![]() ![]() Linda Leaming, author of the wonderful book A Field Guide to Happiness: What I Learned in Bhutan About Living, Loving and Waking Up ¸ knows this too.“I realised thinking about death doesn’t depress me. They know that death is a part of life, whether we like it or not, and ignoring this essential truth comes with a heavy psychological cost. None of this, I’m sure, would surprise Ura, or any other Bhutanese. This led the researchers to conclude that “death is a psychologically threatening fact, but when people contemplate it, apparently the automatic system begins to search for happy thoughts”. The second group – the one that had been thinking about death – was far more likely to construct positive words, such as “joy”. Both groups were then asked to complete stem words, such as “jo_”. One group was told to think about a painful visit to the dentist while the other group was instructed to contemplate their own death. In a 2007 study, University of Kentucky psychologists Nathan DeWall and Roy Baumesiter divided several dozen students into two groups. Some recent research suggests that, by thinking about death so often, the Bhutanese may be on to something. Is this secretly a land of darkness and despair? That would be remarkable for any nation, but especially for one so closely equated with happiness as Bhutan. In Bhutanese culture, one is expected to think about death five times a day. Bhutan is indeed a special place (and Ura, director of the Centre for Bhutan Studies, a special person) but that specialness is more nuanced and, frankly, less sunny than the dreamy Shangri-La image we project onto it.Īctually, by suggesting I think about death once a day, Ura was going easy on me. The Himalayan kingdom is best known for its innovative policy of Gross National Happiness it’s a land where contentment supposedly reigns and sorrow is denied entry. Places, like people, have a way of surprising us, provided we are open to the possibility of surprise and not weighed down with preconceived notions. We have to be ready for the moment we cease to exist.” “Rich people in the West, they have not touched dead bodies, fresh wounds, rotten things. “But why would I want to think about something so depressing?” “It is this thing, this fear of death, this fear of dying before we have accomplished what we want or seen our children grow. “You need to think about death for five minutes every day,” Ura replied. What I wanted to know was: why now – my life was going uncharacteristically well – and what could I do about it?
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