Table Of ContentCopyright © 2013 by Shawn Achor
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Crown Business,
an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
www.crownpublishing.com
CROWN BUSINESS is a trademark and CROWN and the Rising Sun colophon are registered trademarks
of Random House, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Achor, Shawn.
Before happiness : the 5 hidden keys to achieving success, spreading happiness, and sustaining
positive change / by Shawn Achor.
p. cm
Includes bibliographical references.
1. Happiness. 2. Positive psychology. 3. Change (Psychology) 4. Success. I. Title.
BF575.H27A267 2013
158—dc23
2013022564
eISBN: 978-0-77043674-2
Line art and pyramid graphic by Tam Nguyen
Jacket design by Jess Morphew
v3.1
To Michelle Gielan,
who changed everything I knew about happiness.
She is living proof that when we shine brightly,
this world can be transformed.
contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Beyond Happiness
The Power of Positive Genius
SKILL 1: Reality Architecture: Choosing the Most Valuable Reality
SKILL 2: Mental Cartography: Mapping Your Success Route
SKILL 3: The X-Spot: Finding Success Accelerants
SKILL 4: Noise Canceling: Boosting Your Positive Signal by Eliminating the Negative Noise
SKILL 5: Positive Inception: Transferring Your Positive Reality to Others
Positive Inspiration: A Case for Change
Notes
acknowledgments
As I reflect on the wild ride of the past few years—getting to travel
around the world researching and speaking about happiness—I am
continually humbled by the realization that I began this journey in the
depths of depression while at Harvard. I remember during divinity
school my first attempt at journaling, in which I wrote, “I don’t
remember being happy.” Some people who read this book will know that
place well. And others will never experience that dark night of the soul.
But I know this: Change is possible only when we link our lives to
others. There are no words that can convey the deep gratitude I have for
all the people who make every day, during every shining success and
daunting setback, joyful and worth living.
This list is only a small fraction of those people.
Michelle Gielan, my fiancée, business partner, fellow researcher, best
friend … so pretty much she deserves an entire acknowledgment book. I
plan on spending my life writing it. She read The Happiness Advantage
while in the UPenn positive psychology program. She e-mailed me, we
met up, started working together, and fell in love all while researching
and spreading happiness. If I had only known I’d get to meet her, I
would have written the book earlier.
My sister Amy (the unicorn) and my brother for being both my
compass and my rock. Their love, support, and wisdom are worth mixing
metaphors. Little Ana, Gabri, and Kobi are the living fruits of their
generous spirits.
Joe and Sharon Achor, lifelong educators, who taught me how to love.
There is no better compliment.
Jordan Brock for his genius in helping grow our company; he believes
so strongly that this research needs to be heard because he lives it as a
business leader, husband, and father. He and his family are our family
now.
Talia Krohn, my editor, who patiently worked with me for two years
on this book as I kept trying to cram it with new research or rewrite
whole sections as I got excited about something else. She’s amazing.
Stuart Johnson and Meridith Simes from Success magazine. Stuart is a
visionary and Meridith makes it happen. They are not only reinventing
Success, but they are going to be at the vanguard of how entrepreneurs
worldwide use this research. They are also incredibly generous souls and
friends. Thank you to their team, including Susan Kane, who has helped
spread and advance this mission.
Rafe Sagalyn, my literary agent, who believed in me from the
beginning. If you want an agent, Rafe is one of the best in the industry.
Jenny Canzoneri, Holli Catchpole, and the SpeakersOffice team in
California, which officially handles all our back-office logistics flawlessly
and tirelessly. If you are a speaker, you couldn’t find a better partner
supporting your efforts.
CorpU for turning our research into an entire online academic and
social course for companies worldwide. CorpU is the future of online
education, so I’m so grateful that they are so interested in starting with
happiness research.
Greg Kaiser, Kevin Karaffa, Greg Ray, and the entire International
Thought Leader Network, including Donald Bargy, Marti Kaiser, and
Reggie Tyler, for partnering with us to create a sustainable way to
cascade the happiness advantage throughout companies. The parable-
based train-the-trainer program we launched at Nationwide is fantastic,
thanks to their dedication.
Heidi Krupp-Lisiten and Darren Lisiten from Krupp Kommunications
(K2), who served as our top-notch PR team. It is great to work with a
husband-wife team, as Michelle and I work hand in hand as well. They
are fantastic if you want to reach multiple PR verticals and want to have
fun doing it.
Crown Business team at Random House for their marketing efforts and
investing so much energy in this project.
Ali Crum, a former student turned friend and inspiration. She is the
rarest of breeds: a world-famous, brilliant academic with a way of
connecting to anyone with her warm heart.
Marty Seligman for not only creating the field of positive psychology
but also enabling an entire generation of disciples to bring this message
forward.
Jeff Olson and Amber Olson, who dedicated themselves to rallying the
troops at Nerium to make this research turn into a movement.
Cory Ludens and Mattress Firm for partnering with us on research and
becoming a positive outlier company that thrives on passion.
Adam Grant, a modern-day genius and a new friend. Literally the
smartest person I know. His book Give and Take is fantastic, and he
helped me brainstorm several of the ideas in this book.
Gerry Richman from PBS and Colleen Steward from Tremendous!
Entertainment, who partnered with us to create the PBS show for The
Happiness Advantage. Thanks to them, the show aired in 88 percent of
American homes.
Tony Hsieh, Jenn Lim, and James Key Lim at Delivering Happiness for
partnering with us to help create culture change at companies based
upon their incredible work at Zappos and the Downtown Project.
Christian Long and TEDxBloomington for getting us the TED spot that
went viral.
Tal Ben-Shahar, who has inspired not only me but thousands like me
to make positive changes, to become a better person, and to be excited
about life.
Barbara Teszler, who is a PR bulldog who gets things done. She helped
breathe PR life into the Institute for Applied Positive Research and The
Happiness Advantage.
Alexis Roberts, for keeping her finger on the pulse of the happiness
movement and beating a constant drumbeat of positivity.
Brent Furl, my spiritual buddy and lifelong friend, who keeps me
focused on what is most important.
Kelci, Brock who is a continual source of light, wisdom, and fun. We
could not do what we are doing without her.
Mike Lampert and Laura Babbitt, whose warm friendship has served as
a great “Haven.”
Writing a book requires massive emotional support. Thank you for my
friends who were there to shoulder the burden or be patient or just be
fun: Olivia “Sfouf” Shabb, Greg and Cathy McCain, Max Weisbuch, Caleb
Merkl, Matt and Jess Glazer, Eric Karpinski, Heidi Hanna, and many
others.
I study positive outliers: people who are up above the curve for any
given dimension. This whole group of amazing outliers and friends needs
to be studied more. I hope you hear their voices on every page.
introduction
BEYOND HAPPINESS
If you want to change your life, you first have to change your
reality.
In my first book, The Happiness Advantage, I described the research on
how a happy brain reaps a massive advantage in the workplace. I wrote
about how, when we find and create happiness in our work, we show
increased intelligence, creativity, and energy, improving nearly every
single business and educational outcome. In short, that book was about
how happiness comes before success. This book is about what comes
before both. If you want to create positive change in your life, you first
have to change your reality.
To be honest, I think I’ve learned more about happiness over the past
five years than I did in a decade sitting in labs and teaching in
classrooms at Harvard. During this time, I have had the opportunity to
travel to fifty-one countries, speaking at companies and schools and
learning more about this connection between success and happiness. But
each place I visited pushed me harder. The more I observed, the more I
wanted to understand how we can positively change people’s view of the
world to make them not just happier in the moment but more engaged,
more motivated, more alive—permanently. I wanted to learn how we
could help people not just succeed at certain tasks, or accomplish certain
goals, but reach entirely new levels of success. But over the course of my
travels I also found that it wasn’t enough to study success and happiness
