We last week came across an excellent article entitled "I'm a psychology expert in Finland, the No. 1 happiest country in the world - here are 3 things we never do"
Finland has been ranked as the Happiest nation on earth for 5 years running, making it no stroke of luck!
In the article, its writer identifies and explains 3 things the Finnish people “don’t do” to maintain a high quality of life (despite their long cold winters!) as follows:-
1. They don’t compare themselves to their neighbours
2. They don’t overlook the benefits of nature
3. They don’t break the community of trust.
We deal with the 1st item of not comparing ourselves to others in our post entitled “Maintain a Positive Stressbusting™ Frequency by avoiding Jealousy”.
The 2nd important issue of appreciating nature, we address throughout our posts - see for example “The Shortest Day – A Reminder of the Cyclical Nature of Anxiety”, “Welcome to January's "Wolf Moon"" and "Keep an eye out for nearby Stressbusting™ Activities".
However, we feel the 3rd deserves some direct attention here from a dedicated stressbusting™ perspective.
All communities, in order to prosper, flourish and function, require a degree of mutual trust and gratitude between their individuals.
To an extent, this is secured by the laws of a nation, as explained in our previous post entitled “The Relationship between Legal Compliance & Stressbusting™”.
The Law of any nation prevents certain "unlawful" actions that would be harmful not only to an individual, but also to society more widely, to enable that society to operate smoothly and fairly.
Without such laws, Anarchy would reign.
But the Law does not generally demand of individuals the continued performance of morally good charitable endeavours.
This is left as a moral matter and freedom of choice for individuals themselves.
However, in periods of economic downturn or uncertainty, bringing with them higher levels of inflation, greater costs of living, unemployment and more companies going bust, people’s attitudes can change.
They can to some extent understandably become less inclined toward charity or empathy with others and more directed toward self preservation.
It is interesting in this regard to observe that Finland is in fact a wealthy country in contrast to many other countries in the world.
The act of charity is, however, an immensely powerful stressbusting™ tool, as described and reasoned in our previous post entitled “Stressbust™ those Winter Blues without Bursting the Bank”.
And this may be where Finnish culture differs from others – the Finnish nation as a community may take a higher level of initiative in assuming personal responsibility for voluntary acts of kindness than other cultures, regardless of their overriding economic, legal or social climate.
In our view, such a philosophy of ongoing empathy and generosity has to be passed through generations, particularly given the Law itself is largely silent on the matter.
Therefore the mantle for impressing its importance on the young must be on parents, schools and carers – see our post entitled “Leverage the Stressbusting™ Wisdom of Age”.
Unless and until this happens, we are at risk of not only inhabiting a less happy planet, but a more stressful one.
After all, everyone in the world will at some point in their lives require a third party favour of some form or another.
And one of the secrets to personal stressbusting™ is to be able to graciously and unconditionally receive a favour from time to time with the same grace and absence of conditions as one gives such a favour from time to time.
Society starts to suffer when this reciprocity breaks down - in other words, when sections of society begin to feel for some reason that they are entitled to receive favours, but are not minded to give them in return, even when they are cost free.
We should therefore all be on the lookout in life for how we might help others in need or less fortunate than ourselves as a daily norm.
This is a “win, win situation” that should never be dismissed or overlooked.
And who knows, at the end of the day, perhaps the Finnish people (who should of course be applauded) are in fact more happy because they are less stressed in the knowledge they are all looking out for one another whereas other communities are not.....?!
For further relevant information on this issue, please visit our posts entitled “The Relationship between Toxicity & Stressbusting™” & “Break Time Quickie : Open the Door to Imperfection – it can be Liberating as well as Stressbusting™”.
We hope you find our posts of continued use or interest and please provide us with any feedback you may have or issues you might like us to cover.
Love,LouLoU™&MikeyM™ xxxx☺💘💞 xxxx