Happiness holds the key to Wellness

In their pursuit to understand why some people live healthier and longer lives, and after chasing several measurable parameters such as blood pressure, blood sugar, cholesterol, uric acid and smoking for over half a century, medical scientists are now tumbling upon an esoteric factor that has been conspicuously missing from medical books, called ‘happiness’ that could hold the key to our wellness.

Happiness is quite like the hippo in the zoo. When you see it you can easily recognize it, but when someone asks you to describe it, it is not easy. It does not have the distinctive features like an elephant’s trunk or a leopards spots. And yet when you try counting people in office who are happy, or occasions when you have been happy, you know exactly who or what they are!

Funny as it might sound, the arrival of “happiness” as a medical factor affecting our lives probably started when a group of German pragmatists tried to beat the Americans at their habit of measuring every aspect of life with dollar as the common denominator, in their own backyard by whipping out stats that many with piles of money were not necessarily living great lives. Despite their limousines, liquors and lavish means, the frequency of drugs, divorce, and deaths due to suicides and murders were often disproportionately high. Why else would youngsters go berserk every few weeks and go on shooting sprees killing innocent kids in schools and campuses?

If you have started chuckling tauntingly at the Americans for their dollar-obsession, just hold on.  Let us see how we Indians, with our multitude of faiths, philosophies, festivals, and even our recent Santa-Banta fare against them and others in the world. The World Values Surveys samples populations from 97 nations to see how happy and satisfied they feel, and rank them from the most to the least happy, based on scores from +4.24 to -1.92. Sadly, despite our rich philosophical heritage India ranked 67 with a measly score 0.85!

The irony gets worse as India is the place where Hasya yoga or laughter yoga is thought to have originated. Also, it was an Indian doctor from Mumbai, Madan Kataria, who started a laughter movement in 1995 that has become global, spanning 70 countries with 7000 laughter clubs, which I discovered in faraway Melbourne, Australia during a visit there!

In recent times, “Wellness”has become the new watch word in Indian media hogging up space next only to scams, disasters, crime and sports.The pursuit of “Wellness” needs a top-down approach, beginning with Happiness at its fountain head, and  steering our attitudes and feelings to positive zones, before we turn our attention to the heart, muscles, skin, and bowels.

A daily dose of happiness could be far more effective than the proverbial apple in keeping the doctor away. Try it.

As published in HT City ( Hindustan Times) dated 30th March, 2014.