Casual
DeLorenzo, Josephine
Casual HOW I LEARNED TO BE HAPPY Ionce had a bad day that lasted all of 1995. Admittedly, I was not diagnosed with a terminal disease, and no one died, but many other things just seemed to...
...Siimon Reynolds explains it all in his cheery new book...
...On those few tragic occasions when I awoke in the middle of the night from the pain of what felt like burning shrapnel embedded in my chest, it was really all in my head...
...Step Four seems a bit complicated, but never fear, it’s really quite simple to Reprogram Your Brain...
...Just as you can Reprogram Your Brain, you can Change Your Body Movements, because “happy thoughts create happy movements, and happy movements create happy thoughts...
...For a time, my motto was: “If anything can go wrong, it will...
...That which doesn’t kill us makes us stronger, right...
...Reynolds, we learn in the introduction, had money, fame, power, looks, and love, yet was still not happy...
...Therefore, “you can program your brain to make you think and feel whatever you want...
...Step Five takes this denial to a new level...
...That’s right, six easy steps, eight minutes...
...It’s true...
...This can’t be happening...
...There is a disclaimer, however...
...I thought it was a grave injustice that I went from discussing the finer points of the Communist Manifesto with clueless undergrads to answering phones and faxing things...
...Become Happy in Eight Minutes has changed my life...
...After all, “it wasn’t necessarily a bad event or bad person that made you feel unhappy, it was how you told your brain to react to this bad event or bad person...
...Now I have new words to live by: “Smile...
...Finally, much to my dismay, I found that my Notre Dame degree and my service as a foot soldier in the Republican Revolution of 1994 qualified me only to answer telephones in the nation’s capital...
...That is, always look on the bright side “no matter how bad the event may first appear...
...Indeed, it only takes two minutes...
...Makes sense...
...JOSEPHINE DELORENZO...
...Step Three requires you to drink some fruit juice and then take advantage of the temporary sugar high to think happy thoughts...
...But as Reynolds points out, the fact that my parents squandered tens of thousands of dollars on my college education should be negated by the fact that, hey, I could be unemployed, and worse yet, I could be a vegan working in a slaughterhouse...
...It’s almost impossible to cry when you do that...
...Step Two takes two minutes and involves changing your breathing, because, as modern science tells us, “if you breathe the wrong way, melancholic moods will be your constant companion...
...You must,” Reynolds says solemnly, “give it 100 percent...
...Thanks to the wonders of modern science, it is now possible to Become Happy in Eight Minutes...
...This so-called cybernetic loop can even make you stop crying...
...Reynolds concludes that “your brain can’t tell the difference between what’s true or false, but just acts on whatever information you give it...
...Now that I have stumbled upon the cure for a broken heart and underemployment, the second half of 1996 will be my best ever...
...Then, I had to adjust to a hostile, foreign environment: I had moved from Michigan, where the automobile is worshiped as a semi-divine entity, to Virginia, which outlaws radar detectors and prohibits driving on certain highways unless you have a preordained number of occupants in your vehicle...
...From his exhaustive research, Mr...
...No, the reader soon learns, happiness is not composed of material possessions like BMWs and condos in Vail, or immaterial, spiritual bonds like marriage and children with the elusive Mr...
...Finally we come to my personal favorite, Step Six, where you learn to Change Your Focus...
...Step One is to Stimulate the Thymus Gland by smiling a big happy smile, tapping the upper portion of your breastbone, and placing your tongue behind your front teeth on the roof of your mouth...
...If I had only known then what I know now...
...This procedure will activate your happy hormones...
...Right...
...Wrong...
...There is a cure for a broken heart...
...Rather, happiness is a technique, and you too can master it for only $9.95...
...I cried a lot, consumed twice my weight in chocolate, and listened to Alanis Morissette 24 hours a day...
...I suffered with puffy eyes for much of 1995, but had Siimon Reynolds gotten to me sooner, I would have learned that to stop a body convulsed with sobs, all you have to do is “smile and look up at something on the ceiling...
...There was the problem of men not calling me when they were supposed to...
...What did I do in the face of such insurmountable obstacles to my happiness...
...I mistakenly believed I could do without the power and fame if I had looks, love, and tons of cash...
...It’s called denial...
...All it takes is a little practice...
...Admittedly, I was not diagnosed with a terminal disease, and no one died, but many other things just seemed to go wrong...
Vol. 2 • September 1996 • No. 1
