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Permalink Reply by Dyck Dewid on November 20, 2012 at 11:55pm

This was an interesting test/survey.  It seems pretty well done to get some kind of standardized index.  I would find it most interesting to correlate reasons for unhappiness to see if I could substantiate my crackpot theory.  That is, we want 'things' that we think will make us happy (hence try to acquire them).  Anything that interferes with getting what we want is bad, and that which enables it is good.  This applies in re-naming things to positive & negative too.  And it works in reverse also... to avoid pain or discomfort.

In fact, it may all boil down to pain and pleasure... perceiving our life task is to duplicate pleasure and avoid pain (sounds pretty mechanical, no?).  Is happiness simply a sense of pleasure with the absence of pain?

By the phrasing of many questions I can infer, how at least the test creators see, people's values, money habits, employment, etc.. For example a scale implies one spends their disposable money only on either material objects or experiential activities.  That tells me they think all people do this... or else their question is flawed.

There are also judgements strewn here and there in Q/A choices, using words like "Good" and "Positive" and "Optimistic."  This implies an assumption that we (public) act, respond, and think in terms of arbitrary judgements of what is good or bad.

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Permalink Reply by Dyck Dewid on November 24, 2012 at 11:09pm

...this makes me happy.

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Permalink Reply by Dyck Dewid on November 25, 2012 at 10:47am

I feel your unhappiness, Bradfield.  

... wish you could taste of my happiness for a day. 

Perhaps we are sharing something, after all.

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Permalink Reply by Ben Roberts on November 26, 2012 at 10:00am

Or perhaps not, Dyck.  Looks like C.A. has left the Cafe, and deleted all his posts in the process.  Wow.  He must have spent hundreds of hours on this forum.  Much as I often found his posts to be an irritant due to his frequently critical (and at times complaining) message, I feel sad that he is gone.  The loss of all his writing feels even more sad, in a way.  Like piece of the history of this place has been cut out, leaving a gaping hole.  So many exchanges that will no longer make sense.  

[As an aside, this is a reminder to check into the options we have for archiving and also to see if this automatically happens every time someone leaves or if it is an option they need to choose--I do know that once they are deleted, they can't be restored without an archive that we currently do not maintain].

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Permalink Reply by laura musikanski on November 26, 2012 at 9:42pm

Thank you for the call today! Here are the survey results for the 38 who took the survey

occupy café sample size	38	National Average	Occupy Cafe Sample
Satisfaction with Life		77	73
Psychological Well-Being		76	79
Physical Health		71	66
Time Balance		60	65
Community		63	72
Social Support		76	77
Education, Arts & Culture		73	69
Neighborhood		78	71
Environment		76	76
Government		59	56
Material Well-Being		68	62
Work Experience		70	66

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Permalink Reply by laura musikanski on November 26, 2012 at 9:44pm

 A list of the domains is on this page (scroll down). Also, two suggested reads on happiness 

If you want to read a book on happiness these are the two I suggest - one on individual happiness, the other on policy: 

The How of Happiness by Sonja Lyubomirsky - to learn more about your own psychological state and its impact on your happiness 

Wellbeing for Public Policy by Ed Deiner, John Heliwell et al - to learn more about your community and its impact on your happiness and wellbeing

A TON of  resources: http://zacharydavidwalsh.com/

You can download the tool kit here  http://www.happycounts.org/toolkits/

And I am happy to issue anyone a unique code!

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Permalink Reply by Ben Roberts on November 27, 2012 at 12:39pm

Thanks for the follow up resources, Laura. Looking forward to exploring what might come next on this afternoon's Connect2012 Cafe Call.

It's great to see that a number of people took the time to complete the survey (something the rest of you can still do, by the way!).  I wonder what stands out for you in the data?  I see that we're ahead of the averages in terms of community and time balance, but lag in neighborhood and physical health.  Not sure how big a margin makes something statistically significant.  Also wondering about looking at absolute levels of the data, rather than just the comparison to the national average.  

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Permalink Reply by Dyck Dewid on November 28, 2012 at 12:13pm

Thinking humbly about the strategy of helping the world become a place that serves everyone.

With the Connect Call yesterday it's making me think of tactics too. Perhaps this Happiness INdex appeals not only to the left brain functions of measurement and change. But, it also seems to engage the ego. This takes us in differing directions and for me makes things more confusing... not that its bad to be confused as that leads to something else with perhaps more clearness.

One scenario is that we imply acceptance of a terribly broken system (by appealing to government to use the HI (Happiness INdex) and make changes, then re-measure. Yes, this may help some people but will it also hurt the effort to radically change our society? Another artifact is it would ostensibly appeal to the masses (ego) and could foretell engagement and participation in their destiny... But, being motivated by self interest would this really serve or interfere with the high purpose of "seeing that it is all about caring about others" which will bring about 'a world that serves all.'

ps, I sent a msg to admin about this format having changed appearance & function.

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