empathy

Happiness for Cynics podcast

In this extended episode, Marie interviews best-selling author and founder of The Resilience Project, Hugh van Cuylenberg, about all thing’s resilience. Laugh with them as they delve into why Aussies are such cynics and learn how Hugh gets his message through to some of the world’s biggest cynics, from the meanest footie players to corporate hotshots. 

Transcript

M: You’re listening to the podcast Happiness for Cynics. I’m Marie Skelton and on today’s show we have a special guest.

Hugh van Cuylenberg has been working in education for over 15 years. The highlight of his teaching career was the year he spent in the far north of India, volunteering and living at an underprivileged school in the Himalayas. It was here that he discovered resilience in its purest form.

Inspired by this experience, he returned to Melbourne and The Resilience Project was born. Having completed his post graduate studies looking at resilience and wellbeing, Hughes developed and facilitated programmes for over 900 schools around Australia for the National Rugby League, The Australian Cricket Team, The Australian Netball Team, The Australian Women’s Soccer Team, The Jillaroos, 10 AFL teams, and he has presented to over 500 corporate groups. Hugh is also the best-selling author of The Resilience Project.

Hope you enjoy today’s show.

[Happy Intro Music]

M: So thank you for joining us today on the Happiness for Cynics podcast Hugh, I’m excited to have you on the show.

H: My pleasure, it’s an absolute pleasure.

M: So for those listeners who don’t know you or your background, would you mind sharing with us your personal story and what led you to dedicate your career to helping people find happiness and resilience?

H: Yeah, well, that’s a great question, because it kind of. There’s been a few moments in my life where things have happened that I guess have kind of led me to what I do now. And I think that’s pretty common for everyone. Like, we all can look back in our lives and pick out little moments that have had influence on the reason we are, you know, the reason we are the way we are and so often the really fascinating thing is that they’re things that at the time were incredibly painful or incredibly difficult. Or at the time we just thought, why is this happening to me? This is so unfair. I just wish this wasn’t happening. But so often they’re the things that actually get us through… Well, shape the kind of person we turned out to be.

So there’s an amazing lyric in the song, the song called ‘Let Go’ [by Frou Frou] by a group called I think It’s either Froo Froo or Frau Frau, I’ve never known. It’s in the Garden State album, it’s a wonderful, wonderful album. The Garden State Album and the lyric is ‘[cause] there’s beauty in the breakdown’. And I, I think about that often when chatting to people who are going through something really difficult, it’s often the kind of thing that will turn out to define them. And I kind of feel like that’s what sort of shaped, I suppose, my direction.

For me obviously, you know, being in mental health and talking about resilience my, my little sister Georgia, when she was 14 years old was diagnosed with a mental illness, Anorexia Nervosa, and that was a huge shock to the system for my family because we were a very, very happy family and everything was great and we never had any, anything difficult, really. Life was, well certainly I wasn’t aware of it when I was a child, life was perfect, really. And then my sister stopped eating when she was 14, I was 16 and my brother was 11. She just stopped eating and it was devastating. And it was when she was 18 years old, she was admitted to hospital because she’d dropped below crisis weight. She was not a short person. She was weighing in at 31 kilograms when she was admitted to hospital.

M: [Shocked noise]

H: And yeah. Oh, really devastating stuff. But I remember having a moment and I can’t remember where in that journey of her mental illness it was. But I remember very clearly having a moment of sitting at the dinner table and my dad, my dad was crying. And, you know, I think a lot of people who see their dad crying for the first time, it’s a pretty… it rocks you.

M: Mm hmm.

H: It wasn’t the first time I saw him cry, but the other time I’d seen him crying was when we lost, our dog passed away, Sammy, he was like, 17. So he’d been with us for a long time and Dad cried then and then a few years later, I saw him crying for my sister for how sick she was. And that’s when I remember having this very strong feeling of ‘Oh my God, my family is so unhappy.’ And that’s very foreign to us and I remember at that point … just thinking, ‘What is it that the people do to be happy, like what? Is there anything I could do to help Mom and Dad be happy?’

Or I mean, I felt like my sister’s mental illness was a bit beyond me, but I remember thinking, I reckon I could help my brother be happy, and I reckon I could help my mom and dad be happy. And that’s… but, I didn’t know. I was 18 and I had no idea what the answer was or um, I can’t remember how old I was, but I was in my teens. I remember thinking ‘I’ve got no idea what I should do to help. But gosh, I wonder what I could do?’

Anyway, it wasn’t until I was 28 years old that I was living… It wasn’t like every day I was walking around thinking, ‘What can I do to be happy? What can I do?’ And I sort of, I’d become a primary school teacher, thinking that I can help kids in primary schools by being a positive influence in their life but I had no idea. I actually went to a girls school to teach at a girls school and people often questioned why I did that thing. It’s a bit of a strange thing to do for a young male. There are no males teaching in girls schools or girls schools primary schools, [I was] the only one.

M: Mm Hmm.

H: And I’d go to all the other school association events, and it’s like, cross country athletics, and I was the only male teacher there in all the girl, all girls primary schools. But it was just because I’ve had this feeling like I could somehow have a positive influence on them. I could maybe stop them getting a mental illness, which is the most outrageous thing to think.

M: [Laugh]

H: But that’s what I was thinking. But yeah, I just remember having this kind of, I guess moment of..

Oh sorry. there was that, but then when you fast forward to when I was in India, 28 years old was living in India and I was volunteering in a school community. When I got there, I thought, ‘Oh my God, there’s no way I’m going to stay here.’ I’m meant to be here for two weeks, but I I’m embarrassed to admit to you now that I said to the principal on night one, “Oh I actually meant two nights, I just meant two nights.” because I was thinking ‘I can’t sleep on the floor, I can’t sleep on the floor here for two weeks.’

M: The culture shock is huge isn’t it?

H: It’s massive. Yeah. I’m thinking, ‘I can’t walk half an hour down to the river to get water every day. I’m not gonna sit in the river for a bath, like that’s just not going to happen.’ Um, but I remember on my first day in the school, which I planned to be my second last day in the whole community, I met a kid who was nine years old and slept on the floor like everyone else. But I remember thinking to myself, ‘I have never in my life seen joy like this before.’

M: Mm hmm.

H: ‘This kid’s the happiest person I’ve ever met. I’ve never seen anything like him. How incredible. How is it this kid’s so gleefully happy?’ And I remember I was living with the principal and I remember I went back to his little mud hut, and I was just, I said, “No, I think I need to stay a bit longer.” And the reason I wanted to stay longer is I was thinking ‘What do these people do every day that makes [them happy], what does this kid do that makes [him happy]?’

It wasn’t just this kid, it’s everyone right. Everyone is just so full of joy. I remember looking out the hole in this, well it wasn’t a window. It was like a hole in the mud brick wall at this school. I’m looking across thinking ‘there’s nothing here, there’s nothing in this village. Like I mean, there’s a beautiful view of the Himalayas, and that’s about it. I don’t know what these people are so full of joy.’ So I lived… I decide to stay there as long as it would take me to work out what it is those people do every day that makes them so happy.

And I ended up staying for three and a half months, and in three and a half months I saw three things. I mean, there were many things going on. I mean, they were surrounded by awe all the time.

M: Mm hmm.

H: There’s a beautiful book by Julia Baird ‘Phosphorescence’ where she talks about just being surrounded by awe is so, such a good thing for your mental health. So they were in the middle of the Himalayas. But I watched what those people did. And every day they practised:

Gratitude

Empathy, and

Mindfulness.

They’re the three things that were a daily practise. I joined in and it had a profound impact on me.

And I feel like I’ve moved away from your question a little bit here. I’ve just given my life story now.

M: [Amused voice] You’re answering my second question.

H: Oh.

M: So, so please keep going. [Laugh]

For our listeners who haven’t yet read your book, and I highly recommend it. Can you give us just a little bit of an overview on, on those three things and maybe how they came about through your time in India?

H: Yeah, so I guess. Sorry for skipping to it before.

M: [Laugh] Not at all.

H: So I guess. Are we acknowledging for this that this is the second time we’ve done this?

M: [Laugh] Sshh! [It’s a ] Secret that I didn’t record this properly somehow. [Laugh]

H: I think it’s a lovely example. One of the, one of the keys to experiencing more joy is to embrace your imperfections. And I think it’s a lovely thing to do.

M: [Laugh]

H: I think that my saying we forgot to record this the first time. [Laugh]

M: Yes. I am very grateful that you were gracious enough to do this all over again.

H: Not a problem, not a problem.

M: [We’ll] put it that way.

H: No, no not a problem. So yes. So the three things I saw them practise every day was gratitude, empathy and mindfulness. I would listen to them. I would watch these kids in particular this Boy I spoke about before stands out and like when he saw something he is grateful for, he would just stop and pointed out to me, and he would try and say the word ‘this’ but couldn’t pronounce the ‘th’ so he’d say ‘dis’. As people who’ve read the book will know. He’d say “Sir, dis! Dis, dis, dis,” you know, whether it was his shoes that were too small because he can’t afford to buy new shoes. But he was pointing at them saying “How lucky am I, I’ve got shoes on my feet. Some of the kids here don’t have shoes. How lucky am I?”

Whether it was the rice he got for lunch every day, he only got rice every single day. Just rice. That’s it, from the school. But he couldn’t afford to bring lunch to school. So the fact they got provided lunch. “Sir, dis, dis, dis.” Look I get fed here every day. How lucky am I? Moments he loved. If he realises in a good moment, you know, he’d stop and he would just point out the things he was really grateful to have like the things that were happening.

He loved Bollywood dancing, so often I would walk past him and he was doing a ridiculous, choreographed Bollywood dance, but he’d say “Sir, dis, dis, dis.” What he was saying was, ‘I’m so lucky I’m doing this right now.’ That’s actually a really, that was quite a life changing, I won’t say moment but a realisation for me. We need to get better  at paying attention to the good stuff as it happens.

Like for so many people around Australia right now who can think about the things they miss doing, due to Covid. I mean, for me here in Melbourne, I miss so much going to cafes and having lunch and coffee with my friends. But when you think back to the last time you were in a cafe having coffee with your friends your going ‘God the sun’s right in my eyes here or this table’s a bit wobbly or this coffee isn’t great. I should’ve ordered that meal.

We’ve just become so spoiled and we needed everything to be perfect in order to have a good time. And I think back to this kid Tsunsen who, if something was good, he would stop and he would just say “dis”. Now I’m not saying [to] everyone listening that every time you see something good, you should say this, but I think we’ve got to be better, and actually stop and absorbing the good stuff that happens and just say this right now is pretty special.

M: Mm hmm.

H: So that’s what I saw, him practising gratitude every day. He’s the kindest person I’ve ever seen. Like I’ve never seen someone who does more for other people. I went from teaching this school here where the kids had nothing and were so full of joy. And I actually went back to teaching at Gelong Grammar School, renowned for positive education and an incredible program that they’re doing now. I mean, it’s life changing for so many people and it’s been so influential in Australia and the world in education. But I had a real problem with, I found it more confronting being there where the kids had everything.

M: Mm hmm.

H: They’re the most privileged. We’re talking about the most privileged kids in the country. My gosh, I was… I only lasted there for about I think it was a term or two terms. I couldn’t handle the… how confronting it was, with kids who had everything were just… were so unhappy with everything they had. Like they needed everything, they needed the best things to be happy they needed this, they needed that and so on. So overindulged I suppose. Um, and I mean, all kids need, I just remember thinking I can’t be here. I need to be somewhere where the kids…

What I saw with this community in India is these kids were so unbelievably kind. This kid particular, if he saw, if they saw someone by themselves straight over to them “just checking you’re ok. Do you want to come play with us?” If someone wasn’t in school he would swing past their mud hut after school and say ‘Hey, just checking in, are you ok?’ Now, I’m not. I didn’t mean to draw a comparison to say that Gelong Grammar kids aren’t kind. That’s not the case at all. They’re very kind kids but I think that any school I went to would struggled to compare to what I’m seeing in this little village.

And mindfulness, they practised it every single day. They had a half an hour meditation before school, every single day. It was optional, so no one had to be there. Yet every single child turned up for it, and I think essentially because they just got instinctively how good it was for them.

M: Yep. I’m really keen to circle back. So you mentioned the pain of experiencing along with your sister what she was going through and that pain of your family and definitely Happiness for Cynics, the podcast has come out of me being quite cynical and really quite privileged as well as everyone is in Australia. Let me just say.

H: Yeah

M: But then going through trauma, I’m interested to know is there any hope for people who want to be happy? But I don’t feel like we should have to put them through trauma or pain to get that change to happen or with your work with kids who have everything and really are privileged. Do you really need to… short circuit something in their lives to make them rethink the way they’re living and truly appreciate things?

H: The two ways we address that, and no you don’t have to go through, I mean, it’s often the case, right? It’s often the case that, you have lived this yourself.

M: Mm hmm.

H: It takes trauma. It takes something difficult to think that ‘I need to make some changes’ or for a lot of people [who] are going through Covid, especially in Melbourne. People are saying ‘Well, you know what? This is the time to make some serious changes.’ And a lot of people have done that, and so a lot of people will be better off when we get through this.

M: Mm Hmm.

H: And we had zero cases today, which is very exciting.

M: Yep.

H: But when we get through this, people will be, there will be a lot of people who are better off emotionally and spiritually because they’ve made some changes that they never would have made.

M: Yep.

H: So for me there are a lot of things I wouldn’t have done if it wasn’t for Covid, like, I’ve stopped watching television at night now and I go into our front room, and I have this routine that I do every night, which, it sounds weird, but like I’ll do a certain amount of push-ups, 10 minutes of core, stability, strengthening stuff. Then I do this, [laugh], like I’m a sprinter and I’ve got terrible hamstrings. So I do this, like hamstring exercise every night, and it takes about half an hour, half an hour of exercise, I drink lots of water. While I’m in there I have a green tea, I have the lights dimmed and I listen to like meditation or like yoga music.

M: Mm hmm

H: And then I go out, I have really healthy food afterwards. Pretty much go to bed. I have some like yogurt and nuts and muesli and stuff like that and I don’t turn the television on and I listen to really calming music and I go to bed. That’s so much healthier than what I was doing before. I was like watching television, have a couple of beers on the couch watching telly.

M: Mm hmm.

H: If I can’t find something on television, I’ll just find something else, I’ll watch just whatever it takes. So that’s me, like who’s in a pretty good place for making some changes. I know some people have made some pretty drastic changes, but that’s not answering your question at all. So I’ll come back to your question, Marie. Sorry.

M: [Laugh]

H: So the reason. So the way I feel like we have been reasonably successful in impacting people’s lives who haven’t gone through something traumatic or didn’t feel like they needed to. There’s two ways:

Number one is modelling.

So I think the most powerful influence anyone’s behaviours to model the behaviours. So I think modelling how powerful that stuff can be has a huge influence and parents out there listening, going ‘Hey, but how does my kids don’t want to hear this stuff? How do I tell my kids?’ You model this stuff to your kids, do this stuff yourself, and you watch what happens when, you know, if your kids or you might be thinking my kids and teenagers, they hate this stuff. They’re watching you right now, like kids are watching to see how we respond to a crisis. So the values that you are modelling now will have a big impact on the kind of person they decide to be when it’s time for them to grow up and be a normal human being. And they’re trying to work out. How do I show up in the world? Well, the way you’re acting now is going to have a big impact on that and what you’re modelling.

And the second way that we I believe we have an impact on people who potentially, you know, thinking ‘I don’t know this stuff. I’m fine. Or I’m not going though anything traumatic. I’m going OK.’

[Number two] I think the way we get through to people is just with stories.

So we don’t get up and say, this is the definition of gratitude, this is the definition of… This’s why you should practise… We just tell stories about people who have gone through this stuff. People who practise it, the impact it’s had on them. Storytelling, we love stories, like people remember stories, we remember stories. We don’t remember stats, statistics, definitions, we remember stories and storytelling is you know, it’s the currency of so many, you know. You do to the pub with your friends, your currency is storytelling. You’re involved in sporting club, you know your currency is storytelling, so that’s what we listen to it. That’s what we love. And so using stories to engage people on this journey is, I think, a really powerful tool.

M: So would you say that was your secret or the way to get the change in the attention of footie player as well, I just I have this image of you standing in front of rooms of these big, competitive mean footy players and them rolling their eyes at you. And obviously, you know in the book that they went in that way to a lot of the sessions that you held for them. But they’ve asked you to come back-

H: Yeah

M: -again and again. And there’s been so many life changing stories off the back of it.

H: You know, it’s amazing.

M: Is it the story telling? is that it? Is that the secret?

H: Yeah, well for the book. I just wrote all the stories out and Penguin Random House my publishers were just so happy with it. But then we had to go the players and say are you happy with this? And like, 90% of them said no. So there’s only a few left of them in the book, but one that’s left in the book is a beauty. It’s Nick Riewoldt, a legend from St. Kilda football club and he’s a friend now and I love him dearly. He’s a great person and I’ve always looked up to him immensely. I remember the first time I turned up to St. Kilda Footy Club. I was sitting down as the players were walking in, I was sitting next to the guy who organised the talk from the club and Nick went up to him and said,

“I don’t have to be here for this do I?”

And the well-being officer said “I would love it if you were.”

And he said “Mate, I don’t have time and I’d rather spend time on the massage table or see the physio.”

And he said “No, it’s compulsory.”

“I don’t want to do this.”

And then the guy said, by the way, this is Hugh here, he’s doing the talk.

“No offence mate. I don’t need to hear this stuff.”

Or words to that effect.

M: Mm hmm.

H: He was very, he was polite but he was also quite blunt. And they said “No, you have to stay.” And I remember two, maybe five. No it would have been five minutes in. I remember looking up and I saw him, he was in the back row and he had tears and his face, streaming down his face and his hat over his face and he couldn’t look up. And after a while he looked up and teammates would just pat him on the back during the talk. And it was, like, it was storytelling, like he was so engaged and the story is quite emotional, but the other thing that is so important is, with these guys is humour. They have to laugh if they’re not laughing they don’t want to be there.

And there’s nothing more rewarding and exciting than a room full of 45 very manly men, like this uproarious laughter you get when you… There’s a few go to gags or stories that I’ve got that get them every single time. There was one club I was at and they didn’t laugh at all. It was unbelievably awkward. So I had this big pause for laughter.

M: [Laugh]

H: Ahh… No one’s laughing here.

M: That was akward.

H: But yeah, it’s great. You just, so what I do with these men, well this for everyone’s first session. For the first five minutes, I was trying to get people to laugh. I think, you know, laughter is the most… Not saying I have an incredible sense of humour I just know some funny stories that happened to me and sense of humour is a super power, making people laugh is a super power.

M: Mm hmm.

H: If they’re laughing for the first time, it means they want to be there, they’re happy being there. You resonate with them, they kind of like you and go, ‘Yeah, I like this person, I’m happy to hear them and what he’s got to say. But you see it happening the first time, I see them going for it. And it’s not just, I had a group of magistrate, um judges from magistrates, like just the other, like on Friday, and I could see their [faces], like it was on zoom. But I could see the look on their faces of like, ‘how long is this going on for? I can’t believe I’m sitting here.’ And five minutes in I could see them going, because all of them are facing side on like pretending, they’re all like typing, pretending they were listening.

M: Ha, ha ha.

H: They were going [pretending] And five minutes in they were all leaning forward, they closed computer screens or whatever it is and they’re in and all I’ve done, I hadn’t talked about well-being, I hadn’t talked about happiness, hadn’t talked about gratitude and mindfulness you save that part ‘til you’ve got them. Like, a sense of humour. Laugh, laughter and storytelling is everything. I listen to lots of people talk about this stuff, these topics. A lot of people, a lot of people out there talking about this stuff, which is fantastic, the more the merrier. The ones I enjoy listening to most of the ones who make me laugh and the ones who tell a good story.

M: Do you think that is an Australian trait? Are we cynics by nature? And that’s why it’s that little bit harder to get engagement or is this worldwide that there is a resistance to a lot of this positive psychology, science and understanding?

H: No, I think it’s fair to say it’s quite an Australian thing. I go to New Zealand and even in New Zealand just across the, the… What is it?

M: Tasman.

H: Tasman, thanks.

M: [Laugh]

H: Across the beach to New Zealand. People were just in, I start talking, I don’t need to win people over. In America, oh my god, I was in America and I did, I was speaking to a college football team and I did my whole thing of, it’s such an Australian presentation like it’s really self-deprecating the first five minutes as well. I’m really self, I put myself down heaps. Australians don’t like thinking someone is like above them on a pedestal.

But the very fact that I’ve got a microphone that puts you on a pedestal and I try and get rid of that straight away. I’m just, like, ‘no I’m just like you guys.’

M: Mm hmm.

H: There’s like 80 people in an American football team. So I walk in there, they’re listening to hip hop music and dancing as I walked in, I was like, woah, these guys are pumped and I started speaking and I’m doing this putting myself down and saying I was terrible at sport, I can’t relate to you guys, you’re unbelievable blah, blah, blah. This guy stood up and goes “Hey, man, believe in yourself. You can do it!”

M: [Laugh] That would never happen here.

H: Yeah. In my head I’m like, nah I do believe in what I’m doing now. “I’m fine” I said. And then I said “guys try and model failure. I’ll probably stuff up that many times” and this guy goes, “Man, come on. Confidence is a blessing. You’ve gotta be confident in your ability.” And I was like, ‘Oh my God, this is not gonna work here’

M: [Laugh]

H: And it just didn’t work in the States because my style is so self-deprecating and I try to be so humble and like, ‘Hey, I’m not being anyone else, I’m just like you’, didn’t work in America.

M: Mm hmm.

H: So, I think it is a really Australian thing, like I have to spend the first five minutes of… huh it’s probably more males as well.

M: Mm hmm.

H: Like a group I worked with called Mecca, Mecca cosmetics. All females, oh they were wonderful like, I don’t have to prove myself to anyone. They were just like ‘we’ll hear what you have to say.’ But if I get a group of males, the first five minutes is like I’ve got to impress them and make them realise have to listen to me otherwise we’re not getting anywhere here. So in my experience of speaking overseas, you know, like in India, oh they love it, like absolutely love it.

M: Yep.

H: So, yeah, I think Australians are naturally a lot more cynical. I don’t know why we’re like that. I don’t know what it is, but we’re definitely more cynical here.

M: So look, I’m just going to point out and just leave this here that also men’s mental health is probably a lot worse and we’re coming to realise that men’s mental health is a really significant problem and suicide rates with men are much higher than women have been for quite a while. So just going to leave that there?

H: Yes.

M: I’m not implying causation or anything like that.

[Laughter]

H: It’s a fascinating one, like I’ll never forget this presentation I did up in a country town called Clermont, Claremont, I think it’s about four hours west of Townsville. It’s a mainly a beef cattle farming land, and I mean the suicide rates have been horrendous. And the pharmacist, a lovely guy, he is the local pharmacist he organised for me to go and speak in the community. And I said, “How are you going to get all these men to come?” Because there had been all those suicides for men and he said, “We’ll have it at the pub and we’ll call it like I don’t know, Jugs and Jocks night. I’ll provide all the jugs [of beer] if they come, they’re allowed of a jug free if they turn up and we’ll just wear jocks. And I said “Look, man, I’m not doing that.”

M: [Laugh]

H: A part of the thing didn’t work. He wore jocks and everything else, All the old blokes were like I’m not doing that. So every else wore their pants, except for him. But they got a free jug at the pub and a free meal if they came along and he said, and he said, “Oh, I’m inviting a bloke along who’s mates with Billy Slater and he’s mates with Johnathan Thurston, and he wants to tell us a few yarns and I was like, This is really fascinating. I got there, there’s 250 men there and he couldn’t believe it he was so pumped.

M: Mm hmm

H: I could hear them all going “What the f? Who’s he going to talk? What’s he talking about?” And so I realised I had about… and they’ve been drinking for about an hour when I got up there, 250 men, a crowded pub and I thought, ‘I reckon I’ve got two minutes to get these blokes, when they realised what I’m talking about here it’s going to be over.’ And all I did was put myself down for the first two minutes and tell a story about a massive stuff up when I was doing this job is and they were in. And they loved it, and it was just, the feedback we got was just… We get invited back there every year to speak to them again. These men who have never, ever talked about this stuff before, and I had men hanging around for hours. I was there till one in the morning, with men just saying, like they couldn’t actually talk like they’d try.

M: Mm hmm.

H: Not, not because they’d been drinking, because the topic was so foreign to them.

M: Yep.

H: But it was so raw, like depression was just through the roof, and these men saying “oh, mate I am…” Typically might just want to say something like just we said before that depression and sh*t and they’d start crying and they’d be like “Ah, I can’t talk about it,” and sort of walk off.

M: Yep

H: But we actually, can’t actually even talk about it in some communities, and it’s too hard like, but we feel it. We feel it deeply. And um.

M: Yep.

H: That was one of the greatest programs I’ve ever been a part of. We just as men, we find it so foreign.

M: Yeah, even just having the words, I think there’s a great study that was released last week in Melbourne. I’ll have to find it and put it in our show notes. So there’s some university people that have done work in primary schools to give the students the words to communicate their feelings.

H: That’s amazing, amazing yeah.

M: Yeah, and they’ve had some great, so positive psychology interventions, they’ve had some great results there with just people or with the kids just being able to vocalise what’s happening a lot easier.

H: Yeah, absolutely.

M: Even before Covid we we’re seeing rises in anxiety, stress, depression, loneliness, burn out, every year it feels like there’s a new syndrome or disease that that we’re adding to the laundry list of things.

H: Mmm.

M: What steps do you think we need to take in Australia to start to reverse the trend?

H: Whatever we can do to get to kids at a young age, to teach them preventative skills rather than sitting at the other end going okay, well, let’s have things in place for people and they become depressed or they become anxious or suicidal. There’s some… We need to put more money into prevention and whatever we can do to provide emotionally engaging programs for kids that teach them how to deal with stuff when, when things go wrong, basically. And I, I think any program that teaches kids how to deal with stuff when things go wrong. Any programme that teaches kids that they are worthy as they are. I mean, one of the issues with schooling system, we had a podcast recently we had a guy on called Will  McMahon, who’s won half of Will and Woody, the radio duo, incredible radio duo.

M: Mm hmm.

H: And he went to a private school and he was saying it’s just destroyed him going to private school because he has so hard wired in his head that to be happy, he has to be successful and to be successful has to achieve heaps. And this model has just undone him because he feels like he’s always chasing [success]. He will succeed in something that is going to succeed in something else because at school it was like everything you did you’re rewarded with like these badges on your blazer and like different groups you were captains of and you had to be achieving, and if you achieved, you got your name on the walls and everything’s about achievement, he said, “it’s the undoing of me and all my friends, like we all are still chasing those achievements to be happy. Yet even when we achieve them, we realise we’re not happy.

M: Mm hmm.

H: So I think any program that teaches kids that they are worthy as they are, they don’t have to be the smartest person, the richest person, the funniest, the best sports person, most… Programs that teach kids that you are worthy as you are right now. You’re worthy -when I say worthy, I mean worthy of love and worthy of belonging as you are right now, they’re vital. Any program that teach kids that things will go wrong in your life but when they do hear some things you can do. I think that’s I think that’s where we’ve got to start.

But gosh, you’re right. Trends are going the wrong way. So what we’re doing right now is not working for the masses.

M: So for those of us who are well and truly out of school, [laugh].

H: Mm hhm.

M: Can I ask you to maybe leave us with one tip or one piece of advice? Something tangible that people can do in their lives to bring more happiness or resilience?

H: I would… The most simple thing to do, I think, in order to experience more joy and positive emotion, that’s what creates resilience. So that’s why I’m bring this up. But I think that the easiest thing to do a really practical one, is just to write down three things every day that went well for you. Not three things that have been life changing, not three things you’re grateful for because that’s impossible to keep that up every day and not get bored.

What are three things that went well for you today?

Had a nice coffee.

You saw the sunrise.

Had a nice text message for a friend.

Whatever it is. If you do that every single day, you actually physically rewire your brain to start scanning the world for the positives. And that makes you a happier person. And it’s something you look forward to. Write it in a note pad next your bed, in a journal, on the shower screen door. However you want to do it, totally up to you. But what you’ll find is you’ll start to experience more moments of joy, and you’ll be more aware of them as they happen, which is a really nice starting point for all this stuff.

M: Great. On that note thank you so much for your time. How can people find out more about you and your book?

H: So just if you type in the Resilience Project, I think the first thing that comes up is actually the book. You can order the book online via our website, but there’s also it’s in all book stores around the country, and the audio book is, I actually did, I narrated the audiobook myself, because I felt like they were my stories so it had to be me. It took a very long time, it was very difficult to do so please go and check that out cause it took so long to do it.

M: [Laugh]

H: But that seemed to be a popular version of consuming the book, the audio book. But if you like reading it’s in all good bookstores and probably not good ones as well-

[Laughter]

H: -all around the country at the moment, so yes, that’s probably the best way to do it. Any other stuff on the resilience project, just go to the website and it’s all, it’s all there. I’m just checking. I should have checked at the start, I was checking you’ve pressed the record button? It say’s record on the top here.

M: [Laugh]

H: I think we’re good.

M: It is flashing, [laugh], we won’t be doing a take three, I promise.

[Laughter]

M: Well, thank you so much for your time, a second time [laugh].

H: Pleasure, absolute pleasure.

M: And have a good day.

H: You too, Marie. Thank you so much, bye.

[Happy Exit Music]

Related content: Read Happiness for Cynics article Words That Can Change Your Mindset, listen to our Podcast Why You Need to Develop Your Emotional Literacy (E42)