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Hello, hello, hello, hello, hello, hello. It's me and Vinnie, we are here again, hello, hello. That was really rubbish, I do apologize.
So hello and welcome to jasonnewland.com. My name is Jason Newland. Please only listen when you can safely close your eyes, and this is Let Me Bore You To Sleep. Now, now, now, now, and, and, and, and, and, and, it is Trivia Tuesday, trivia, trivia.
Okay, I'll stop. So yes, Trivia Tuesday. Now, if I remember correctly, didn't I say last week that I was gonna do a similar kind of Trivia Tuesday as what I did last Tuesday? Okay, now, I don't know if you can hear that in the background, I hope you can't.
It might sound a bit like a fly or something to you, but it's someone's, it sounds like someone's being cut in their lawn for about three hours, or someone drilling the same hole for three hours. I generally don't know what they're doing or where they're doing it. I've looked into the garden, I've looked out the window, well, I looked out the window into the garden, it's just been nonstop.
I mean, it hasn't been nonstop, it stops and then it starts and then it stops, but it goes for about a minute or two, then it stops for about 10 seconds and it starts again. Really don't know what's going on, in general. I don't know, I'm confused.
I'm confused, my dear, confused I am. Right, earlier today, I did do another new recording called, well, it's Let Me Bore Your Pain Away, number 41, called Let Go. And yeah, so that's uploaded.
It took ages, we've got a bit of wind today. You didn't need to know that, did you? So I, yeah, so I did that Let Me Bore You To Sleep, number 41, and it's probably, it's a little bit different from the one I did yesterday. I mean, it almost sounds like a hypnosis session, which it's not supposed to sound like that.
But it just, I got into it, I got into what I was doing, and I guess with those, it's gonna, they're gonna variate. So, plus, it's only the, you know, number 41. So it's been a, I've not exactly done thousands like I have done with the Let Me Bore You To Sleep.
When's the first one I did? The first, the very first, the very first Let Me Bore Your Pain Away. I can't even see. That's weird.
According to this, it's not even on, why? They're not on there. I go down, and the further I go down, it's like number 10. But what about, that's really weird.
What about number one, and number two, and number three? And number four, and number five, and number six? What about number seven, number eight, number nine? Yeah, number nine, what about that one as well? I tell you, I sometimes wonder, it's hard to keep track of all these different podcasts. And, how weird. That is really weird.
I'm just gonna have to search on my hard drive to see where they are, because, oh, it's not even available. Ah, well, never mind. It's not attached.
It's not attached. Well, I've definitely done, I did one to 10, but I think it might have been quite a while ago. I also need to tidy up the Monday's Boring Objects podcast, because that's actually more visible online than the Let Me Bore You To Sleep, which I found weird, because I was searching for boring podcasts and sleep podcasts on Apple Podcasts, and the Jason's, was it, Boring Objects, Sleepy Boring Objects, is the first one out of all mine to be listed.
So I need to do something about that. I need to tidy that one up and make it up to date, because the last one I did, the one I've been doing the most weeks, but the last one that's actually available on my website, on podcasts, sorry, on a podcast, is number, oh, not number, but it's the 11th of August, Shoes, and I've done a lot more since then.
So I need to get back on that.
But I'm not doing it now, because I'm busy. I'm busy with you. I'm focusing on you.
You, you, you, you. Let's just have a look. Mer, mer, mer, mer, mer.
Let's just go onto YouTube quickly. 1,608 subscribers. Apparently it's my birthday, my fourth time around the sun, and I'm still going strong, well done, YouTube tells me.
So this YouTube channel is four years old. So in four years, I've got about 4,000 recordings and 1,608 subscribers. And it's still growing, it's still growing, it's, yeah.
I mean, technically I'm probably uploading too much stuff, but that's just what I'm recording. I'm record sometimes, you know, I go through periods where I will record two, maybe three sessions a day. Three's a little bit out of the box, but it's a little bit unrealistic these days if I'm doing all the other stuff, like getting the description and filling all those details in.
That in itself takes another couple of hours on top of the actual recording. So yeah, I can't do that three times a day. I'm still behind with the one I did this morning.
I've still got things like admin to do for those ones, if you know what I mean. If you know what I mean, do, do, do, do, do. So I took Vinnie out earlier and it's been a nice day actually.
Didn't have to wear a coat, I wore clothes. I mean, I'm legally obliged to, but you know, I just had a jumper on, cardigan, whatever you want to call it. And it's quite weird because my friend Luke gave me that cardigan.
It fit him because he was a lot taller than me. So his arms were longer, but I'm bigger. Like body-wise, if that makes sense.
So it fit him, but it was slim on him. Me, it doesn't look like, you know, like a sausage skin with like sausage being pumped in. It's not what it looks like with me.
It's not quite that, not quite like that, but a little bit like that. No, it's not too bad, but it fits me because of the, yeah, it just, it's a little bit too long at the sleeves, but I've never had long arms. I just haven't.
So I have to ask people to help me to get stuff out of my pockets. Again, in court, I said, I said, listen, your majesty, magistrate, look how short my arms are. I said, yeah, but perhaps have pockets, have pockets on your top instead of asking a couple of these strangers to help you get loose change out of your jeans.
None of this happened. Don't know why I'm saying it. Oh, it's finished.
You can probably hear him in the background, doing his thing. Let me just see if there's anything on Facebook. I can add any, anything new.
Anything. All right, okay. Someone posted on Facebook, describe happiness using only one word.
And okay. And someone, someone wrote, because people are writing down things like blessed, dogs, blessings, healthy, coffee, retirement, gratitude, someone put down divorce, Jesus, all kinds of things. And Mark wrote down, am I the only one saying family? So obviously feeling a bit of pride, self pride there going on.
And I reply, I don't normally reply. Okay, I was gonna put tits, but to the question, but anyway, I don't normally reply. But on this occasion, I just put to Mark said, that's seven words.
Cause you know, am I the only one saying family? That's seven words. I like that little pedantic side of me sometimes. It's somebody's done a little chuckle.
They laughed at that. Oh, Mark is the one that, Mark, I love you. I love you.
So yeah, it's, it's all fun and games, isn't it? See, describe happiness using only one word. I definitely wouldn't put down family. That's the, nan, happiness.
What is happiness? Is it, it's a fleeting thing anyway, isn't it? I mean, for me, it's a, you know, it's like, well, you get feelings. It's a feeling. Just like anger.
What is it? It's a feeling. And sometimes I feel happy. Sometimes I don't.
Just trying to think. I feel a little bit of happiness when I've helped someone. Like at the weekend when I was helping to guide the traffic away from a traffic jam, like a crash and that.
I felt quite good afterwards. Like I'd done something nice, contributed to helping other people. I was part of a trio.
There was three of us doing it. And I might not have mentioned the other two people because I wanted to take credit just for myself. Don't tell anyone.
And there was four of us, because Vinnie was there as well. But all he did was just bark and scream at everyone for the first 20 minutes. And then he calmed down.
He got used to it. It must've been bad. So people were pulling up to me, getting the window down, and I'm about to talk and he's screaming really loud.
And then they pull the window up again, drive off, looking at me angrily. Couldn't blame him really. And there's me, they're shouting at me something and I'm shouting at them.
They probably can't hear what I'm shouting. What I'm shouting to them is, can you please take the dog with you? Please take him with you. Take him.
When I've done a recording, when I've done a recording, there's that sense of accomplishment, achievement, maybe. But then accomplishment or achievement, I don't know what would be the right word, is kind of the same thing really, isn't it? It's all dependent on what you class as accomplishment. For some people, me creating a recording is probably the least accomplished thing that anyone could ever do.
In some people's minds. For me, it's one of the, possibly one of the best things I could do with my time. But I know that there's people that, I say I know, but I'm pretty certain, I know a lot, I've known a lot of people and I kind of gauge how some people are and how they think about things.
Including members of my own family would think that I was providing more value to society if I worked in a factory like folding boxes up or something like that. And I just want to add that there's nothing wrong, I'm not putting down working in a factory, folding boxes, because I spent 20 years of my life doing those kinds of jobs, so I'm not judging at all. But the idea that anything, providing I got paid and wasn't unemployed or wasn't getting, I wasn't at home, any kind of job would be better than doing this to some members of my family.
And I'm not saying that like, oh, you know, this is just factual. And I find that strange that complete strangers can actually value what I do and value me as a person, but my own blood, people that, you know, they don't, they can't see it. Not that they don't care about me, you know, but they can't see any value in what I do.
And that's one of the biggest shames, I think. One of my, that's one of the things I kind of, I feel a little bit sad about. It's weird, even at 55, and this is not what the recording is supposed to be about.
Even at 55, you know, all I really wanted was for my dad to tell me that he was proud of me. It's weird, but at 55, now I've had, I've been told, my friend Noel, Noel told me he was proud of me, and that meant the world to me. And this is back in 2000, no, 1999.
Yeah, 1999, because I did this, I did a hypnosis session with someone, and it went quite well. And he was my friend. I've known him for quite a while.
He's about my dad's age. And he looked out for me, really took care of me and helped me out, before that and after that as well. And he told me he was proud of me, and it meant so much, you know? And I do realise, and I've read enough self-help books, motivational books, I mean hundreds and hundreds over the years, to know that really, I shouldn't care too much what other people think, and shouldn't, which is a nice word, isn't it?
Shouldn't.
I should, you know, I could, I would benefit from being able to rise above that need for acceptance from my own family. And I am to a degree, this is going too serious, I've done well, I'll talk about farts in a minute, it's okay, it's all right, I'll get back to it. This won't last long, I'll carry on, and I'll get back to the juicy bits.
I'm not saying that farts are juicy, I'm just saying, you know, they'll be. Actually, I saw this advert on television, advertising children's stories. And also, because I was doing some research yesterday on the podcasts that are out there, sleep podcasts, and there's ones for kids.
And I'm just thinking, I mean, I do have a podcast, you might not know this, I'm not saying I have a podcast, because you're listening to a podcast, but I have a specific story podcast, which I never promote, and it's almost hidden. But it is available, and on my Spreaker, what's it called? Is it available, or is it gone? Oh no, it's there. Jason's Bedtime Storytime.
And I've done 30. 30? No, blimey, I've done 31, 31 different recordings. The last one was the 4th of January, 2025.
And the first one was, I've got no idea. According to this, 2020, 2nd of January, 2020. Really? Really? So five and up, we're nearly six years ago, the first one.
So yeah, I've done quite a few different ones, and I am thinking about maybe doing a new one every week, perhaps as part of my, because this is part of the Let Me Bore You To Sleep family, as it were. So you've got the Let Me Bore You To Sleep, you've got the Jason's Bedtime Storytime podcast, there's the Monday's Boring Objects, or actually it's Sleepy Boring Objects, but I don't know if I changed it.
The logo says Sleepy Boring Objects.
And then the addition, more recently, but it's still been for a few years, is the Let Me Bore Your Pain Away. So there's four podcasts all related as far as like the boring, sleepy stuff. And when I was listening to some of these podcasts, just had a little breeze through them, I did find it kind of, the tone of the voices of some of the presenters of the reading the stories, very talking to the kids, just, do you know that infant school type talking?
Hello Jason, how are you today? Are you okay? Beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep.
Which, I've known primary school teachers to talk like that in real life as well, I guess because they're doing it all day at work. And it's like, why are you talking to me like I'm five? I mean, admittedly, and they kind of, you know, they pointed out at the time that I was actually five, but just, it's kind of a, what's the word, not condensation, not condemning, talking down anyway, he's talking down to someone.
And I don't know if it's necessary to do that in a recording.
Maybe it's necessary to do it in a school. Now, I'm not saying that teachers or people should be shouting, come on then. You've got to remember who you're talking to, but I noticed the teachers, that they'd be all gently speaking, but then they're in the playground and they'll be shouting at the kids, come on, stand up, stand there, do like they're in the army or something.
I suppose a lot of it's just to do with getting them used to being controlled, I guess, isn't it? It's all part of the system. The system, oh no, he's gone into conspiracy land. Not really, it's just the way that this country has been set up.
I mean, when I went to college, well, university, but it was at, the course was at a college, which was linked with the university. And there was a lot of young people there that had just left school doing like beauty courses and all kinds of different courses. And I'd hear the teachers talking to the students who were maybe 17, 18, 19, whatever, talking to them like they were little kids.
I couldn't believe my ears. I was gonna say I couldn't believe my eyes. Couldn't believe my ears.
It's like, why are they putting up with that? Once you leave school, you don't have to put up with that stuff anymore. Unless, of course, you wanna keep your job maybe, but I stopped putting up with it when I left school. Once I hit 15, April, when I was 15, I was in August and I could leave school.
I did. I don't think you can leave school at 15 anymore. I don't think you can even leave school at 16 anymore.
I think they changed the rules where you have to be 18, which wouldn't have really suited me because what would they have had me do? What would I do for another two years? I didn't have exams to take. I left school with nothing, with no qualifications. No nothing.
I mean, it was, it really, obviously I learned stuff. I learned to speak and, well, I think I already learned to speak properly before I went to school because I had two brothers, so I was never gonna not be able to speak, generally, because kids, the more people you're around, the more, I don't know, you know what I mean. I practically taught myself to read, which I think is why reading was so valuable to me.
I kind of lost my way with reading, which is a little bit sad because reading was one of the most important things in my life for such a long time, and my book collections, I say book collections because I've lost my book collections many occasions. But it was always an important thing.
And now as my eyesight is starting to, well, is continuing to diminish somewhat, I need to get some, I need to get an eye test and get some glasses, but I also need to find out whether or not my benefits are gonna get cut before I do that because it's gonna cost me like 300 pound or something to get some glasses.
The eye test is free, which is good, although I do have to pay five pound extra to have, and they've got a special technique now which they can look even further into the back of your eyes. And I had the beginnings of macro degeneration, which my dad's got and my nan had, she went blind with it. And so that's why I have actor light, like dark glasses when I go out to hopefully protect my eyes.
But then what do I do when I'm indoors? I'm staring at a computer screen. Which is not good for my eyes. This has turned into just a big moan.
Or you're finding out more about me, whichever way you look at it. Yeah, I don't know how much glasses are now, but it's probably five years. I'd say it's at least four years, maybe five, probably four years, five years.
I reckon it's five years since I got my glasses, maybe even six years. It's been a while, because I got two pairs of glasses the same. So one, buy one, get one free kind of offer.
So I wore out the first pair, and then I started wearing the second pair. This time, when I eventually kind of get to go to the opticians, I'm going to get separate reading glasses. I'm not going to have like the different lenses all in one lens.
It doesn't suit me. Doesn't, doesn't, yeah, it's no good. And it kind of doesn't matter what type of frame it is, because I won't be wearing them outside.
I might do if I had my own garden, but I don't have my own garden, I don't. There's a communal one out there, but it's not, it's not welcoming. It's not really.
The problem we had, or I had, or both me and my friend downstairs had is, when we did sit in the garden, suddenly people from all over would come in, not to see me, but to see him. So it was very popular. And he just wanted to have a bit of peace and quiet.
And before you knew it, there was all these like three, four people all standing around and talking loudly, and it wasn't ideal, to be honest. Hmm, yeah. And there's not really anywhere to sit, because it's just surrounded by windows.
There's like one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, nine flats. People could look out the window at you. And then the other side is people higher up.
So it's like one, two, three, four, five, six. So it's not, there is no privacy. Now, it's not like I'm gonna be there having a little, with my little tin bath, give myself a little bath, you know, in the garden.
That's not gonna happen. So I don't need privacy for that. But like a little tin bath, it'd have to be a big tin bath now.
Well, you don't know what a tin bath is. It is what it says. It's a bath made of tin, like a metal bath.
That's what we used to have when I was a kid. You know, in front of the fire, be hot water in it, and everyone would take their turns. And I would always be in last, because I was the littlest.
Not bathing in a sewer, it was a tepid sewer. Oh, so, especially after I finished. So, yeah, what was I talking about? Describe happiness using only one word.
I wonder if there's a trivia question about happiness. Give me an idea, idea of using happiness for Trivia Tuesday. Give me an idea.
Okay, that's a lovely idea, Jason. This is chatgpt.com. A happiness Trivia Tuesday. Episodes could fit beautifully into your relaxing, reflective style.
Still offering a mixed light, interesting, even uplifting facts. Okay, here we go. The science of happiness.
Happiness around the world. These are possible trivia categories. History and quirky happiness facts.
I like that, what about you? And you've got psychology and happiness quirks. Pop culture happiness trivia. Could just do a mixture of all of them.
Yeah, I don't know. I'm kind of, what am I more interested in? The science of happiness? Right, okay. So expand, expand one.
So what I'll do, the science of happiness. I don't want you to write me a script. When have I ever, stop it.
It's because I put in all these scripts that I've transcribed and asked for a description. Now it's expecting me that I want to ask for a script. I don't want a script.
I shouldn't be rude. Thanks very much. Thank you.
Please list 50 trivia facts. Wow. I mean, I've been using this to do, I guess what I need, I need to set up a project specifically for trivia Tuesday.
50 happiness trivia facts. The word happiness comes from the old Norse word, hap, meaning luck or chance. Is it happenstance? Luck or chance.
If I happen upon a gold duck or something like that, I suppose. Finland has been ranked the happiest country in the world several years in a row. So who listened to this is from Finland.
Do I get anyone from Finland listening? Let's have a little look. Finland, I only wanted you to go into Finland. Right, let's have a look.
Finland, where is Finland? Okay, I do. Oh yeah, blimey. I do have people from Uusimaa, Helsinki, Espoo, Espoo, Vantaa.
So there's a few places in Finland. So thank you for listening. Would you agree that it's the happiest place? Cause I might move there.
I'm going to move to Finland. Do you agree it's, I mean, you can't, I guess if you live there, you can't, you can agree, but unless you've lived everywhere, it's kind of hard to really judge it, isn't it? I know what it's like to live in this country. I've been to a few countries and I lived in Ireland for like five or six weeks, but that's, it's not the same as living there for a long period of time.
So yeah, it's really, that's the closest I've got to compare. And also that was 30 odd years ago. So it's not really, it might be different now.
It might be completely different now. I kind of hope not, cause it was a lovely place. But it might be even better, it might be.
I liked it. I think that the people in Ireland, of course not everyone, it's just the same there anyway, it's not everyone, but nice people. But then I think the people in this country are also nice.
If you do a survey, I feel like I did a survey on Saturday when I was stopping traffic and telling people about, you know, the, to divert away from the crash that was ahead so there was no traffic jam. Yeah, I am gonna continue talking about it because I am a hero. I am.
The majority of people were nice. Friendly, waved. Some people weren't.
Some people were very rude. Now I know it's human nature to sometimes like focus on that rather than the other. But looking at it from a very kind of unattached view, I kind of did come to the conclusion that actually I just sampled, I don't know, how many hundreds of cars in an hour, over an hour, like one car every second, two seconds.
There's quite a few cars. And so hundreds of cars and pretty much everyone just waved, said thank you. And those I spoke to, everyone was nice except like two people.
The majority of people were nice, decent people. And I know that that's not a popular thing to say because, you know, all the news shows is the opposite to that the newspapers show the opposite to that. But then you're not gonna open the newspapers and national newspapers will go onto the news on TV and see me directing the traffic in my cape, you know, to divert them from a traffic jam so they can get on with their day, you know, reach the flight.
I tell you it's weird, right? The, not weird, this is even nicer, the bloke that initially started diverting the traffic, he lived right where the traffic, where the accident happened and it was outside his house. And I think he called the police and whatever and then he came up to divert the traffic because he's seen it so many times living there. And his wife was in the house while he was here so she had to let him know when it was, luckily she did let him know when the police had gone.
And he was on the phone while I was, we went to tell him and he said, I already know my wife's on the phone, she told me. Because someone had come, a car had gone through and let us know that, they drove back to let us know it was clear. The police didn't, but you know, hey, nevermind.
Hey, hey, hey, hey, some of them are nice as well. So he, this was weird, he said, oh, the couple in the caravan, no the couple in the car were on the way to the airport to catch a flight. And I think, why are you telling me this? And he said, my wife's just driven, she's driving them to the airport.
Like, wow, I mean, after being in a car accident to want to still carry on with your holiday or wherever they were going, it might not have been a holiday, but it was, you got given like something there, like wow, you know, to just still want to carry on as normal because it's a quite freaky thing to happen, isn't it? But for a complete stranger, just to sort of say, I'll take you, it's a good, probably 50 miles away, 40, 40 miles, 50 miles, something like that.
Because London's 60 miles, Stansted Airport, I think is less than 60, but it's maybe about 50, 45, between 40 and 50, I'd say. It's still, you know, it's still a journey, isn't it? It's still like at least two hours out of her day to do that.
If she gets there and back like instantly. And I imagine once you get to Stansted, you might want to go and get yourself a coffee and something to eat, maybe go to news agents, buy a magazine, maybe go and watch a movie. I don't know, I didn't know what kinds of things she likes to do, do I? So is Finland, is it, would you agree it's the happiest country in the world?
For several years in a row, apparently.
Number three, Bhutan, Bhutan measures gross national happiness instead of gross domestic product. Wasn't it Bhutan when they had all the riots? I'm saying this because I just have a memory. I was watching it live online, Bhutan riots.
Bhutan riots. Yeah. Okay, no, that's not what I'm thinking of.
Maybe it's a different thing. Um, right, okay, there was some stuff went in there. I'm not going to get involved in politics, but I thought it was to do with the internet being taken down, but I saw this riot.
I think it was in Bhutan and they were rioting and the police were doing what they do. And there was a civilian, a non-Bhutanic person. Wasn't it the Bhutanic plague? Was that from Bhutan? So this bloke was on a moped and he was a YouTuber or he was just happened to be taking film footage.
He'd like to travel around the world and film stuff. He streamed it live and it was chaos, but you know what? All the crowd helped him. They got him to safety.
They, you know, some of them got in front of him and helped him sort of into an alleyway, gave him some water because stuff like that. Wow. And they were smiling and laughing.
So the natural disposition was, seemed to be like nice. Number four, I know about this, but smiling Smiling can trick your brain into feeling happier, even if you fake it. It's true.
It's true. I mean, it's been proven psychologically. The word is can, not necessarily will, but can.
I'm not a big fan of faking. I mean, I do fake. We all, I guess, if I'm in a grumpy, I'm in a grumpy, grumpy, grumpy, grump, and I'm in the park with Vinnie, and I'm not going to sort of be rude to people because that's the mood I'm in.
So there's a degree of faking, but at the same time, I'm not going to stand around and chat either. So there is a degree of faking it, I think for everyone. Like sometimes we just kind of have to, don't we? You know, the old smile and get on with it, grit your teeth and stuff.
And I suppose everyone's had to kind of do that at some point. But yeah, I just, I like to smile. I like to laugh.
I do. I like to smile. I do.
If it's real, if something, so if something makes me laugh, like really makes me laugh, I love it. You know, if something just, and unfortunately, because I've got a weird, well, I've probably got a quite eclectic sense of humor. I never really know what's going to kind of trigger me to laugh.
And, you know, I like things from intelligent stuff to really dirty, rude stuff to completely absurd stuff and surreal. You know, I'm kind of a fan of everything. I remember I was staying, I was living in this house.
And it was, yeah, after I lived above the co-op when I was 17, I just turned 18 and I got a job in a factory. And I used to make boxes in that factory as well as putting meters in the boxes. And I lived, I got kicked out of the flat, got evicted from there, moved into this room.
It was full of females, not the room, the building, the house. And I got on, I got on pretty well with everyone there, including the landlady. And I remember we were watching Hale and Pace.
Maybe I didn't even have my own television, which would be weird. Why wouldn't I have my own television? But we were watching, we were all standing in the doorway. Watching Hale and Pace on telly.
And, there was this scene. Hale and Pace was a comedy show. And they were like a double act.
And, it was very popular actually. Very popular show. But it was a mid-week kind of show.
Like on a Tuesday, Wednesday, something like that. And there was this one clip, where, Hale was the, I think he was the bigger lad, bigger bloke with a beard and a moustache. Pace was the more smaller bloke.
So Hale, he's on the floor. Actually it might have just been, it might not have been him. But someone was on the floor, having, needing medical treatment.
Emergency medical treatment. Surrounded by a big crowd of people. And, Pace, one of the comedians, he started shouting, please, can you let me through, I'm a doctor.
Let me through, I'm a doctor. So they make their way, and he walks through, and he just steps over the person and carries on walking through. And it's just, I don't know, it was just funny.
It made me laugh. It really made me laugh. And, my landlady said, oh, I said, what? She said, you really should smile more.
You're much better looking when you smile. Now I got a little bit scared, because there was no lock on my door. And I thought, oh no.
I just thought, I can never smile again. I think she, she wants me. And, no, I didn't think that.
But I, I did, it played on my mind a little bit. I was like, okay. So you're saying that, the only way I can be, marginally, erm, I don't want to use the word attractive, but marginally palatable to someone's eyes, is if I smile.
But I'm not a smiler. I do smile when I smile. But I'm not going to smile unless I'm smiling.
And, I don't, I used to. Well, I just remembered I used to do a fake smile, every time I answered the phone, when I worked in a call centre, at Churchill especially. I'd answer the phone saying, like this is what I would say.
Hello, and I'd like put a big smile on. Hello, welcome to Churchill. My name's Jason, how can I help? How can I help you? Hello, I'm Jason.
Would you like to buy some insurance from me? You know, that kind of, if I put a fake smile on, thinking that it would lighten or make me sound more approachable. I know it's on the phone but, more listenable to a bull. Yeah, so that's quite fake isn't it? See, I'm not really into pretending to be anything or pretending to be interested in anything or anyone, unless I genuinely am.
If someone says to me, they mention, I don't know, I had a neighbour say to me that she used to be a footballer when she was like in her twenties. She was like, practically semi-professional. But that was when it wasn't popular.
So she wasn't professional but she was kind of winning trophies and stuff as an amateur footballer. And, because she's like nearly 50 now. So this is probably in her late teens, early twenties.
And I'm like, really? And I was genuinely interested in what she had to say for the first time. And I don't mean that rudely. Sounds rude doesn't it? And perhaps I shouldn't have told her that.
But, if someone grabs my attention and my interest, I really, they know it. Because I do, I have questions, I have follow-up questions. And I really listen.
And then they can see the difference between my, my monotone expression, my just plain expression where I'm just listening to where I'm actually, actively, really interested. But I can't fake it. I can't.
Now, when I was a counsellor, I didn't need to fake it. Because, I was interested. It was my job to be interested.
And, no, not for the money, because the money was rubbish. It wasn't about, you know, are we getting paid so much money, of course you're going to pretend to be interested. No, trust me, it was not.
It was, but it was a different kind of interest. It wasn't an interest for my pleasure, for my entertainment. It's a different situation.
And also, I think, one of the benefits that I went to when I became a counsellor is, I never went, I never had a client walk into the room, or, you know, come into the room and me think that I'm going to, I know something about them before they talk. You know, based on how they're dressed, based on how they talk, based on how they smell maybe, based on, I don't know, there's all kinds of things, you know, based on what they're wearing, if they're wearing a hat.
Doesn't it include it in how they're dressed? Yeah, I know, but I realise I said it and I'm kind of covering myself by saying hat.
But thanks for mentioning, thanks for reminding everyone. And I just, even when the client was talking to me, I wasn't assuming that I understood what they were saying. And I would ask.
Like in a normal conversation, sometimes I'll just be quiet and I'll let people talk and I don't know what they're talking about sometimes. Or I don't feel a need to. Not out of rudeness or insincerity, maybe a little bit of insincerity, I don't know, but just I find that in a normal conversation, people don't like to be interrogated.
Which is kind of what I would do if I'm interested. Interrogated, not in a bad way, not like bombarding them with questions, although that is, that is kind of something that I have done in the past. But just out of interest.
Because once I'm interested in something, I find it very hard to stop being interested in it. Until it's, I guess it's met it's sticky end or whatever, you know, it's got this, it's reached it's final course is what people say. So there's been things that I've been absolutely obsessed with in the past.
Like martial arts and various different things, and now I'm not anymore. But at the time, that was all I thought about. And now, really, the only thing that I've been obsessed with is the same thing for the last nearly 20 years, and it's this.
The stuff I do online. But it's less of an obsession in the sense of, I do think about it, but it's not new, and it's not exciting, the way it used to be, you know. When I first started out, I was like, wow, I've got five people listen to my podcast today.
15 people listen to my video on YouTube. And things like that was exciting, like, how did they find me? But even now, every day when I wake up, I'm excited or interested. It's between interested and excited, which kind of comes to the word happiness, I suppose.
I'm looking forward. So I would say happiness is possibly having things to look forward to, things that you are looking forward to in a positive way. And so I'm, when I go to bed, I'm looking forward to getting up the next day so I can check the stats, so I can see if, you know, how many people have visited my website, how many people have listened to my podcast that I did yesterday.
I look forward to having my breakfast. I look forward to maybe there's a movie or a TV show I'm looking forward to watching, looking forward to making a recording. So the only time I don't really look forward to the next day is if I have to go somewhere.
If I have to, you know, doctor's appointment or have to collect my prescription or something like that, that's when, yeah, it's a different kind of feeling. So for me, my whole life is around this, which might seem weird because I know, I just know that some people like think, well, you've been doing this 20 years. In January it'll be 20 years.
Where is your achievement? What have you achieved, baby? What have you, and yeah, they might have a point, but what I can say I've achieved, and I can actually prove this because I've got it on here, is on my stats. This is only since 2018. Right, so bear in mind I started 2006, 12 years before that.
So just on Spreaker since 2018, I've got 15,342,072 total downloads. That's total plays. 15,342,000.
With the SoundCloud included in that, it takes me up to about 20 million. And that's just for the last, what, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 27 years. So there's a, you know, the 12 years before that I didn't keep track of it all.
I didn't keep track of the stats. So there's probably a few more million on top of that. So it is something.
Shall I do a little photo? I'll do a, how do you take a picture? I should do a total picture, like say, I wonder how it'd work out if I put in I don't know, anyway, it's definitely that. What's it? Charts data may seem lower than total numbers due to longer data extraction time. Ah.
Total amount of listeners accrued through Spreaker and any other external sources such as Apple Podcasts or Spotify. See, it's got total live plays 42. They don't even offer live plays anymore.
What's that all about? I don't know. Do you know? I don't know. I've got no idea.
Dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin and endorphins are known as the happy chemicals. And happiness. For me, it's weird, I don't know, because of the bipolar and all that stuff, I can, I can feel uplifted when I shouldn't feel uplifted.
You know, so it's hard to take it seriously as far as the feeling because the feelings don't necessarily coincide with the environmental factors that are occurring at that time. So, I've been at a wedding and felt like I was at a funeral, like the way I was feeling, and vice versa, ridiculous enough. So, there's not, and that's just part of, you know, the deal with having the mental health stuff.
So, I'm on, I have antidepressives which have, do they have dopamine in them or serotonin, I think, serotonin reuplift or reuptake or whatever it's called. So, I don't produce enough serotonin anyway. So, but naturally, I mean.
So, my, well, I tell you what's weird. When I'm feeling happy, when I'm feeling up, it's really up. When it's up, it's really up, okay.
And like higher than anything else that I've done, that I could do synthetically without going into any details. So, my natural ability to be ecstatic is there, but I don't have control of it. And when it gets too high, well, it doesn't really get too high much because I'm on medication to even my moods.
So, I'm on a mood stabilizer as well. But, sometimes it still creeps up and it's almost like a rocket taking off and it's too much. Like, it's, I can't handle it.
It's like, no, no, no. And it's, yeah, it's weird, but it doesn't happen very often. But I get spikes where it's like, wow, I'm feeling really good.
I had one earlier today, actually. I don't know why I was feeling good. I think it might have been because I did that I did that Let Me Boil Your Pain Away recording.
Yeah, uploaded it, did all the editing, all that stuff, and it was completed. And I felt good about that. It's like, okay, I can now sit down and relax.
I think maybe after doing that, I also help my neighbor out with something and then I could just relax because that was something that I was concerned about because my neighbor asked me to help out to set up their ring doorbell and we agreed I was going to give them a knock at 12 and all morning I was kind of thinking about it because I wanted to go to sleep.
I wanted to get some rest and I needed to stay awake. And there's something about making arrangements, making plans that doesn't suit me very well.
Laughter increases blood flow and boosts the immune system. It makes sense. Definitely makes sense.
People who own dogs are genuinely happier than those that don't. Depends what kind of dog you've got. I shouldn't say that as a doggy daddy myself.
I don't know. They're demanding. I see other people's dogs and they're just so friendly and they let themselves be picked up and almost like they want the attention of their owner.
They want to please their owner. Vinnie does not care one bit about pleasing me. He won't let himself be picked up.
He doesn't want to do anything that I want him to do. He just wants to do his own thing. Now maybe you could say well that's very much like me.
I don't like being picked up. I don't know. Maybe, I'm not quite sure what it is.
But he does cuddle up to me. It has to be on his time, his initiative. Something that he, I've realised how to get him to do something is by literally telling him to do the opposite.
So if I'm on the bed, I want him to get on the bed. If I say get on the bed, come and get on the bed. He'll just sit there on the floor and stare at me.
If I say out and point towards the door, he'll jump on the bed. The same as if I'm sitting on the settee and he's just standing there. I say, come on, come on, give daddy cuddles.
Nothing. I say out, he'll jump on the chair. If I want him to, honestly if I want him to follow me, I say stay and he follows me.
He does the complete opposite. If I want him to get off the bed, I say stay on the bed, he'll get off the bed. If he's not eating his food, I've got a way to get him to eat his food.
I put bits on the floor and he ignores it. But then I go to pick it up and he watches me. And then I do it slowly.
I'm going to get it, I'm going to get it. And I do it and he grabs it before I can and he runs off and eats it. And after doing that a couple of times, I just put the bowl down and he grabs the bowl and he doesn't let me near it.
I can't. I've never known a dog like him. So yeah, I don't know.
I mean, I've met a lot of people that really, they, it seems like their dog is very important to them. And Vinnie is to me. I know I moan about him and stuff but he is the only company I've got.
And if it wasn't for him, I wouldn't leave the house pretty much maybe twice a year to go to the doctors maybe. Seriously, I wouldn't go out. I don't need to go out and get deliveries.
I like to think I would go out sometimes but chances are there'd be weeks if not months where I wouldn't go out and that's how it used to be before I got him. I wouldn't go out for weeks at a time especially when the weather got bad which it does, you know, this time of year. And why would I choose to go out in the rain? What possible reason?
X, oh look at this.
Listening to music releases dopamine in the brain. Now, I listen to quite a lot of music and I like to listen to classical music. I've got a bit of a penchant, I don't know if that's the right word, for violin music at the moment.
But I also, this week, I don't know why, but I've been listening to 90s music. Specifically 90s dance music. Everybody's free to feel good.
All that. Like rhythm is a dancer. So I've been getting into some of those songs that I've not heard in years and those were the songs that I used to play when I was a DJ.
So I like to sometimes just sit back on my chair and listen to some classical music. I don't normally listen to, like, pop music unless I'm working on something. So let's say I've got to do the administration stuff for a podcast and it's going to take me an hour or an hour and a half.
I'll listen to an album or listen to like, you know, the best hits of 90s or something while I'm doing that. Generally not classical music though. That's more when I want to just chill out and relax.
Helping others activates the same pleasure centers as receiving rewards. Now that for me helping my this is just my personal opinion and this is how I live my life. Helping others is everything.
Now, admittedly, I do it remotely. I do it from making podcasts and stuff. But I do also help people in person as well, like locally.
But generally it's mainly, you know, through this activity by recording my squeaky voice and making it available for all 12 people to listen to. But I do agree, helping others and before I discovered this, before yeah, really, before I started doing this so going back nearly 20 years I didn't have a purpose. I didn't have a direction.
Now I realize at my age the direction is perhaps not quite going in the right direction. You know, it's going in a certain direction that I don't want it to go, but you know, aging and all that stuff, but I kind of can't believe that I've stuck at it because I've never stuck at anything for this long. Never.
And I'm old enough to even say that as well, haven't I, because I was 35 when I started doing this. Now some people might be thinking, yeah, it seems the recording does seem that old. Seems like it's lasted 20 years.
I'm not talking when I started this recording. Rude. I could talk about helping others all day because for me helping others, the best way to help yourself is to help others.
In a way. Now, I guess that can't be taken literally because, you know, everyone's got different circumstances. But generally even as such as I mean, I know I did the recordings online but I also did, like, fire my website.
That's before I even knew what a podcast was. But I volunteered, started volunteering at an an alcoholic charity in 2006. I think it was about April time.
And through doing that I then got asked, I was doing relaxation sessions. I got asked by a drug rehab place to do the same thing with them. And then I started making CDs of the recordings I was recording and then, you know, different things happened and I ended up going to university to become a counsellor because I was around these counsellors that I really liked.
I liked all of them. And I know the counselling degree in some ways didn't really change my life in a way that I wanted it to or the way that I expected it to. You know, when I started doing the degree I had everything planned out I was going to be a counsellor for the rest of my working life and I was going to be successful.
And neither of those happened. I mean, I did become a counsellor for a few years. Even, like, earned a living for a few years.
Not a great living, but I did, you know I did okay. Well, I managed. And it just, it feels weird.
At least I did it. At least I gave it a go. Whether or not I had the cuts because it was government it was financial cuts from the charities that meant that I lost my job, basically.
On my work. I could have tried to get more private work, but you know, things weren't just, yeah, wasn't I depended a bit too much on the charities. And at one point I was working with three different charities counselling people.
And I think I had one private client. So I don't know, if the cuts hadn't happened would I still be doing it? I don't know. It's very, very difficult.
There's no way of knowing, is there? But I got to help some people along the way. And for all my faults, I can at least say that I genuinely have tried to help people. And for me personally, helping others has helped me.
Now I know that I've had people take advantage of me and I guess that hasn't helped me at all. But ultimately, if I was to go the other way and say well that's it, I'm not helping anyone ever again. Then that wouldn't be fair on other people that do appreciate, don't worry my voice is getting croaky that do appreciate what I do that do benefit from what I do.
This is way too serious. I need to do it's got to be a fart joke somewhere. So yeah, helping others.
I remember I said this kind of, I don't think I might have said that, but like certain members of my family have been very dismissive of what I do online. Since I've been doing it. And I think their opinion really was if you're not making any money, why are you doing it? It's just a hobby, I was once told.
Like this is not a hobby. This is no way, this is not it's not a hobby, blimey. This is my life.
My life's work. Yeah, and there was another time when this was 2019. I just remember and I had a couple of my family members.
One said charity, I don't know what I was talking about. But they said charity starts at home, which is an old cliche, an old trope, whatever they I never even heard the word trope until the last few years. But an old cliche.
And I tried to explain to them that they clearly don't understand what the word charity means because that's, it doesn't start at home. So helping out your family is not charity. That's not charity.
Charity is helping people you don't know or helping people that need help. Not your own family. That's just your duty or that's just like maybe not duty, but the kind of the correct moral thing to do, isn't it? If I go in to take my my dad and like take him to the hospital or do something nice for him.
It's not charity, is it? If he needs pretend to be a kitten again. Meow. Okay.
Exercise boosts. No, let's not talk about exercise. Bastards.
Studies show that gratitude gen can increase happiness within two weeks. I mean focusing on positives is almost the complete opposite to this country's way of living. The way that we're brought up in this country by society.
I mean maybe not by the parents themselves, but by society television. It's so much opposite to positive. or so many soap, you know, soaps that are on TV.
It's just misery, misery after misery. So focusing on things that you're actually grateful for. It almost can't not help you.
You know, it's a very, very nice thing to do. I keep thinking I need to sort of get back to doing my gratitude thing, you know at the beginning of recordings, because I've done that in the past. I seem to come up with the same things every day though.
Exercise. Shut up Vinnie. Hello mate, stop squeaking.
Thank you. Exercise boosts serotonin and endorphin levels, improving mood. I mean anyone that's done exercise could probably agree with that.
I, yeah. It's definitely a I would say it's a stress reliever. It depends.
I mean running in some ways is a stress reliever and it can, you know, it can improve your mood. Depends how far you've run away, because if you've got to walk all the way back it might be raining, you might get back feeling worse than you were before. Being outdoors for at least 20 minutes a day can improve happiness.
So I'm outdoors 20 to 30 minutes, sometimes more with Vinnie, two or three times a day. And I do think it helps to get outside in the sunlight to maybe say hello to a few people briefly. I've got some people I just wave at, they wave at me.
There's a couple I've not even ever spoke to, I just wave at them. They probably think I'm a bit mad. The smell of freshly cut grass can make people feel happier.
I know I feel happy after the cut grass, freshly cut grass. Especially, it's mainly because the lawnmower has stopped. The noise has calmed down so I can smell the grass and I know that I haven't got to listen to that lawnmower for another few months.
The smell of freshly cut grass is quite nice, isn't it? Maybe not for people with hay fever. People who volunteer regularly report higher life satisfaction. I class this as volunteering.
I know it's a little bit different because I don't have human contact but I still feel it's kind of like volunteering because I'm doing something, volunteering my time. Chocolate contains compounds that trigger serotonin release. Why are you telling me that? Stop it.
There's a lot of things that chocolate does. Regular social interactions is one of the strongest predictors of happiness. There's a few people I see when I'm walking, Vinnie.
That could feel quite nice. I just realised I said the word walking. Happiness tends to increase with age after middle life.
I suppose I'm there now, aren't I? I'm 55. Is that middle life? Live to be 110? Yeah. I suppose with age there's a few, there's less pressure in some ways.
Maybe. It depends. For people who have kids and grandkids and middle aged, if someone's middle aged and they've got teenage kids they might not feel that actually they're in the happiest part of their life.
But if you've got maybe grandkids and you get lots of presents for Christmas and maybe you've got people you get on with and all that kind of stuff. I mean this is kind of after middle age so maybe people in their 50s, 60s. I suppose there's a degree of not having to conform anyway or anymore.
Not really wondering whether or not you're being judged because I know I'm being judged but I also know that I'm almost invisible. So if I talk to someone young they're going to think of me as old, like an old person. That's if there's someone that I'm friends with, someone that I know.
But if it's someone I don't know, they're not even going to see me. They're just going to walk through you if you don't move. So it's not a great feeling necessarily but it also means I can wear what I want I don't have to dress up nice I can shave my hair off because no one's going to even notice me if I've got hair or not.
Yeah, I suppose there's less expectations there's less societal expectations to like for me, to go out and buy a house buy a car, get into debt all the things that seem to be not all the things but a lot of things that are quite often expected of people in their twenties or thirties you know, to conform and I don't really need to conform but I never did conform it's not they didn't want to, I just couldn't, I wasn't able to and they didn't want to wish I had, I'd have my own house now and I
might have a car and I might be in lots of debt, damn it laughing 100 times laughing 100 times burns about the same calories as 15 minutes on an exercise bike Really?
I've never heard that before do you think they're making it up? So, if someone is laughing all the time, like 8 hours a day which would mean thousands and thousands and thousands of laughters they would literally just shrink away they'd just disappear they'd be sitting next to you at 8 in the morning by like 10 o'clock at night and you'd be like, where'd they gone?
well, they enjoyed themselves watching all these funny movies studies suggest spending money on experiences brings more happiness than buying things I guess that would be like holidays and going to the cinema possibly eating in a restaurant I don't know I've not done anything fun for years the last time I went on a date was 2011 I think no, no, 2015 2015, it's the last time so it's 10 years, it's quite a long time people who sleep well report higher levels of happiness you're welcome the helper's high is a real phenomenon caused by endorphins after acts of kindness I agree,
it's really nice to help people and I know I go like, there's a hero and all that stuff but it's not really about that it feels nice, it's almost helping people sometimes it almost feels like a selfish act because I feel good doing it even if it's just helping someone to carry their shopping or something small it doesn't have to be a big thing I remember years ago probably 19 years ago I was walking home from work it might have been a Saturday I was walking home from town and it was absolutely pelting down with rain so I got my brolly and I'm walking down and I see this bloke and he's getting soaked through unprepared,
but I wasn't going to judge him it's been raining all weekend so what I do is I stand and wait and let him get under my brolly and we walk the rest of the street together because he was walking to the supermarket and I walked to the supermarket with him and that's a good 15 minutes it was awkward and I think we both felt we were a bit too close together to feel comfortable but that's not a good example I didn't enjoy that it was just nice what I did was almost an anti-social thing to stop and let a man use my brolly with me it's a kind of thing not a chauvinist what's the opposite to chauvinist?
I don't know, it's more like an anti-macho thing to do I've never been macho so I'm OK with that but it was nice, just doing something nice so this made me laugh it made her laugh, I've talked about this I love talking about good things I've done but you know what?
I don't want to talk about bad things I've done I don't want to focus on that stuff I want to try and focus on the good things and have more of that I want to be remembered for something nice if at all possible so I outside the Sainsbury's like minimart or whatever there was a lady on the floor she'd had a fall she was quite elderly I just realised all these people walking past and staring at her it was raining as well it was really cold he couldn't do anything he
had a walking stick he sat on the bench either she fell conveniently or he dragged her to the bench I don't know I don't think so a shop gave her a pillow it was quite convenient not for her this shop gave her blankets and a pillow to keep her comfortable but I just thought how horrible it must be she was crying she was looking around she was staring at me I was talking to her I lied down next to her some people might think I was doing it for attention I
don't really like attention what I was doing it for is people were no longer looking at her they were probably wondering what the heck's going on here there's two weird people just laying down on the floor what's that man laying down next to that woman for bearing in mind what was I at the time I was 40 I was about 40, 41 it was a fair time ago I just laid down and she couldn't stop laughing I was saying funny things it has two effects you laugh or you scream there's
been times I've woken up with someone they think I'm in bed with them they scream it's me it's my face you didn't look like this last night I said yeah they must have weird lights I said ok she was laughing anyway I've had that as well I remember I once woke up with someone they started laughing hysterically they said I can't believe I slept with you I was like what?
I can't believe I slept with you I can't believe I've woken up with you I said you're my wife what a rude thing to say that was five years of marriage gone down the drain I just laid down next to her chatted to her until the ambulance got there and I took off she found it so hilarious my main aim was to help her with her pain I thought if I got closer I could talk to her which I did a bit but she couldn't focus on that because she was
laughing so much her laughing made me laugh her husband didn't seem very pleased but he was worried about her either that or he regretted dragging her to the chair so he could have had a bit of peace not having to listen to me maybe he got fed up with her laughter and thought he could have a break from her laughing which hopefully that wasn't the case regular social interaction smiling is contagious seeing someone smile could trigger a smile in you a nice smile is lovely I think I'd say the best
smile I ever saw ever in my entire life was when I worked in a gift shop in 2004 and it was the summer time or maybe it might have been spring time and it was quiet so it definitely wasn't during Christmas wasn't during Mother's Day wasn't during any bank holidays so it was very quiet and this woman comes in and she's got a little kid in a pushchair or pram a little girl about a year or two years old maybe less looked like a human and she was smiling she had
this big lollipop as big as her head and she had the biggest happiest smile that I've ever seen before or since it just stands out because I just started laughing I'm not sure if her mum enjoyed that bit but I've never seen anyone look happier than your little girl and she really was so happy like she had the world like she'd won not just the lottery she'd won all the lotteries at the same time which technically she had because she was born into this world into this country and she was
healthy and she had a big lollipop life doesn't get much better than that now I kind of feel bad for stealing the lollipop but it just showed you that things can change the smile went and then I gave her the lollipop back the smile was back but it was almost I don't know she was looking at the lollipop like what have you done with it I've done anything with it I didn't take it off I'm just messing about what do you think I am the average child laughs about 300 times
a day adults laugh only 20 times a day so if that's true let's go back 300 times a day which is the equivalent of 45 minutes on an exercise bike so literally how do children ever grow because they must be losing weight all day long imagine cycling for 45 minutes a day and you only weigh like 4 stone to start with you'd never put weight on would you everyone would be walking around tiny medication can increase positive emotions meditation can meditation can increase positive emotions and overall well-being I've experienced that
I've done a lot of meditation over the years sometimes it's just something you need sometimes even without the meditation I've been in a room with other meditators and maybe a guided meditation and sometimes I'm not even doing a meditation I'm just sitting there and being in that environment is beneficial or I felt it was beneficial sunlight helps the body produce vitamin D which boosts mood people who express gratitude to others feel happier afterwards I've always found it important to I don't think I showed much gratitude when I was younger or
if I did I didn't mean it like when I was really young but now if someone does something for me especially if I haven't asked them to do it I do feel grateful or yeah it doesn't happen too often I feel grateful if someone helps me I'm trying to think of something there was something the other day what was it?
I dropped something on the floor and they told me someone like oi you dropped this I can't remember what it was I think it was on the bus that was when I was going back and forward on the bus after I'd used up all my money on taxis in the summer and I dropped my I think it was my debit card or it was my bus pass on the floor and someone on the bus called me and took it no I think it was my wallet my whole wallet fell out
of my pocket for someone to do that was amazing or was it my phone it was something yeah but yeah things like that are just lovely laughter therapy is used in some hospitals to help recovery laughter therapy is used wasn't used in a hospital when my friend was that would have made such a difference I don't know how it can be done you hear Vinnie he's trying to get my attention you're trying to get my attention aren't you I've not finished the recording Vin Vin Vinnie Vin Vin Vinster Vin Vin
I haven't finished no I haven't once he starts barking then I know that he definitely wants my attention research shows that people who spend time with friends can have an extended life span ok well I don't have any friends so there you go oxytocin is often called the cuddle hormone because it's released through touch the only person I touch is Vinnie literally the only physical contact I have is Vinnie so hopefully and that's every day cuddles you know like at night I put my arm on him when he's on the
sofa and stroke him so maybe I get something from that singing out loud releases endorphins and can lift your mood instantly I like a nice little sing song smiling uses fewer muscles than frowning there's an old joke about that I won't say it because it's not my joke ok well it's a Bill Hicks joke someone came up to me and said smiling uses fewer muscles than frowning and Bill Hicks response was taking your time out to tell me that uses I can't remember the joke something about alright smiling uses fewer
muscles than frowning and he said not telling me that would use fewer muscles than telling me that something like that he said it in a funny way though not like someone came up to me and said smiling uses fewer muscles than frowning not like that if you speak like that I'm not making fun of how you speak money money can increase happiness up to a point roughly £60,000 a year studies suggest that's a bit specific isn't it it depends what you want to do with your life how you want to
live your life £60,000 a year is a huge amount of money for someone like me but for someone living in London who's got a mortgage to pay £60,000 a year is not going to be a huge amount of money to them potentially or is it £60,000 plus I've definitely travelled the world on that the colour yellow is more often associated with happiness yeah when I moved into the big house with my family I had a yellow walls and then at one point we changed it to pastel blue walls and the
yellow walls were very bright it was quite a light room quite a bright room with a big window I'm very different from the room upstairs which had the window facing the wall but I still prefer the one upstairs because it was a bit more private the song happy by Pharrell Williams has topped the charts in over 20 countries because I'm happy the smell of oranges is linked to reduce stress and increase happiness ok cool smell of oranges it's a tit, not tit, citrus,
citrus flavours watching funny videos for just 10 minutes can raise endorphin levels I'm quite enjoying some of the AI videos they're just short videos some of them have got me cracking up I don't want to create them myself I'd rather just be a viewer some of them are just so funny they've got these chiropractor ones they're wrong but very funny I don't know why I laugh so much people who live near the sea tend to be happier than those inland I do love the sea I wish I lived near the
sea I think as I retire as I'm getting to that age I think being near the sea would be quite nice me and my mobility scooter just having the sea air and Vinnie running trying to catch up with me on the lead I used to live by the sea a few times and there's benefits to living by the sea maybe one day the world's first recorded smiley face dates back to 1635 in Slovakia that's all I know about that studies show people who practice mindfulness report less anxiety and more happiness
that's why I started doing mindfulness and meditation because of the anxiety issues I was having in November 2003 it took a while but the mindful practice isn't just when you're sitting you can use it a lot washing up or making a cup of tea just being in the moment as I said that I now realise I'm in the moment it's a tingly feeling in my body a nice tingly feeling yeah,
it's quite nice it feels nice to be present I prefer to get presents laughing can improve blood sugar control in diabetics that's good to know I'm not sure where my sugar levels are these days still haven't received the blood test results couples who laugh together stay together longer statistically speaking isn't that an old saying couples who laugh together stay together or eat together stay together I don't know couples it kind of makes sense really doesn't it if you can't I tell you what's always confused me is how someone would be
in a relationship with someone else like a romantic relationship and be getting into arguments now my question's been this if there's one person in the entire world do you really should just be nice to all the time I mean I would argue probably everyone but if there's one particular person that you should always be nice and respectful to and kind to and loving to it should be the person you've decided to spend your life with your mate, your partner, your lover,
whatever person you're living with and I'm not saying above a family member but ultimately that person is with you when other people come and go and if someone can't even do that then that's not a relationship I don't mean everything has to be perfect all the time but there's an old saying I think it's a London, East London saying that's just because that's where I heard it so it might not be we're only cruel to the people we only hurt the people we love we only hurt the ones we love that's the most ridiculous sentence in the world we only hurt the people we care about the people we love,
no that's the opposite and I've stuck to that, it makes no sense so there laughing have someone you can laugh with my uncle married my auntie long before I was even born and my nan was telling me a conversation she had with him a few years prior well when I last spoke to her it was a few years before that and she said it was just like talking about why he was with her why he stayed with her how come the marriage lasted so long because it hadn't lasted so long with some of her other children and he said mum,
it's simple, she makes me laugh she makes me laugh so much and always has done for the last 45 years or 50 years, whatever it's been and I thought that was so cool I know I'm not going to have a relationship that lasts for 50 years but I think having someone that makes you laugh I'll make you laugh the peak end rule the peak end rule says people judge experience by how they end not the length that's an old thing isn't it you can have the bestest date in a restaurant and oh my goodness it's raining and I have to take Weasel Bob out that's not fair,
it hasn't rained all day I could have taken him out half an hour ago but no, I wanted to do the recording but now I'm going to get wet and I am not pleased with that so there's the whole thing if I was to have a date and there was a female that liked me and I took her out so we went to a restaurant and it was the most wonderful night ever and everything was perfect how perhaps she had always imagined it would be,
how she would like her date to be I was the perfect gentleman and everyone was fine the meal was perfect the journey there was perfect perhaps we went to the cinema first or theatre then we go for a meal and right at the end the waiter pours some red wine over her head I bet you that's the only thing she'll remember I bet you she'll remember all the good stuff like enjoying the meal getting ready all the stuff that was enjoyable the conversation the only thing she'll remember is this waiter
walking up with a glass of red wine and then pour it over her head I'm going to remember seeing that and seeing the look on her face of horror and she's probably going to remember it happening and seeing me laughing so I think that's what that means peak end rule it's how things end not how good it was during not all the good things I just had a bit of a disruption someone knocked on the door I thought it was a neighbour it wasn't,
it was my delivery I got some lights lights that I can put on myself when I'm walking Mr Fartypants people are happier when they spend money on others rather than themselves yeah I can see that to a degree although I wouldn't necessarily call myself a selfish person but I prefer getting presents than giving them I like helping people but when it comes to gifts I like getting gifts if I'm sitting at a table or in a room and I've bought gifts for everyone else around the room and I've got gifts
from everyone around the room like in a bag or in a pile where I am I'm more interested in what's in my gifts than watching other people open the gifts that I bought them and I remember in the past my step mum would say oh Jason your dad's opening his gift from you I was like yeah so what are you telling me for and that's my natural selfishness I suppose I'll work on it in Japan the concept of Ikagi Ikagai Ikagai means a reason for being a source of joy in
life a reason for being would that be the same as a purpose a reason for being this is my reason for being however ridiculous it might be this still is my reason for being so it's a source of joy in my life I guess the famous smiley face design was created in 1963 by Harvey Ball oh cool is that what they use on emojis he must have known the internet was coming he was a bit ahead of his time what is it a smiley face it's going to be for emojis
for people when they send texts emails and post messages on Facebook ok so when do you think we can start making some money from it probably about 40 years Hygge Hygge a Danish concept means cosy contentment boosts feelings of happiness Hygge or Hygge cosy contentment I suppose there's a bit of that I would say probably being warm after being out in the cold being warm cosy having food in your belly not needing anything or finishing work on a Friday maybe being at home on a Friday night knowing you've got the
weekend or maybe waking up on the morning of your holiday things like that I guess studies show that simply anticipating a happy event can make you feel happier yeah I get that I suppose it's that whole looking forward isn't it looking forward to something technically looking forward to something means looking towards something that hasn't happened yet that you are expecting to happen but we use that term when it comes to positive things you don't say I'm looking forward to seeing the dentist on Friday we don't use it in that term
but it is probably the correct term to use cos you're thinking about something that's going to be happening and you're looking forward to it but for some reason it's turned into this positive thing looking forward to something so I guess that's what they mean anticipating a happy event can make you feel happier happiness can be contagious your friends happiness can increase yours by 25% yeah I'll go with that it depends on my mood but it can work both ways I know it can work the other way so yeah I like seeing people in good moods I do,
even if I'm not in a good mood myself and I know that I can't participate in their particular activity it's still nice to see I like just to see people getting on to succeeding, to doing well to achieving what they set out to achieve to having good luck someone who maybe wins a lottery or someone who meets someone nice I like that for someone else when they win, when they feel good, when they feel happy it's nice, it's a lovely feeling people who regularly express I wonder where this is going people who regularly express affection live longer and feel more content yeah, I mean in a way don't they deserve to?
maybe that's a weird thing to say but someone who's being nice to other people goes through life being nice to other people I think they deserve happiness I'm not saying that other people don't but they just, you know if you spread happiness then I think happiness you've got no choice but to receive it there's the old saying isn't there that you get back what you give out so you always get back what you give out maybe ten times more but you have to give out to get back so you have to give to receive but at the same time you don't give to receive just put your faith in the fact that you will receive,
that you will be looked after so by feeding, making sure everyone you know has enough to eat means that you'll always have enough to eat but you're not doing it for that reason they're little things I kind of believe in doesn't mean it's true I think it's stopped raining I think it might have just been a little rainy moment but either way I've got to get prepared to be soaked through man so this apart from being one of the longest recordings I've done for a while is the end of the recording the end of this particular session tomorrow,
whisper Wednesday yeah so thank you for listening remember to be kind to yourself because you deserve to be happy and be gentle with yourself you deserve to feel safe lots of love bye
Paragraph spacing and recurring name or title errors have been tidied. Because this began as a voice transcription, an occasional word or piece of punctuation may still be incorrect.