The Happiness Experiment and Second-hand Stress

This is a fun article on the nature of happiness working the workweek versus the weekend. 

The author is something of a nerd (love that) with great perspective for getting more happiness into your weekday. You data-heads like me will appreciate how he approaches and analyzes this question.

I also really enjoyed his concept of “Secondhand Stress”. This is the idea that, like secondhand smoke, the unhealthy nature of stress can be passed to you by those around you. 

Given the dangerous nature of stress for our health, maybe we should have outdoor areas for people to be stress balls away from the rest of us. 

Out by the dumpster. 

We can tell them in the winter to go shiver out there with the other stressy stressers. Airports will have “stress friendly” rooms where people can go between flights to wring their hands until the veins pop out on their necks. 

Short of stress-shunning, it’s important to be aware that your environment can add to, or subtract from your own angst. And this directly addresses the issue of corporate wellness culture.

When there is positivity (of mood, language, and interaction) it becomes a feed-forward benefit for everyone. On the other hand, a climate of angst, stress, and negative speech infects others like an influenza spreading from one person to the next like the virus it is. 

In either case, once the wellness culture gathers inertia it becomes somewhat self-sustaining. The key for us is to make it a positive one.