We humans are a tangled mess of bundles of emotions! Nothing is simple and straightforward! Most of the time we can be transparent, permeable and easily judged by others. We try to be opaque to go through life with a poker face, but often the emotions get the better of us! Our emotional intelligence is constantly at a test. It reveals all about us, especially in times when we are most vulnerable.
We carry our relationships with us at all times. That is the baggage we must all carry originating from the bitter-sweet, ‘best-forgotten’ memories of early childhood leading to our relationships in adulthood. Our ‘happiness index’ from each relationship has a direct impact on how we perform in a workplace. The contentment which comes from the work itself, and the professional relationships at work, also change the way we interact with our family members in terms of time and communication as an input. It is also about how we manage stress in both situations, work and life. Understanding how quick we are to temper, and how we can compose ourselves even in the most irritable and annoying situations, is the essential key to finding the happiness-index.
Genes apart – our ‘life-environment’ consists of personal space and professional space. Personal space includes our closest relationships with a spouse, a partner, children, friends and perhaps neighbors. The professional space has the formal interactions with the boss, the colleagues, and other co-workers.
This ‘life-environment’ goes through several changes as we grow into late-adulthood. So genes apart, the build-up of stress over the years, sourcing from our ‘life-environment’, could eventually manifest in a pot-belly, love handles, and receding hair-line.
We carry along this stress, and let it spread across without much restriction. We forget the art of compartmentalizing. We bring our work and its stress to home. We take anger and guilt from family to work. Come evening, the magnetic draw to alcohol and comfort foods could only compound the inner brewing of ill-health into late-adulthood, not to mention the gradual pessimistic mind-change and eroding serotonins. So this is how we gradually allow the personal space to mingle with professional space. We start to fault in both spaces. Our ‘life-environment’ goes in a state of disharmony. We call it normal. We get immune to the change. And Aging does not help either.
So let’s take a moment to breathe deeper! Let’s think of the things that matter. Sift away the redundancies of life’s elements which lead to such stress and decrease the essence of joy and happiness. Let’s chat more. Text more. Skype more. Talk more. Communicate more. Use the voice more. Its tones and modulations, loaded with emotions. Let’s laugh and cry. Not alone, but with someone who matters. Someone who will empathize. See the difference. There’s a touch of happiness. It’s a touch! Its good mental health and well-being!
By Rashmi Malhotra Ph.D.
