Ah, the Power of Improv!

In a city of millions, it comes as no surprise that New Yorkers are experts are remaining aloof and non-responsive – we simply turn up the volume on our headphones, burrowing deeper into our paperback, and do our very best to avoid eye contact.

But every once in a while we might stumble on a situation that forces us to sit up and take notice, to unplug and power down. Maybe it’s seeing hundreds of people in the subway who aren’t wearing pants… in January. Or perhaps you wandered into a Best Buy only to find that every single person in the store is wearing the standard staff uniform (khakis and a blue polo). The urge to take stock of your surroundings and to communicate with others involved in the same experience – even if it’s as simple as a shared smile or laugh – is irresistible. And this is precisely Charlie Todd’s goal. As the creator of Improv Everywhere, he started creating wildly funny, zany or offbeat scenarios in public places in New York in 2001. The enterprise has since become a global movement operating under the appropriate tagline “We Cause Scenes.”

Whether it be a silent dance party in a park or a re-enactment of the opening scene from Ghostbusters in the Reading Room of the New York Public Library, Todd and his team of volunteers put unsuspecting people in the improvisational line of fire. In devising these scenes, Improv Everywhere compels bystanders to burst out of their individual bubbles, take in their surroundings and interact with those around them. After all, if a gang of four men in yellow jumpsuits with vacuums strapped to their backs started chasing white-sheet-clad ghosts around while you were studying quietly in the library, even the most jaded New Yorker might be tempted to crack a smile, especially as library security guards stand there apparently dumbfounded.

Charlie Todd and his team of improv “agents” put into action many of the same guiding principles of WOOPAAH. Creativity, spontaneity and the unexpected are powerful tools for enacting change. They can (albeit unwittingly) bring together all kinds of people, breaking down the walls we build to keep others out and make the stimulus overload of our city more bearable. With humor and a wonderfully creative spirit, Todd reminds us that even though we are all different, shared experiences through play that encourage us to look outside of ourselves can help us connect with those around us on a fundamental level. And perhaps sharing a laugh with a stranger is the first step to beginning a dialogue and creating a greater sense of understanding and happiness amongst us all.

Why Your Boss Will Live Longer Than You...Unless, of course, you take my advice

I just bought a new shoe rack from Bed, Bath, and Beyond and got so excited at the thought of seeing my heels all in a row...so much so that I began to laugh at just how much this meant to me.  But then I hearkened back to what I learned in grad school and realized how this tidy endeavor signfies much more than my Ms.-wanna-be-anally-organized-ness. It's actually representative of a life-threatening problem that faces everyone who has a boss.  What we're talking about here people has been the root of wars, of struggle, of heart-ache (physical and emotional) and of pre-mature death for as long as we can remember...or at least since the famous 1967 Whitehall Study proved it so...what we're talking about here people is the desire for CONTROL.

According to the two very famous studies, Whitehall I and Whitehall II, one's rank in class, status, or heirarchy at work or in life have a dramatic influence on lifespan. Who do you think lives longer? A busy CEO or her secretary? (I guess my post title gives it away...but keep reading). According to the Whitehall studies which examined 18,000 male civil servants in 1967 and then over 10,000 men and women 20 years later in a longitudinal study, it turns out that those in a lower rank have a morbidity rate of almost twice those who occupy higher-level positions. The higher your position, the longer you're more likely to live. Why? Wouldn't the responsibilities of a CEO cause more stress, which leads to spiked cortisol levels, which leads to cardiovascular issues?  Uhhh, you would think . But actually, the study found that the less control you feel you have over your lot in life, the higher your level of stress.  Capiche? Other studies following this theorize that perhaps it's not so much control, but maybe the anticipation of not knowing what's next. Same difference to me.

So how do you live longer (or just as long) as your boss?

1. OUTSMART YOURSELF: Accept that you don't have control over the events in your life. Because you really don't. And that the only thing you can control is your reaction and thought in regards to events that you can't control. That actually gives you lots of control! (In fact, it's determines about 40% of your happiness). Outsmart the power struggle.  Choose your response to things that come up.

2. CREATE PRETEND POCKETS: So maybe you can't control the fact that your company's biggest competitor just came up with the next best thing to sliced bread, that your baby cries at night, or that the train is late...but you can create pretend pockets of control. Pretend pockets of control are little things you do for yourself to make you feel like you do actually have control in life. This could be making sure you get to the gym no matter what every morning, or it can be eating healthy, or it can be organizing your shoe closet!

3. ACCEPT IT ALL BUT CREATE WITH INTENTION.  This means accept whatever comes your way as information and an opportunity to create something new and better if what you got wasn't exactly what you wanted. For example, you thought he was the one, but getting dumped over lunch might mean he's not. Accept that.  Learn from the information you gathered during the relationship. And continue to intend on finding love, but the kind that actually does X, Y, Z. This also means forgiving yourself. Like if your pretend pocket is going to the gym every morning and you don't make it this week - accept that other things got in the way, and continue to intend on a healthy lifestyle, start going again tomorrow.

Now that we're all worked up - or at least I am...I'll have to write next about just how POSITIVE it is to be out of control sometimes. Will save for later.

Best,

Stella

P.S. On a very serious note. The Whitehall Studies have been transformative and powerfully indicative of how dangerous social and economic injustice is to well-being. While I'm keeping this light, everyone from parents, to employers, to political leaders should consider how to empower those with less power. Everyone will benefit. In this post I'm assuming civic rights and beyond. This is not available to all and that's a whole other post.

Want to learn more? Resource:

Marmot, Michael. Status Syndrome. New York: Henry Holt and Company, LLC, 2004.

40% of your happiness is in your control

Happiness doesn't just happen to you, you make it happen! Did you know that there is an equation in positive psychology that tells us about 40% of our happiness is voluntary and in our control. About 50% of our happiness is based on things we canʼt control, such as our DNA, which influences our personality. The remaining 10% or so is influenced by life circumstances such as oneʼs marriage and job.  Itʼs in the 40% of voluntary happiness where positive psychology comes in and where WOOPAAH lives; we hope to be a vehicle for people to take off, one step at a time.

Despite having the capacity to make ourselves happy, weʼre not doing a very good job. While spending over $11 billion in 2008 on self-improvement books, CDs, seminars, coaching and stress-management programs (which was 13.6% more than they did back in 2005), the number of Americans taking antidepressants is still double what it was about a decade ago, from 13.3 million in 1996 to 27 million in 2005 (Gardner, 2009). Furthermore, the growth rate of our national life satisfaction as a nation has flat-lined (Diener & Diener, 1995).

I believe that one of the things that may stand in the way of so many Americans flourishing is the way they approach it: through their heads, and not their hearts. Even though Americans may be spending billions to learn the “how-toʼs” of happiness, knowing is one thing, but doing is another.

That's why we've got to play, to get surprised, to do something that enrolls us enough to distract our brains and grab our entire self into the process of positivity.

More on this to come!

S

Wanna learn more? References:

Diener, E. & Diener, M. (1995). Cross-cultural correlates of life satisfaction and self- esteem. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 68:653-63.

Gardner, A. (2009, August). Antidepressants use in the U.S. has almost doubled. U.S. News & Wold Report: Health. Retrieved from http://health.usnews.com/

Seligman, M.E.P. (2002). Authentic happiness. New York: Free Press.

Shooting Guns is Good Failure

Have you heard of the phrase, "Ready, FIRE, Aim?"  It's a play on the phrase: "Ready, AIM, Fire." Ready, FIRE, Aim essentially means that you get into the zone of doing, do, and then course correct once you've actually acted. Many people get stuck in the aiming and never fire. It's the drive for perfection, for getting it right that actually leads to what I call "bad failure." Let me just pause here with a major disclaimer: I believe that all failure is indeed AWESOME -how else do you learn? But there are different types of failure: "Good Failure" is the kind you embrace before it happens, while "Bad Failure" is the kind that you try to avoid at all costs. 

Ready, FIRE, Aim is a strategy to achieve Good Failure at worst, and amazing success at best. A mantra that many successful businesses and entreprenuers live by, Ready, FIRE, Aim has nothing to do with skills, resources, or time. It's purely about having the guts to be wrong...or at least not perfect. It's about valuing momentum over calculation.  It also happens to the be driving force of nature, of children, and all things creative.  Evolution is evidence of nature creating and course correcting.  Imagine if nature was anti-mutation...we'd be extinct! Or, imagine if every time a baby went to walk it decided, "naah, I'd rather wait..I don't feel like falling."

You probably not only get the point here, but know it all too well. As do I. But I'm writing this damn post because I personally need to be reminded of it. ALL THE TIME. Like NOW. This post is secretly for me.  What you don't know is that I've been meaning to write my official welcome blog post for over a month.  But I've been putting it off, waiting until I had the time to write the bestest post eva'. 

So here it is. I fired! It's probably full of typos. No where near how GREAT it could be if I just spent another 30 days thinking about it. But, it's done. And now, I can share it. Now I can course correct. Now I have momentum that will can lead me in new directions (or at least more posts).

So welcome. Welcome to WOOPAAH! Where we courageously march into the unknown, live alive, play with possibilities, create as we go, and have an f'in good time doing it all.   This blog, as is every step we take, I hope, serves as a microsmic extension of our values and our mission to not only inspire you - but to give you access to your living your biggest life, your most awake existence, your most creative everything.  

Here's to celebrating good failure and experiencing explosive growth.

Much love,

Stella

Shooting is Good Failure

HOLY MOLY HELLO WORLD

Wow. We're finally here. The official WOOPAAH website is live. We're still beta-ing...and my first real-deal post is to come. But in the meanwhile, here's celebrating where actions and dreams-come-true collide. This has been many years in the making.  I'm excited.

WOOOOPAAAAAAHHHHHH!

Stella