The Happiness Challenge

Self-compassion is key when it comes to learning, growing, improving and trusting yourself- don't dwell on your mistakes, but instead turn them into kind, positive, teachable lessons. Test out four questions that can help you to foster self-compassion in moments when you make a mistake. Based on fascinating research by Serena Chen. Support the show Learn more: https://thehappinesschallenge.co.uk/...

Trust is an important factor in every relationship, including your relationship with yourself. Lack of self trust in practice means that we need constant reassurance from others when making decisions, we don’t try new things because we are uncertain of our skills and we are not consistent in keeping our promises. Ultimately, without self trust we cannot follow our dreams and get to our happy place...

Starting New Year with Self-Reflection: 15 Powerful Coaching Questions With the excitement of the New Year, it is easy to rush back into our life but what about spending time self-reflecting and learning from the past year? In this episode, Klaudia is introducing 15 powerful coaching questions (divided into 5 categories) to self-reflect on the past year so that you can gain insights into your happ...

Christmas as any holiday or celebration is a safety blanket for us. Because we know that whatever happens, whatever good or bad year we have had, Christmas will come. It is that one constant in our very unpredictable life. With that however, we have high expectations towards the holiday season, working hard to make the festivities magical and special for everyone. And yet the same good intentions...

As humans, we have a very strong need to belong because ultimately our connections we have with each other are the centre of our happiness. A multitude of studies confirm that those of us who have strong and broad social connections are happier, healthier and live longer. However, our strong need to belong can lead us to only surrounding ourselves with people who are exactly like us. This means we...

Studies suggest that those of us who are more self-reflective also report being happier. This is because asking thought provoking questions encourages us to prioritise positive experiences in our life. However, self-reflection can change into rumination and overthinking so to find out more about how to reflect well, Klaudia invited Tamsin Hartley, a physiotherapist, coach and trainer who created t...

Klaudia is exploring a new concept emerging in relation to happiness and engagement in the workplace: Quiet Quitting. For some quiet quitting is about not going an extra mile and disengaging in the workplace, whilst for others is about setting healthy boundaries. To find out more, Klaudia speaks with Elle Whitehead-Smith who is a content specialist at The Happiness Index. Elle works with experts i...

Our brain utilises innovation, creativity and art during challenging moments in three specific ways: a distraction tool (helping you to decrease your stress). a contemplation tool (allowing you to process difficult emotions and making space to self-reflect) and finally a self-development tool (ensuring that you skill set and confidence grows). Inspired by the gift of poetry book entitled “10 Poems...

In this episode, Klaudia is tackling the topic of Opportunities and Happiness. As much as it is wonderful to believe that we are achieving success through our own merit regardless of our background, unfortunately, the reality is that there are social and political factors that make success easy for some and not so easy for others. Klaudia's guest is Margaret Ochieng who is an organisational psycho...

This episode of &Happiness is a little different as Klaudia is sharing her own journey on happiness with her friend Leyla Okhai via the podcast " Diverse Minds ". Klaudia had a deep conversation with Leyla about the fact that happiness is not plastering a smile on your face to pretend all is ok. Instead, they discussed rooted and practical ideas for everyone going through a challenging time. I...

Imagine that every day you are writing down places that make you happy? After a few months, you are looking back at your list, what kind of pattern do you notice? A project called Mappiness analysed records from over 20,000 people on “happy places” and made a clear conclusion: we consistently report higher levels of happiness when we are outdoors and in green, natural environments. Places like the...

Did you know that we are all born with the predisposition to perceive music and to enjoy listening to it? Isn’t it fascinating that human newborns are sensitive to melody, intonation, rhythm, and the dynamics of the noise in their surroundings? Music is a powerful tool in alleviating our moods and one that can make us feel more upbeat almost instantly. In this episode of Music &Happiness, Klau...

A multitude of studies confirm that people who have high quality relationships are happier, healthier and live longer. For couples to enjoy happy companionship, for every one negative interaction they have with each other, they also need to have five positive feelings and interactions to combat the negative. These research findings are intriguing but what is happy love exactly and how to find it?...

Research is quite surprising in the field of happiness and parenthood. Even though parents often refer to their children as their "pride and joy”, research tells a different story: having kids doesn't necessarily make people happier or at least not in a way that we may expect. As a cool auntie, Klaudia was also curious how can we all contribute to raising happy children and how kids impact our per...

Food plays a direct role in more than just providing nutrients to our body, it also is a key component in our social life allowing us to celebrate beautiful moments with our friends and family. However, we live in the world where we are given mixed messages around food: we are told how much to eat, what to eat, and even what times to eat. These can lead us to feel shame, guilt and confusion. In th...

Our internalized story that we create about ourselves, of who we are, is called by psychologist, narrative identity. And that narrative identity impacts our behaviors and the level of our happiness. In this episode, Identity &Happiness, I am speaking with Leyla Okhai, coach, mediator, inclusion and wellbeing practitioner, who is the founder of an organization called Diverse Minds. We discuss w...

Positive psychology researchers are now confirming that our recipe for a successful career has been backwards. We have been told all our lives that when we are successful then we will be happy. But in fact the research shows that increased levels of happiness lead to greater career success. Why is that and how can we be happier in our work? Klaudia was asked this question by Rachel Gilfrin , found...

Grief seems to be an unusual topic for happiness but yet it is an essential part of our life – where there is life, there is loss and with any loss comes grief. Some of us will rush through grief whilst others get stuck in it. And in both cases we don’t appreciate the positive, healing aspects of that process. In this episode, Shelley F. Knight, a chemotherapy and end of life nurse who is now a wr...

What do you think would make you describe your life as satisfying and successful? According to the research: friendships! My guest this week is Robin Dunbar – Prof. Of Evolutionary Psychology at the University of Oxford. Robin's research makes it clear: the single best predictor of your psychological health and wellbeing and your physical health and wellbeing, even how long you will live into the...

If your happiness was a shape, what would it be? If it was a colour, what would it be? Stefanie Posavec, designer, artist and author, created an emotional check-in device called “Updating Happiness” that gives us an opportunity to think about and reflect upon our own perceptions of happiness. In this episode, I discuss with Sefanie the results of this visualising happiness project, and what it can...

What determines our happiness? Our genetic makeup, the circumstances that we are in or our daily habits? It has been estimated that even though our happiness is determined 50% by our genetic makeup and 10% by our life circumstances, what truly matters is the remaining 40%. That 40% of our happiness depends fully on the activities and habits that we repeat daily that shape our happiness. So, what h...

Do we need to be geniuses and impact the whole world to be creative? Or do we need to be artists or creative types to let our creativity flourish? With the aim of finding more creativity to solve our daily challenges, I invited Girija Kaimal, Associate Professor in Creative Art Therapy at Drexel University in the United States to discuss her bold statement that art and creativity are fundamental t...

Good mental balance is very important to our happiness and especially our resilience because it helps you to cope with problems. By having a more balanced perspective and emotions, you are able to deal with difficulties more effectively, but how can we find this balance in the world with so many options and unbalanced views? In episode 2 of our new series, Klaudia interviews Tessa van Keeken - an...

Having goals and making progress gives us a sense of meaning and purpose resulting in long term happiness. But being under pressure, placing our self-worth on our achievements, and being concerned with constant winning can result in burnout. In the first episode of Series 3, our host Klaudia Mitura interviews Cath Bishop - a leadership coach, triple Olympic rower, silver medalist, and former diplo...

Get your tissues at the ready - this is Kitty's last episode! Join KIaudia and Kitty as a duo one final time as they run through their favourite moments and most important learnings from the first two series of &Happiness, before Kitty heads off into the sunset. From Gratitude (obviously!) to Resilience, Courage to Rest - join us to find out which themes have had the most impact on the daily l...