Top 5: Finding Joy in Any Job

Top 5: Finding Joy in Any Job

Author: Pushkin Industries November 15, 2024 Duration: 35:18

To mark the podcast's fifth birthday, Dr Laurie is revisiting some of her favorite episodes. And this show - Working Your Way to Happiness - has a special place in her heart.  

Marty kills rats... but if you asked him what his job is he'd say it was "solving problems" and "helping people". How we view our work can contribute greatly to our daily levels of happiness - far more than money or status.

Dr Laurie examines how we all came to ignore the importance of job satisfaction and hears from Professor Amy Wrzesniewski about "job crafting" - the reframing skill that happy people like Marty use to see their careers as more than just a way to make money.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.


We often chase after things we believe will bring us joy-the next promotion, a perfect vacation photo, a bigger house-only to find the feeling is fleeting. The Happiness Lab with Dr. Laurie Santos digs into the surprising psychology behind why our instincts about happiness are so frequently wrong. Dr. Santos, a Yale professor, doesn't just offer vague self-help advice; she translates the rigorous research from her record-breaking university course into practical, actionable science. Each episode feels like a personal conversation, where she breaks down complex studies and shares stories from people who've applied these lessons, revealing how counterintuitive changes in our daily routines and mindset can have a profound impact. This Pushkin Industries podcast moves beyond the surface of wellness trends, offering a grounded look at what genuinely improves our well-being across our social lives, personal health, and cultural expectations. Tuning in, you'll hear not just theory, but the tangible steps you can take to rewire your habits, backed by evidence that often contradicts our modern chase for more. It’s a refreshing take that makes the science of a better life accessible and genuinely useful, episode by episode.
Author: Language: en-us Episodes: 100

The Happiness Lab with Dr. Laurie Santos
Podcast Episodes
How Horror Movies and True Crime Can Make You Happier [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 44:57
Halloween isn't just costumes and candy. It's also a time when we indulge our interest in the scary and macabre. But there's also a taboo about gory horror movies and gruesome true crime shows - we often feel that being…
Make Vulnerability Your Superpower (with NBA star Kevin Love) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 37:07
Not many elite athletes talk openly about mental health, but five-time NBA All-Star Kevin Love is changing that. After a very public panic attack on the basketball court he was told to "snap out of it". But Kevin decided…
How to Make Better Choices (with Barry Schwartz) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 40:48
Every choice you make shapes your wellbeing - and the bigger the decision, the greater the impact. So when it comes to life-changing questions like where to live, who to marry, or which career to pursue, how can you tell…
Take a Three-Day Weekend Without Losing Any Pay (with Juliet Schor) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 55:51
Many of us toil for long hours - and even take work home at the end of the day. That's bad for us in so many ways - but extensive research shows that it just doesn't have to be this way. Many of us could work a four-day…
Eat Like the People Who Live Happily to 100 (with Dan Buettner) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 39:21
Your eating habits could be cutting years off the end of your life. But there's a simple solution - eat like the people who live happily and healthily into their 80s, 90s and beyond. Dan Buettner studies the inhabitants…
Why Having the Courage to Defy Makes us Happier (with Dr Sunita Sah) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 39:53
We all go along with things we don't want to do... or worse, things that make us feel uncomfortable or morally uneasy. We comply for lots of reasons. We don't want to make trouble, or upset our friends, our bosses or peo…
“Can You Train Your Mind to Be Happier?” (with Dr Tal Ben-Shahar) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:27:14
How do you train your mind to be happier? That was the question posed to Dr Laurie by Dr Tal Ben-Shahar at a live webinar for his Happiness Studies Academy. Tal is a leading expert in positive psychology and co-founded t…