For presumably obvious biological reasons I’ve never been a mother, but if I had, I’m sure I’d declare that it felt as if I’d spent my entire life doing things for others, much of it involving picking up items of discarded clothing and small unidentifiable plastic toy parts. Mums say these things.

If you’ve been in a situation in which others have entirely depended on you, you’ll know that it can be incredibly demanding work, leaving little time for much else, but even when you’re run ragged by supporting others, it’s likely that you’ll feel at least a small degree of satisfaction from doing so.

There’s no doubt that helping people and, in general, showing kindness to others delivers a physiological lift whose chemical effect some experts suggest is similar to a diluted morphine hit. No wonder some refer to it as a ’helper’s high’.

Of course, when we do things for one another, it doesn’t just give us a boost – it helps to create a better world, a more integrated community, an environment in which it’s nicer to live.

So why not look for small ways to help those with whom you come into contact during the next 24 hours? If you’re physically strong, offer to lift something for someone who isn’t. If you’re skilled at something, do a favour which utilises this ability. If you’re not in a hurry, give way to someone who is.

It’s often the small actions which have the most impact.

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

Whichever way you look at it, we live in a world beset by problems and tragedy. War, famine, disease, crime, poverty – they can all add up to paint a gloomy picture of this rock we call home.

Sorry, were you having a happy moment before reading this? Despite the downbeat intro, it really isn’t my intention to persuade you and me to take a gloomy view of things but, instead, to suggest that there are times when we simply have to focus our concern less on the things we cannot change, and more on those which we can.

Just writing this, however, feels selfish. It leaves me questioning myself, and makes me doubt my worldview.

However, and unfortunately, the simple truth is that if we spend all our time worrying about the many problems which are entirely beyond our control, we’ll almost certainly make no progress in dealing with issues which are closer to home, and a failure to do so is likely to leave you in disarray.

By all means (please) empathise with those less well-off, indeed help them when you can. But perhaps it makes sense today to focus the majority of your ’worry capacity’ on matters which you have the direct power to change?

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

Q – What did the 19th century Parisian newspaper correspondent ask when he wanted to know if the author of ’Les Miserables’ and ’The Hunchback of Notre-Dame’ was at a party?

A – ’Hugo’s there?’

Puns aside, ’Who goes there?’ is what sentries demand when they hear the approach of some unidentified, potentially hostile, individual.

Faced with such a challenge from behind a loaded gun, now possibly isn’t the best time for this person to start asking themselves who they really are. (I mean, who AM I?) Better, perhaps, to announce that you are the King’s Messenger and that you come in peace (or words to that effect).

Of course, it’s not always that straightforward to answer the ’who are you’ question. You’re someone’s son or daughter, you may be a brother or sister, you’re somebody’s neighbour, you could be an employee or a boss.

I think you’re also what you stand for, and what you believe in.

Whoever you are, however, be comfortable with it if you can. Life has made you this way, and although some change may be possible, your component parts are pretty firmly in place (well I hope so, anyway).

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

You may agree with me that to keep learning new things can play an important part in keeping us healthy and (at least relatively) happy.

A desire to acquire knowledge is one of the ways in which a therapist might know that someone is doing well. An aversion to new experiences may be a sign that all is not so well.

So if that’s the case, why did curiosity apparently kill the cat? What’s meant by this well-known proverb?

In fact it started life in a different form. Back in 16th century England, it was expressed as ’care killed the cat’, with the care (pay attention now) actually meaning ’worry’ or ’sorrow’. Who knew?

What therefore began as an exhortation to ’don’t worry, be happy’ became a warning about the hazards of unnecessary experimentation. Now I’d agree that this is almost certainly a reasonable admonition were you, say, to be thinking about exploring an electricity substation. Especially on a rainy day, wearing an aluminium foil suit.

In general however, isn’t it more the case that staying curious is a Good Thing? I think so.

Do all you can today to learn new things. Go to different places. Listen to a different radio station. Pick up a magazine you’ve never read before. Ask people ’Why?’, and then ’Why?’ again when they answer. Cook something you’ve never cooked. Drink something you’ve never drunk.

Read a poem. Ask a friend to tell you something they never have before. Look at the labels in your clothes to find out where they were made. Find out why the place where you live is called what it is. Dance to a new tune.

Today’s a day to be as curious as you can. Who knows where it will take you?

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

The other day something prompted me to think about Ivan Pavlov, the Russian psychologist who proposed the idea of the ’conditional reflex’ at the end of the 19th century, when he demonstrated that dogs who were given food while a bell was ringing would eventually salivate at the sound of the bell alone, even when no food was actually present.

Apropos of nothing I wondered, as you do, what breed of dog Pavlov ’recruited’ for his experiments. Good old Google, but it seems there’s no record of this – apparently he simply used indeterminate breeds.

Now I’m not sure about salivating when a bell rings (unless the ping of the microwave counts), but I reckon we probably all experience other forms of conditional reflexes, among them that old chestnut of answering ’Fine’ when someone asks us how we are.

How do you feel? Fine. You just say it, however you actually do feel. In fact it probably becomes such a conditioned response that it’s hard to even ask the question of yourself. How do I feel? Er, fine?

Here’s a little suggestion, though. Change just one word in that question and your internal response may prove more helpful.

Instead of ’how do I feel’ ask yourself ’WHAT do I feel’.

It’s different, isn’t it? Not so easy to answer, either, I suggest.

Knowing WHAT you feel is a good way to truly get to HOW you feel. So why not try this today? Change ’how’ to ’what’. See where your thoughts take you.

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

I wonder how many times you’ll say ’thank you’ today?

For most of us I suspect it’s an unconscious response harking back to the days when manners were drummed into us, so it might be pretty difficult to count the number of times we say it.

But I wonder how many time you’ll say ’thank you’ today and really mean it?

Now, this may well be a different kettle of fish.

Saying thank you to someone to whom you’re grateful, and (the important bits) meaning it and explaining why, is another of those great actions which benefits both parties, yet I’m afraid to admit that I can sometimes go days without doing so.

Today’s a great day to boost the thank you economy. As it progresses, why not be a bit more aware of your reasons to be thankful – particularly reasons that involve others?

Then let them know, and let them know why. And mean what you say. And make it clear that you mean what you say.

It may be a tremendously profound thank you, but it could just as easily involve someone who might be completely unaware that they brighten your day.

No need to wait for November. Perhaps today can be a Thanksgiving Day too?

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

Nobody loves me, everybody hates me,
Think I’ll go and eat worms…

As nursery rhymes go, it’s not exactly one that’s going to get the positive psychology movement dancing in the street, is it?

But it’s interesting to reflect on that common child-like behaviour of reacting to someone else’s unkindness by ’catastrophising’, leap-frogging from just one person’s lack of warmth to the idea that EVERYONE is full of complete and utter loathing for you.

Although doing this may seem illogical in the cold light of day, it’s easy to succumb to it when you’re not at your best.

One thing goes wrong, and your interpretation is that the whole house of cards has tumbled down.

One email or call doesn’t get immediately returned, and you’re convinced that you’re unloveable.

I think it’s easy sometimes to become swept along by a wave of unreality and over-dramatisation, and pretty difficult to keep a sense of perspective.

It’s when this happens that you could do worse than remind yourself that it probably really isn’t as bad as it seems.

So why not try to keep a sense of perspective today? And if I were you I’d leave the worm consumption to Bear Grylls.

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

For five years starting in 1997 Apple’s advertising urged us all to ’Think different’.

It was, and still is, admirable advice – but it’s not always plain sailing to put it into practice.

I like to think that what we (and I very much include you in this) are doing with Moodscope is to ’think different’ about the whole ’manage your mood’ thing.

But on a more micro day to day level I reckon it’s all too easy to get stuck in the tramlines of negative thinking, seeing things in the same old way, often to the detriment of how you feel.

Apple’s end game was to sell more computers, but I believe that thinking different has a more fundamental appeal. Change the way you think, and you may also change the way you live your life.

Now sadly I’ve no magic wand which can alter your thoughts. But I do have a suggestion.

Thinking different is less likely to manifest itself when you ’do same’. (Mangled grammar, I know, but I hope you’ll see my point.)

Even small changes to your daily habits can nudge your brain towards new thought patterns.

So sit in a different chair. Take a different route. Read a different newspaper. Order a different sandwich. Wear a different colour. Sing a different tune.

Talk to a different person. Watch a different channel. Use a different shampoo. Get up at a different time.

In short, when you want to think different, it often helps if you do different.

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

In my ad agency days it was generally sensible to conduct an analysis of ’features, functions and benefits’ when starting work on a new brief.

Features, functions and benefits? In simple terms they’re defined as (a) What is it? (b) What does it do? and (c) Why would someone want it?

An example, if you’re advertising a cellphone, could be its caller display feature. So that’s (a) taken care of.

What does this do? Well it shows you the identity of the person who’s calling before you answer the phone, and that’s (b).

As for (c), the benefits may depend on who you are and what your situation is.

You might for example use it to avoid unwanted or unknown calls.

Or it could enable you to always pick up when the call is from somebody important.

If you’re otherwise engaged, you could put your phone on silent but keep an eye on calls so as to either return them later or, if you believe they might be urgent, excuse yourself and answer them immediately.

Now I wonder if you could apply a similar kind of thinking to the various parts you play in life?

It’s often said that it’s good to know your true purpose, and I’m sure that – if you can – this tends to improve your overall mental wellbeing.

So let’s suppose you’re someone’s son or daughter. That’s (a).

How about your functions and benefits then? What’s your (b) and (c)? What do you do? Why would someone want that?

I’ll leave it with you, shall I?

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

Part of the County of San Diego, Coronado Island is where ’Some Like It Hot’ was filmed in 1959.

It’s connected to the main downtown part of San Diego itself by a jaw-dropping (and slightly vertigo-inducing) bridge that arcs over the bay.

And the other day I was instantly transported back there (sadly only in my mind) by a simple song playing on the radio.

If you’re not familiar with it, ’Only Human’ by The Killers sounds as if it could be some kind of heavy metal blast but it’s definitely not. I’d certainly include it on my Feelgood List in fact.

When I hear it I’m immediately reminded of it playing on the car stereo as I crossed the bridge a year or two ago. The music plays and I see what I saw when I was there.

The thing is, music has immense power to take you somewhere other than your current location, sometimes to move you emotionally just when you weren’t expecting it too.

Most of us have music in the form of CDs (tapes and records even, if you’ve still a way to play them) knocking around our homes, which we’ve forgotten all about.

Nowadays just about any song you can think of is on YouTube, too, so you’ve no excuse.

Just like reaching for an aspirin when you’ve a headache, why not search your memory for a tune you associate with good times, and treat yourself to a listen today?

A little boogie wouldn’t go amiss, either.

Even if you dance like me.

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

I’m afraid it’s a fact of life that, just as not everyone likes brussels sprouts, things won’t always go your way.

In fact there may be days when it all goes any which way but yours.

Whilst it might feel as though an existence with no problems would be an utter blessing, (a) it’s not going to happen (sorry), and (b) there’s the distinct possibility that a totally predictable life could soon get boring.

When a brussels sprout seed is sown, it needs water, sunlight and nutrients from the soil if it’s to thrive.

Somewhat surprisingly however, gardeners and cooks say the flavour of a brussels sprout improves no end after the plant has endured a frost.

It’s as if it needs to come through adversity in order to reach its full potential.

Brussels sprouts sometimes get such bad press (completely unfairly in my view, but there you go) that it would seem the height of rudeness to compare you to one.

But perhaps it is the case that when we overcome our problems, difficulties and challenges, we truly do become a better brassica.

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

I’ve explored the Aladdin’s cave of a second-hand stall in my local market before:

http://www.moodscope.com/blog/dinghy-dealer

On another recent visit I spotted what looked to me like a fairly ordinary home-made animal cage. It appeared to have two compartments, but was of no real interest until I turned a corner and happened to see the side which had been hidden from view.

A bright orange sticker announced that the contraption had travelled aboard a Qantas aircraft, and careful felt-tip pen writing announced on the left side ’My name is Ted’, and on the right ’My name is Roo’. Above these introductions, the same hand had thoughtfully added ’Please look after us.’

Now clearly someone, presumably in Australia, had constructed a travelling cage, then despatched two creatures (I’m tempted to guess – given their original home and names – a koala and a kangaroo, but I’m sure it was probably just a pair of guinea pigs) to deepest darkest Cambridgeshire.

No matter. For a few minutes my imagination went into overdrive, simply because I’d looked differently at what was on the face of it just a very simple cage.

When you’re out and about it can be tempting to put your mind on auto-pilot, taking little notice of your surroundings, accepting things at face value.

Yet it’s the little quirks and occasional spots of unexpectedness which make life richer and less drab.

They’re all around you, if you look for them.

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

’Go on, give us a smile.’

Hmm. When you’re feeling far from smiley, they’re just about the last words you want to hear, aren’t they?

In fact when you’re stuck in Glumsville without a ticket, any half-smile you do manage will both look and feel false.

Psychologists call the real thing (the one you produce when you truly mean it) a Duchenne smile, whereas the fake one is sometimes referred to as a Pan-Am smile – in honour of the now defunct airline’s flight attendants’ forced efforts.

Real smiles produce crinkly lines alongside your eyes, whereas fake ones don’t.

When you think about it, however (as I hadn’t before now) isn’t it intriguing that we refer to ’giving’ a smile?

Giving, not ’showing’, for instance.

When I passed a busking banjo player the other morning, I could give him no money but after catching his eye I did give him a smile, which he returned.

A smile is a splendid gift to give, as it makes both recipient and giver feel better. Perfect for these economic times too, as it’s the gift that costs no money. (Many apologies for that, Banjo Man.)

OK, so I’m sending you a smile here and now (honest, I’m actually doing it, crinkly eyes and all).

So how about passing it on today? Perhaps even a couple of times.

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

For virtually all of its 93 million mile journey towards Earth, the sun is shining. It doesn’t know how to do anything else other than produce heat and light.

Oh yes, and act as the hub of our solar system, keeping our planet and its neighbours in their proper orbits. But you get my point I hope.

The dependable nature of sunshine is evident when you travel by air. Whatever the weather when you take off, during daylight hours it won’t be long before you’re high enough for the sky to be crystal blue.

So what stops the sun shining all the time here on Earth? Well in most parts of the world, it’s a relatively thin layer of cloud which gets in the way.

93 million miles of unimpeded sunlight, then it all gets blotted out in the final twelve or so.

A metaphor for the way life affects our moods perhaps?

Talking to someone who generally has a sunny disposition might make you see that a lot of their life is not that different from yours.

Often it can be no more than one or two things which get in the way of your day being good.

Not always, but sometimes, it takes just a few tweaks to make everything quite a bit better than it might otherwise have been.

A day for tweaking, perhaps?

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

What do we want?

Procrastination.

When do we want it?

Next week.

Walking down London’s Oxford Street the other day, I was put in mind of this by a group of protesters noisily picketing a fast food restaurant. Although their cause was a more politically charged one, they were certainly making the most of the time-honoured ’What do we want? When do we want it?’ chant.

Back to procrastination, though. I think we probably all put off certain things in life, lacking the appetite to tackle tasks for which we have little enthusiasm.

There’s probably an especial tendency to turn a blind eye to them when you’re feeling one or two degrees under, particularly if your To-Do list contains too many whopping projects.

The trouble is, they can then begin to loom over you. The longer they’re left, the worse they can seem.

But the good news is that getting even a bit done today can start to make you feel stronger, with the result that you’ll probably achieve a little more tomorrow.

So rather than putting absolutely everything off, try to get one or two small items crossed off your list. If you’re facing an overwhelmingly large project, break off a couple of small pieces and see if you can get those done.

Little by little, bit by bit.

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

Last week my friend Anne and I compared notes about what generally happens when people around you realise that you’re having a hard time of things.

Often they truly want to help, but nine times out of ten this gets translated into them asking what they can do for you, one of the most frustrating offers in the world.

Yes, you want help (sometimes desperately) but no – you’ve nowhere near enough strength to organise your thoughts sufficiently to brief them.

As Anne said, ’Don’t ask me how you can help, just tell me what you’re going to do, and do it’.

When times are tough it can feel as though you’re using every ounce of your meagre resources simply to keep the plates spinning.

So when a well-meaning friend asks how they can help, you’ve literally no capacity to work out a strategy. Better by far if they assume responsibility for a couple of plates. ’I’ll look after these two’ – they’re likely to be the words you long to hear.

However, what if you agree with this principle but don’t know how to suggest it to others?

Two ideas spring to mind.

You could always lead by example – help others as you’d like to be helped yourself.

But if the need’s more urgent, why not let me do the seed-sowing? Just forward this email to a friend or two.

Almost certainly they’ll be only too pleased to know that the best way to help you is to simply roll up their sleeves and make a start on something, anything.

Don’t ask, just do.

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

In 1964, when John Lennon plucked a single guitar note at the beginning of The Beatles’ ’I Feel Fine’, its sound issued from a loudspeaker where it was picked up once again by the guitar and returned to the speaker.

Round and round went the sound, causing distinctive ’feedback’, the first time this phenomenon appeared on a commercial recording.

Thanks to producer George Martin, Lennon’s feedback was musical and under control.

But that’s not always the case. I’m sure we’ve all experienced the ear-splitting howl which results from a public address system whose volume is turned up to 11.

Now and then, a similar kind of behaviour can be exhibited by our thinking style.

Thoughts go round and round, becoming amplified in the process.

If George Martin was at the mixing desk, only the good stuff would be allowed through, and these circular thoughts would make you feel, well, fine.

In fact it’s you at the controls, of course, and if you’re anything like me, it may be the negative ideas which seem to resonate most.

An anxious view, a worried thought, can remain cascading with you for days if you’re not careful.

So quite simply don’t let them. Just as shielding a microphone, or turning the volume down, can prevent audio feedback, so you can deliberately tell yourself to Stop thinking those thoughts.

Nobody can tell you what to think.

But you can.

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

Daniel Gilbert wrote the rather good book ’Stumbling on Happiness’ so I was intrigued to read an interview with him in the Harvard Business Review, (and thanks to Michael W for alerting me to it.)

In it, Gilbert talks about happiness research, but as access to it is somewhat limited I’ll pass on Michael’s helpful summary of his two key insights below. Here’s the actual link, though:

http://bit.ly/ydoZnD

The first big observation is that being happy depends on having lots of small positive experiences, rather than a few big ones.

We tend to believe that if we won the lottery or got a great new job, our happiness quotient would leap off the scale overnight. Research suggests however that it’s an aggregation of lots of smaller happy things which make us feel good.

And this is good news. It means you don’t have to wait for your numbers to come up, nor for that mega-promotion. You can, instead, as Gilbert says: ’Wear comfortable shoes, give your wife (I think he means significant other) a big kiss, sneak a french fry.’

We could all do some of that today.

Michael’s second nugget of wisdom is Gilbert’s suggestion that mind-wandering, even onto happy subjects, is not a strictly positive thing. Most people are happiest when engaged in those activities in which their mind wanders the least.

I think it’s a nice way of explaining Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s theory of ’flow’ – that an ideal state of mind occurs when we’re completely immersed in some sort of enjoyable activity.

And that’s another thing which, perhaps, you can do today.

Immerse yourself, avoid that wandering and sneak that french fry.

Just the one, mind you.

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

What’s the point of pessimism?

One might imagine that it’s the optimists who will inherit the earth, leaving the pessimists to wallow in their general lack of hope and expectation.

After all, who’d want their glass half empty rather than half full?

Well. Let’s just stop and think about this for a second.

Imagine that you and I were standing on one side of a chasm. At its foot lurks piranha-infested water, and it’s – ooh – nine metres wide, a little over 29 feet 6 inches.

Your task? To jump to the other side.

As an eternal optimist you might declare ’no problem’. ’Go for it.’

This, however, would be foolish. In the extreme.

The world record for the men’s long jump currently stands at 8.95 metres (7.52 for the women’s) so even an Olympic athlete would end up as fish food.

The point about the confirmed pessimist is that he or she would probably shy away from the jump even if the gap was less than a metre.

But somewhere between these two extremes sits sensible behaviour, which I think we’d probably call being realistic.

I’m not sure about you, but on a bad day I can find myself taking a very downcast view of the world, and I may long to be the complete opposite, a total optimist.

Better, surely, to recognise that it’s being realistic about things which actually gives us the best hope of happiness.

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com

Fifteen years ago in Sydney I traded a slap-up dinner for some priceless knowledge. The friend I met up with, Robin, had just been on a lateral thinking course based on the principles of Edward de Bono, and – keen to learn more about how to think – I plied my friend with food and drink in return for him passing on his learning.

Some time later I discovered that the ’secrets’ he revealed were actually all contained in one of de Bono’s books but, hey, it was a delicious dinner (and nearly always nicer to be taught in person rather than from the printed page).

I was reminded of this little experience the other day when I came across a copy of what I believe was Edward de Bono’s first book (The Use Of Lateral Thinking) in a charity shop and snapped it up for a couple of pounds.

There’s a lovely line in it, which I have to pass on:

’It is not possible to dig a hole in a different place by digging the same hole deeper.’

He’s talking about problem solving of course, and the desirability of thinking laterally rather than vertically, but I reckon his admonition is every bit as relevant to the juggling of emotions as it is to the tackling of challenges.

When your mood is frazzled, sometimes it’s all you can do to keep digging that hole deeper and deeper. However there’s much to be said for pausing for breath and taking a long hard look around you.

Might that lousy mood be telling you something? Maybe it’s suggesting that there could be a better digging location.

It’s a thought, isn’t it?

Measure, track and share your mood:

http://www.moodscope.com