Shawn Achor giving his TED Talk, “The Happy Secret to Better Work” at TEDxBloomington in 2011.

Following up on my previous blog about The January Blues, I thought I might share a bit about how we respond at North Star to teens who arrive with low spirits.  We face the question: “Where to start?”

Should we encourage kids to make a daily routine that includes going to some classes, making some new friends, getting some fresh air, eating well, and getting a good night’s sleep?  Or, should we support them to acknowledge their current predicament, stop trying so hard to get things done immediately, and see if they can slow down, step back, and figure out what they really want to be doing with their lives right now?

Of course the answer isn’t one or the other of these starting points. It’s usually a combination of both of them.  Our response depends on the teen, the parents, and details of the presenting situation.  Still, it’s reasonable to ask, in an overly simplistic way, do we start with some specific behaviors or do we start with some attitude and outlook adjustments?”

One entertaining place to begin is with Shawn Achor’s TED Talk from 2011, in which he argues that the science of Positive Psychology shows that “Happy People Do Things!” more than “Doing Things Make Us Happy.” I watched his talk several years ago, but last week I took another look and then read his book, The Happiness Advantage.  I find Achor’s presentation compelling, and his ideas offer a solid blueprint for how we operate at North Star.

He defines happiness “…as the experience of positive emotions – pleasure combined with deeper feelings of meaning and purpose.  Happiness implies a positive mood in the present and a positive outlook for the future.” (p. 39) Achor’s summarizes his view, “For untold generations, we have been led to believe that happiness orbited around success.  That if we work hard enough, we will be successful, and only if we are successful will we become happy.”  (p. 37) The difference between Achor’s long-term and short-term view is revealed by the rest of his book, which includes several techniques and actions readers might utilize to nurture a happier outlook for ourselves.  He wants to nudge us into feeling happier so that we then feel up to taking on more meaningful life tasks, rather than help us to do important things first so that we feel happier.

Our work at North Star meshes with Achor more than with what I imagine to be a behaviorist perspective.  While we want to support teens in crisis to find an immediate safe space to cope with the moment, we generally propose that we have a longer-term outcome in mind:  life without school.

When a teen arrives in my office for a first interview and shares that they feel depressed, anxious, or otherwise terrible every school morning, I ask a few questions:  do you feel this way on the weekends and during vacations, or are your feelings mostly related to facing another school day?  Do you have any activities in your life that you enjoy afterschool or on the weekends?  When the teen replies that the bad moods are mostly school related, and they do have some activities that bring them joy, I reply, “Here’s an idea that I don’t know if you realize is an option:  Stop going to the place that makes you feel bad, and do more of the things that make you feel good.”

Frequently, young people do not know this is an option, and they can’t tell if I’m serious.  No one in a position of authority has ever said such words to them.  I swear I see young people sit up, shift their posture, establish eye contact with me, and say, “What? Wait! What?”

I think I can sum up my alliance with Achor by sharing what I often say to these teens at the end of the first meeting: 

I am going to lay out two options for you. 

Option A:  You carry on as you have been, figure out how to get through this crisis, and make it through the remaining years to graduation.  You’ll make up the work, pass your classes, and stay with your friends and school activities.  Your parents and the school professionals will support you to succeed on this path, as many people have done before you. We know how to help you complete school, even though right now is tough for you.

Option B:  You opt out of school now. You use North Star’s support for as long as you want or need us.  During that time you try new things, figure out what matters to you, and perhaps obtain a GED.  Maybe you’ll get a job or take a community college class.  I don’t know…none of us can know right now what you would make of that openness.  But one thing I know is that you won’t be worse off for choosing this option compared to Option A.

(I frequently come up with Options C, D, and E – other schools, combinations of the approaches over time, and so on.)

Like Achor, I don’t believe that telling kids if they just get good grades, or if they just finish the year, then they will feel better.  I don’t think those sorts of actions bring the kind of happiness he describes.

In the short term, we at North Star have enough common sense to challenge Achor and some of his words. I know when I’m feeling tired and grumpy, that getting up off my couch and taking my dog for a walk will make me feel better.  If I have a project I need to do, just getting started with the first step can shift my attitude.  Small behaviors definitely matter, and at North Star we often discuss simple first steps with teens to help them proceed towards their goals. Certainly, a life-changing journey starts with a single step, and we keep that in mind.

Still, if we agree with Achor that doing things won’t make us happy in a profound sort of way, the question remains how do we become happy so that we do things?  My best guess is that encouraging teens to find some self-acceptance, offering them significant control over their lives, and asking them what feels worth getting up in the morning to do are very good places to start.  This trio of ideas overlaps with “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” in my head, and proposing them as a starting point rather than holding them as a reward has been part of my own deep happiness with my career at North Star.