises. Laugh.

P: No, Sunsets. Sunsets, yeah. There’s something very quietly reassuring about a sunset, yeah.

M: All right. I’m gonna fly through my joy portfolio.

P: Ok.

M: But mine includes Martinis.

P: Laugh!

M: And Veuve.

P: Ahh! I’m so glad you said that.

M: The songs that bring me joy, Carl Orff – Carmina Burana.

P: Ooh, oh! [panting]

M: It’s such powerful music.

P: I swear if I was allowed to…

M: And I Love Adiago for Strings as well.

P: Mmm.

M: Lately in the Club by Thomas Newsom, he’s a favourite amongst friends.

P: Mmm.

M: Into the Unknown by Indina Menzel.

P: Laugh!

M: Is also a favourite among friends at the moment.

P: Laugh.

M: For a very long time, Stuck in The Middle with You.

P: Yeah.

M: I used to play volleyball and was a middle blocker and hated it.

P: Laugh!

M: All the Lovers by Kylie Minogue, brings so many good dance memories.

P: Oh! Who doesn’t love Kylie?

M: I was playing that, as we joined today.

P: Laugh.

M: Be our Guest from Beauty & the Beast.

P: Yes!

M: Heaven by DJ Sammy.

P: Oh.

M: And Operation Blade – Public Domain.

P: I don’t know that one.

M: Definitely brings back memories from about 2000.

P: Wow.

M: And we were clubbing a lot at that point.

P: Laugh.

M: So, I’ve got quite a few quotes here as well that just brings me joy, so I’ll read a few of them.

“If you have good thoughts, they will shine out of your face like sunbeams, and you’ll always look lovely.” – Roald Dahl

P: Oh, that’s lovely. Oh, that’s good.

M: Okay,

“People are just as happy as they make up their minds to be.” – Abraham Lincoln

P: Very true.

M: Yeah.

“When I was five years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, I wrote down happy. They told me I didn’t understand the assignment. I told them they didn’t understand life.” – John Lennon

P: Laugh! Wow, that’s brilliant.

M: “We don’t laugh because we’re happy. We’re happy because we laugh. –

William James.

P: Mmm.

M: And,

“We don’t stop playing because we grow old. We grow old because we stop playing.” –

George Bernard Shaw.

P: Yeah, very much agree with that.

M: Immanuel Kant, just new things long before we did. Rules for happiness.

“Something to do, someone to love, something to hope for.” – [Immanuel Kant]

P: Mmm.

M: I think I’ll end with Maya Angelou.

“I laugh as much as I can and cry when I have to, without apology. I think that’s happy.”

P: Ooh, wow. Oh, that’s, that’s lovely.

M: Mmm hmm.

P: Yeah.

M: I would include some memorabilia in my box, so I would actually go get one of those dollar shop boxes with a lid.

P: Laugh, yeah.

M: I’d have some photos from my days at George Mason on the volleyball team.

P: Aww.

M: Photos from World University Games and the opening ceremony which had hundreds of thousands of people.

P: Wow.

M: Which was amazing. Getting my black belt and getting my offer letter from Oxford University for Post Grad, that’s in there.

P: Wow.

M: And then photos. All of our overseas trips, our trips to Coffs Harbour, our gold medal at Good Neighbour.

P: Mmm. Laugh.

M: Pretty much any time I’ve been overseas, there are memories there that just bring me so much joy. And then I want to finish by recommending an artist, an Australian artist called Maree Davidson. And she creates amazing cartoon likes somewhat realistic, somewhat cartoon art of animals. So, she’s got a pair of donkeys here and some cute giraffes, and I’ve bought four pieces of artwork from her.

P: Laugh.

M: And they just, they’re slightly childish. But they’re just happy and joyful pieces of art.

P: Yeah.

M: And I love them.

P: Yeah, I love the rabbit.

M & P: Laugh.

M: And so, before we finish, we have this great idea that we’d love to challenge our readers to do.

P: Mmm hmm.

M: And that Pete and I’ve been talking about. So, we’re in lockdown in Australia. But as soon as we’re out, we are going to start curating our own emotion museum exhibitions in our own homes and inviting our friends over to experience these emotions. And so, one of the things that I think is such shame is when people pull together or curate museum exhibitions, they tend to group their exhibitions around things like the period or the medium. It might be all sculptures. It might be all oil on canvas, etcetera, or it might be genre, so it could all be postmodern art.

P: Mmm.

M: And what I love about this is that you’re curating items around, an emotion that you want others to feel.

P: Mmm.

M: And I think we have just decided, and we’re gonna be inviting our friends as well, to pick some of these emotions out of a hat and bring friends over to experience that emotion in a way that is subjective and means something to you but that hopefully you can share with others and you can add music, you can add movies, you could add performances of any kind, artistic performances, as well as do something just as cheap as printing off some prints and hanging them up on the wall to help people feel these emotions.

P: Love it. Very immersive.

M: That’s what I love. As far as your own portfolio goes. If you pick one of those emotions or all 10 and create them, make sure that you go back to them over time and look at them again so that you can re-experience the emotion that goes with that. And it’s something that we’re doing less of nowadays, but it is very important.

P: Yes, tangible. Having something tangible to actually trigger those memories and reflect.

M: Yep, and it’s something that if you are in lockdown, you can still do.

P: Mmm.

M: So, on that note, we’re going to wrap up.

P: Laugh, homework people! Let us know how you go.

M: Do your homework!

P & M: Laugh!

M: And we might actually pay some photos of some of the things in both of our portfolios for everyone to see.

P: Yes.

M: All right. Thank you for joining us, and we’ll see you again next week.

P: Have a happy week.

[Happy exit music – background] 

M: Thanks for joining us today if you want to hear more, please remember to subscribe and like this podcast and remember you can find us at www.marieskelton.com, where you can also send in questions or propose a topic. 

P: And if you like our little show, we would absolutely love for you to leave a comment or rating to help us out. 

M: Until next time. 

M & P: Choose happiness.  

[Exit music fadeout] 

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