S3/EP-27 - ரோஜாவோடு மல்லிகையை அல்ல ரோஜாவோடு இன்னொரு ரோஜாவைக்கூட ஒப்பிடாதீர்கள் - வைரமுத்து கவிதை

5 life lessons that I have learnt are:- 1. What Next is the mantra of life? Rebuild from scratch is the best life journey. 2. விதை நான் போட்டது - Know your strengths and weakness - Build your own unique path, nothing else works for you. All your answers lies with you. 3. ரோஜாவோடு மல்லிகையை அல்ல ரோஜாவோடு இன்னொரு ரோஜாவைக்கூட ஒப்பிடாதீர்கள் - வைரமுத்து கவிதை - You are the best asset in life (நீ ஒரு பொக்கிஷம்). Never ever compare yourself with others. 4. It is very difficult to change oneself. We cannot change others. Accept people as they are with equanimity of emotions. 5. நல்லதே நினை நல்லதே நடக்கும். All life lessons are simple. But not easy to implement. This episode ends the season 3. I want to thank my wife, daughters, all relatives, friends, each and every subscribers and others supported in Whatsapp and FB pages. I want to thank each and every one of you from the bottom of my heart. You mean a lot to me. - Rajesh Narayanan

S3-EP-26 - Project 333 - Be More with LESS.

Be More with LESS using Project 333 What is the 333 rule? The idea behind Project 333 is simple: Wear only 33 articles of clothing for the next 3 months. ... Exceptions include wedding rings, underwear, sleepwear, in-home loungewear, and workout clothing. Clothing that no longer fits or becomes in poor condition may be replaced during the time period. https://bemorewithless.com/therules/ - Credit :- Courtney Carver

The Rules When: Every three months. New seasons start on Jan. 1, April 1, July 1, and Oct. 1, but you can start anytime. 33 items will be enough for any 3 months. What: 33 items including clothing, accessories, jewelry, outerwear and shoes. What not: These items are not counted as part of your 33 items – wedding ring or another sentimental piece of jewelry that you never take off, underwear, sleep wear, in-home lounge wear, and workout clothing (you can only wear your workout clothing to workout) How: Choose your 33 items, box up the remainder of your fashion statement, seal it with tape and put it out of sight. Do it on your own or take the course. What else: You are creating a wardrobe that you can live, work and play in for three months. Remember that this is not a project in suffering. If your clothes don’t fit or are in poor condition, replace them.

Season 3 / EP-25 – சும்மா வருவாளா சுகுமாரி (No PAIN No GAIN)–What is WOOP? - Dr. Laurie Santos 7/7

இந்த YouTube channel லை வாழ வைக்கும் தெய்வங்களாகிய எல்லா ஹீரோயின்களுக்கும், ஹீரோக்களுக்கும் வணக்கம். Lessons learnt:- Credit : The Science of Well-Being – Dr. Laurie Santos, Professor, Yale University. https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-science-of-well-being Putting Strategies into Practice How can we intentionally put these strategies into practice and build healthier habits? Objectives • List elements of effective goal setting • Design your environment and practice goal setting strategies to build better habits https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-science-of-well-being/lecture/yaNZk/part-2-goal-setting Key takeaways are:- Goal Specificity = The Degree of Quantitative precision with which a Goal is specified Results = Goal Specificity - Task Strategy -- Better Performance Goal Visualization What is mental contrasting? A visualization technique involving first thinking of a positive future outcome followed by thinking of obstacles. Implementation Intention = A self-regulatory strategy in the form of an “If-Then-Plan” that can lead to better goal attainment. What is WOOP? by Gabriele Oettingen - Author of Rethinking Positive Thinking Book WOOP is a science-based mental strategy that people can use to find and fulfill their wishes, set preferences, and change their habits. WOOP Method = 1. Think about your WISH 2. The Best OUTCOME 3. Potential OBSTACLES 4. Your If/Then PLAN Right, so the critical part in WOOP is the obstacle. But don't switch the Os. Because our research shows that once you switch Os it doesn't work anymore. The reason is you only can discover obstacle in the framework of the outcome. Uses of WOOPs WOOP helps in two ways - Focus on right intentions - Avoid superficial or idealistic goals WOOP is also a problem solving tool. Critical part of WOOP is obstacle. Woop can be practiced in - Achievement - Interpersonal relationship - Health - Shopping - Stopped smoking - Loss lot of weight. Tagline: Make WOOP as a daily ritual Videos:- What is WOOP? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DpbCMzQqZAU&feature=emb_logo Credit: The Science of Well-Being – Dr. Laurie Santos, Professor, Yale University Please share your suggestions, feedback in practising this. If you want to maintain anonymity, Please share your suggestions, feedback, and comments to rajesh.x.narayanan@gmail.com About me:- EP-0 - Who am I? - Rajesh Narayanan If you do not know me personally, you can check out this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IiuvvMarwOE

Season 3 / EP-24 – நிற்க அதற்குத் தக – Putting Strategies into practice -The Science of Well-Being by Dr. Laurie Santos 6/7

Lessons learnt:- Credit : The Science of Well-Being – Dr. Laurie Santos, Professor, Yale University.

https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-science-of-well-being Putting Strategies into Practice How can we intentionally put these strategies into practice and build healthier habits? Part-1 Situation Support https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-science-of-well-being/lecture/59tJc/part-1-situation-support 5 Habits that promote happiness are 1) Kindness 2) Social Connection 3) Time Affluence 4) Mind control 5) Healthy Practices - Sleep and Exercise. - And the point of putting these up there is not to say that we never want these things, but how often are we prioritizing all those other things that we started with at the expense of this stuff. - if you see one of you guys on phone and just typing and your urge to go on social media and check your own forum would jump up, right? The fact that if we have the cookies out there, makes your urge to eat a cookie and eat less healthily there just because they're present. But the point is just the presence of the situation causes these behaviors. - Simply making these tempting bad behaviors go far away and these kind of good behaviors that we want to encourage at the forefront can change the way we interact, and can increase our good habits. - He runs Cornell's Food Lab, and he has this awesome new book called Slim By Design where he makes a strong case that willpower is completely overrated. Merely changing your situation can affect the extent to which you eat. And his claim is that merely affecting the situation can change the extent to which we engage in all kinds of habits not just eating. -And the question is, is the proximity of the candy going to affect them - Secretaries consume about 48 percent more candies when the thing is on their desk than when it's just a few feet away. -And what you find is that even though it's easy to reach for the candy here as it is to reach in the drawer, what you find is that secretaries consumed 25 percent less candies when they're in the drawer. - And the claim is that both the visibility and the convenience with which you can engage in your habits actually matters. - And what is now a famous study on kitchen counters where he looked at just what's on your kitchen counter and does that affect things like your healthiness and your weight. - So cookies, chips, crackers, cereal, soda. If those are visible on your kitchen counter, you have in general across all these categories about a 10 kilogram increase in your weight right now. Merely by having those things visible. So this is controlling for whether they're around your house, just having them out. - In contrast, if you do the positive things. If you put positive things and you make those visible, what you find is that that can have the opposite effect. So visible fruits and vegetables can actually decrease your weight by again like five to ten kilos on average. And so the point I'm telling you about the stuff in the food context wasn't necessarily to focus on food. - You can fix your bad environments. Get rid of the stuff that is tempting you. - If you had the goal of getting off social media after all negative comments about social media, you can delete it from your phone. You can put your phone away when you're trying to work. You can do these kinds of things. You can make phone free lunches so that you have more social connection. You can force yourself to keep your phone in a deep pocket that you had to zip so it's not visible. All those things you can do to increase this stuff. - You can shape your environment to have less of the bad cues that are causing you to value the wrong stuff. - What does the kitchen counter studies show? It just shows that just by having good things that promote these habits visible that they're there that you're going to do them more often. Right. What about having on your desk your gratitude journal so that when you wake up in the morning it's just sitting there? Right. These kinds of notes and reminders, these simple things sound really dumb, but they capture our attention just like the candy bar on the counter and can make us do positive things. - The other thing you can do is your social context because one of the most powerful environments that we have is the other social agents around us. So fill your lives with people who are trying to do this stuff too like recruit your suite mates to have a sleep fest. - Like try to get people to help with you and to engage in all these healthy behaviors like start a sweet meditation group and so on. - The point is that having others around you who are doing this stuff does two things. One is it promotes the positive habits, but also increases kindness, social connection, all this other stuff that we think matters a lot. - Harness the situation to get some support.

Season 3 / EP-23 – கடவுள் உள்ளமே ஓர் கருணை இல்லமே - Stuff that Really Makes Us Happy -The Science of Well-Being by Dr. Laurie Santos 5/7

இந்த YouTube channel லை வாழ வைக்கும் தெய்வங்களாகிய எல்லா ஹீரோயின்களுக்கும், ஹீரோக்களுக்கும் வணக்கம். Lessons learnt:- Credit : The Science of Well-Being – Dr. Laurie Santos, Professor, Yale University. https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-science-of-well-being Stuff that Really Makes Us Happy Objectives • Understand that seeking a higher salary and good grades can sometimes make us happy with the right mindset • List the behaviors scientifically linked to improved well-being, such as being kind, connecting with others, valuing time, meditating, getting more sleep, and exercising • Practice meditation and conduct a gratitude visit Good Job https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-science-of-well-being/lecture/WnA7c/good-job - Bring top 4 Signature strengths into your job to boost your happiness. - Find your Signature Strength at https://www.viacharacter.org/survey/account/register - Use one of your top strengths in a new and different way everyday for one week. - The subjects’ happiness scores increased significantly and their depressive symptoms decreased significantly. - Higher use of Character strengths at work = Increase in productivity and increase in job satisfaction mediated by positive emotions. - Increasing Flow in your job. - The Best moments in our lives are not the passive, receptive, relaxing times. The best moments usually occur if a person's body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile - Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi Good Grades:- https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-science-of-well-being/lecture/HixlS/good-grades - Extrinsic motivation vs Intrinsic motivation - a focus on grades can undermine intrinsic motivation - a focus on grades can undermine growth mindset - What is a growth mindset? - The belief that intelligence can be trained and that most basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work. Kindness https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-science-of-well-being/lecture/6sTVX/kindness - Practice Random Act of Kindness - கடவுள் உள்ளமே ஓர் கருணை இல்லமே - Spending on others increases happiness across cultures - I'm never thinking, let me get my best friend a pedicure because that would make me feel a lot better. - Interview with Elizabeth Dunn on Kindness https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-science-of-well-being/lecture/L46jX/interview-with-elizabeth-dunn Social Connection https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-science-of-well-being/lecture/TrNRe/social-connection Social connection with others, even strangers can boost your happiness, subjective wellbeing. Interview with Nicholas Epley https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-science-of-well-being/lecture/x4U9I/interview-with-nicholas-epley So it kind of seems like our brains are wired to see other people's rewards as our own rewards. Time affluence:- https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-science-of-well-being/lecture/I6MEY/time-affluence Monetary affluence example vs time affluence Investing in Time affluence Prioritizing time over money was associated with greater happiness! Thinking about time makes you Happier and social. Mind Control:- https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-science-of-well-being/lecture/58VUO/mind-control Our minds wander 46.9% of the time - Killingsworth and Gilbert,2010 An wandering mind is an unhappy mind. Meditation practice can curb mind wandering Healthy Practices:- https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-science-of-well-being/lecture/X2Agx/healthy-practices - Exercising three times a week, for 30 minutes a day can give you as much happiness bang for your buck as taking an SSRI or taking something like Zoloft. - Sleeping enough can make us happier Quotes: “If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted,or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well.” This week’s exercise: This week, we’ll harness the power of our mind control and meditation to increase our happiness. We’ll also conclude with a practice known to have a huge impact— the act of sharing your gratitude with others. Meditate! Why meditation? Well, as we saw in class, a wandering mind is an unhappy mind. Benefits:- Research shows that meditation can have a number of positive benefits, including • more positive moods, • decreases our stress • even boost our grey matter • increased concentration, and • more feelings of social connection. It will make you a little bit more zen and maybe a lot happier. Do a Gratitude Letter/Visit Credit: The Science of Well-Being – Dr. Laurie Santos, Professor, Yale University Please share your suggestions, feedback in practising this. About me:- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IiuvvMarwOE