The Book: Overview

Life can suck or it can be pretty damn cool.

We all know people who have more joy, money and laughs – who are somehow “sorted” as the English would say or as Americans put it, “have their shit together.” They’re comfortable in their own skins and don’t take offense easily. They make wiser choices and become more independent, financially and emotionally. Their kids generally thrive and they even become more attractive as they age.

How the heck do they do it? Are they gifted, lucky? Born wise and strong and handsome? Are they reared in healthy, calm, loving families? Yes… and no. When it comes to DNA, researchers are learning more every day that some of us are dealt a strong hand when it comes to personality and temperament. And having sensitive, smart, supportive parents makes a HUGE difference. But i believe that you can learn how to live or… without sounding too Californian, how to “be” from the healthiest, happiest people around you.

There are traits, attitudes and habits that truly healthy, happy people display in all aspects of their lives – traits that you and I can adopt and make our lives better and richer… make us more productive, more giving, more creative, less self-destructive, more loving and loved human beings. Adopting just a few of them will improve your outlook, your choices -- your life.

I’m not a doctor or psychologist, but I know this is true because I grew up around great examples of both troubled and healthy people. I’ve witnessed many more of both categories as a reporter. (Note – the truly healthy are few among us… Abraham Mazlow, the mid-twentieth century psychologist who taught us a lot about psychological health, believed there may be only 1 in a 100, maybe just 1 in 200 who are exceptionally healthy.) I grew up in a classically dysfunctional family (alcoholism, divorce) most of my kin stray in and out psychological health. But I had some very healthy role models outside my family to mimic. They have become an extended family, my clan if you will. I see them most every year and I know their families and histories. I am indebted to them. I care about them and it is truly joyous to be with them.

Professionally, I became a reporter and interviewed hundreds of powerful, successful, creative people. Trust me, most of them are not super healthy, but a number appear to be and almost all exhibit some of these traits. I started asking them about: their philosophies of life and how they live and make choices, why they think the way they do, what their faiths and routines are, what they believe about child rearing, self-discipline, how they handle fear, pain, stress, exhaustion, what makes them joyous, successful and lucky. Lo and behold, many of the same ideas, attitudes and habits came up again and again. So, I started a list and each person who identified a trait would then send me off reading some article or book that had inspired them to wiser choices and behavior. In particular, I devoured everything that Mazlow wrote and said. (Unlike most psychologists, Mazlow focused on healthy psyches). Mazlow himself noted traits though he never collected them in one list of which I'm aware.

I also immersed myself in the works of Joseph Campbell, the late, great professor of comparative religion at Sarah Lawrence College. Campbell’s insights into the universality of mankind’s psycho-spiritual quests are invaluable in understanding what makes us tick. M. Scott Peck, the author of “The Road Less Traveled” is also a great educator to the ways of sorrow, struggle and happiness. I’m also a big fan of Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger, the billionaire Chairman and Vice Chairman of Berkshire Hathaway. They are first class students of human nature and I believe exhibit most if not all the traits of truly healthy human beings. They are certainly successful, responsible, moral, steadfast, curious and FUNNY gentlemen.

These traits are a straightforward if superficial list of the characteristics of a healthy temperament. I don’t think such a list has ever been widely circulated. If it has, then I haven’t seen it and Lord only knows: The world needs it.

In an anthropological sense, this is a list of behaviors and attitudes that have been handed down by our wisest ancestors. To a few of our luckiest friends and acquaintances they are second nature, to the rest of us, these are lessons learned the hard way… and often never. I believe that success and failure, happiness and sadness typically are not accidents or simply ‘meant to be’. Health, happiness, independence and contentment are transmitted and earned.

Success and fulfillment are not accidental. When “success” is unearned, such as when someone wins the lottery, its rewards are quickly lost. A life well lived is always the result of personal will and careful, loving, righteous initiative. As R. Maurice Boyd, author and retired pastor of The City Church in New York City declares, “Life is not a process. It is a drama.” Your life is a drama in which you are the protagonist with control over how you react and thus over much of what happens to you. As Stephen Covey the author of mega-seller, “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People” says, “You are not the product of nature or nurture, but of choice, your own choices.”