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World’s happiest man gives tips on staying happy

Matthieu Ricard is the world’s happiest man — a fact validated by neuroscientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. A DNA Special

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HONG KONG: The beatific serenity on Matthieu Ricard’s face, and the occasional mischievous  twinkle in his eye as he sips a Starbucks coffee, bear abundant testimony to his happy state of mind. But 60-year-old Ricard isn’t just any happy man. The French biologist who gave up a promising career in science, travelled to India in 1967 and embraced a monastic life in the Tibetan Buddhist order is, in fact, the “world’s happiest man”, a fact that’s been scientifically validated by neuroscientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. 

Ricard himself makes light of the “certification”: the sample size of volunteers who submitted themselves to the experiment and had their brain patterns monitored wasn’t big enough, he protests. Yet, recently in Hong Kong, the author of Happiness: A Guide to Developing Life’s Most Important Skill, showcased elements of that “happiness” study he is collaborating on, and shared his insights on how every living being can train the mind — through meditation — to attain an elevated state of being that is associated with an emotion called happiness. 

“Happiness,” says Ricard, “is a skill. You have to work at attaining it, in the same way that you need to practise to be able to ski or ride a bike. The good news, he adds, is that even a little bit of meditative training goes a long way. 

As part of the “happiness study”, the volunteers had 256 electrodes wired up to their brain, and were subjected to about three hours’ magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanning. The idea was to secure a “signature of the brain”, including blood flow patterns, that would give clues to the state of mind of the volunteer. 

The experiment yielded dramatic results: the area of the brain that was stimulated during meditation was the superior pre-frontal cortex, which is medically associated with “positive emotions”, or happiness. “In other words,” says Ricard, “meditation induces happiness, and is an antidote to depression.” And volunteers who had undergone more extensive mind training exercises engendered more powerful mental states that novices were not capable of. Their powers of concentration, response to stress, and immune system were also much better. Ricard’s own mental abilities were far superior to even other monks who had over 10,000 hours of mind training — which is why he’s come to be known as the “world’s happiest man”. 

It may be possible for a Tibetan monk living in the high Himalayas to attain that happy state of being, but can others caught up with far more existential living aspire to happiness? “It is true that where I live, in the Shechen monastery in Nepal, the environment is more conducive to meditation. But, the environment does not matter: you must think of your body as a hermitage, and your mind as a hermit.”

Every person, Ricard emphasises in his book, has a “base line”, a level of happiness to which they return after experiencing momentary bursts of joy or disappointment. With meditation, that base line can be elevated. “True happiness,” says Ricard, “comes from acknowledging that happiness is a shared goal for every living being… By accomplishing the aims of others in an altruistic and compassionate way, your own happiness can be fulfilled.”

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