The Happiness Trail: A Road Map to Success

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A grande rasgo, el autor propone percibir nuestros pensamientos como lo que son, solo palabras, y prestarles atención solamente si son útiles para poder construir una vida plena y llena de sentido. Y este último es el otro gran elemento de la ACT. Para ello, el autor define qué entiende por "una vida plena y llena de sentido" y propone identificar nuestros valores, o dicho de otra forma, qué es más importante para nosotros, y emprender acciones y objetivos para vivir en consonancia con estos valores.

I want to hate this book. It's so patronising and at times seriously flawed, logic-wise. It explains things with lots of exclamation marks! And drawn-out metaphors! And basically it's just the author going on, without drawing on any examples from the real world! Letting the radio play on without giving it much attention is very different from actively trying to ignore it.” – p. 66I don’t think most people believe THESE myths. I think they believe truths that are very closely related to these that get twisted.

After our first session, I got instant results. Over the weekend that followed I had many changes to indulge my addiction and I had the desire, but I was able to use ACT to make values-based choices. At that point, my knowledge of the principles of ACT was rudimentary.Despite all this, I'm persisting because, in amongst all the guff, there are some strategies in here that bloody well work. And they work fast. This pains me because I, like the people Harris loves to patronise in the book, am one of those that spent a lot of time working through Cognitive Behavioural Therapy strategies. To have Acceptance and Committment Therapy boy come in, sit down and go "Here's some things that will work for you. Got any biscuits?" is just plain annoying. Today, Russell’s comment about happiness or Gandhi’s oft-quoted words about need, sufficiency and greed are increasingly echoed in the works of the proponents of degrowth who warn us about the limits to which the planet can bear our hyper-competitive, material intensive and climate-disrupting lifestyles. Noted theorist of de-growth, Giorgos Kallis writes, “Limits are not a constraint for freedom, limits are a condition for freedom,” meaning that the setting of limits to growth and respecting planetary boundaries, does not curtail freedom but is necessary for freedom. The trail is a temporary feature and as nature changes so to does the exhibition – birds, slugs & spiders are visiting the trail so why don’t you?

I don’t know how I feel about this book. It’s basically a client-friendly overview of Acceptance & Commitment Therapy (ACT) and offers instructions on how to implement associated techniques and interventions. Your values are always with you, always available. And being faithful to them is usually deeply rewarding. So the more you embrace your values, the greater your sense of fulfillment.If you are willing to read just one self-help book - this is the one. Especially if you prefer advice on how to find out what you like and why you are better off behaving in a certain way, to 'just so' statements about beliefs you must adopt and the way you should think-feel-behave to achieve a specific goal / way of life some guru says is best. The Happiness Trail is a Velocity Artist in residence programme, funded by Clyde Gateway, managed & administered by Glasgow Life from 2018 to 2021; with initial support also from Creative Scotland and Festival 2018.