Say what?  Happiness is a pursuit as old as personkind. There’s lot’s a self-help guides, gurus, TED talks, classes, lotions and potions to arrive at the destination. Yet it does seem to remain illusive for many. There’s a few reasons for this and I won’t to explore a couple in a bit more depth.

Paradoxically we now know more and have access to knowledge that previous generations did not have. What was once tightly held information kept within cloistered communities is now just a click away. Yet armed with this knowledge we don’t seem to apply it in such a way and as often as we should to get off the conveyor belt which is our lives. And that conveyor belt is getting faster and faster as each generation ticks on. They say we live in a VUCA world (volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous). And yet knowing this seem fairly helpless in doing much about it.

‘Pursuit’ I think is the key word when contemplating happiness. It’s not about the destination but the journey we are often glibly told. What happens though when our journey is on a path that can never deliver us to the destination. This I think is true for the vast majority of us. The reason being our VUCA lives are run so fast that we seldom find time to check the map to see that we are still on track. Before we know it the pursuit of the bigger house and the better car has us heading away from true happiness. The paradox of affluence which bedevils most of us who pursue the acquisition of materials things is that they seldom deliver happiness. The more we get the more we want. Those getting their first private jet soon want the jet with the more luxurious cabin and the longer range. This brings misery rather than joy and misery does not lead to physical and mental well-being.

Luckily there is a solution. The answer, I’m told, lies in another pursuit. Happiness academics, and there are now quite a few, advise us that the research points us in the direction of pursuing experiences not things. Easy-peasy!

The next issue bringing us the opposite of happiness lies in social media. We are wired psychologically to compare ourselves with others which acts as a motivator to stretch and improve. Those we compare ourselves too have to be within the stretch zone and historically this was a smallish circle of friends, family or community. Our psychological wellbeing is not overly impacted when this is our comparison group. However, a new phenomenon has emerged based on social media. Forget the carefully manicured and curated lives of our friends. We can see through some of that BS and have evolved to do so.  

What we haven’t evolved is a filter for the influencers and celebrities. Research has shown that having access to the level of detail and intimacy of their lives brings them into our comparator group, previously reserved for those within our own social and economic orbit. And here is where the real danger lies. Subconsciously they become our stretch targets. This is a game we can never win. We can never get their perfect bodies, net worth, luxury accoutrements, amazing circle of influential friends or the kind of financial independence that means we don’t have to grind away in jobs until we are in our mid sixties any more.

This doesn’t just cause dissatisfaction with our own lives, jobs, partners it contributes massively to mental health problems and can cause stress and physical morbidity. In short, it’s dangerous. Academics have been musing about the tidal wave of mental health issues in society right now. I’m willing to bet a significant percentage of this comes from unfavorable comparison with people who have no right to be in our comparison group.

This impacts us all but where might it impact on men’s health? Here I am particularly thinking of male body image. When we start following the likes of David Groggins and similar who berate those who don’t push through their own pain barrier and give up too soon, there are perverse consequences. Rather than motivate the individual which I’m sure is their ultimate goal, the follower gets disillusioned meaning their health suffers and their mental health in particular goes into decline.  Nothing against Groggins and his cohort, they are great turnaround from adversity stories, but they seldom look genuinely happy!

Luckily there is a solution. Go Groggins style and ‘go hard or go home’. Cut off all social media and don’t go back. Not so easy-peasey!

Warning there is a reference to suicide in this blog. If you need help call Lifeline on 13 11 14 or Mates in Construction on 1300 642 111.

I’ve challenged myself to do five blogs in five days for men’s health week. This is day three and I want to discuss emotional regulation.

The common misconception of us blokes is that we are not the emotional gender. That’s our sisters right! Actually I don’t think this is the case. The gap between our emotional responses is wider than we care to acknowledge. There’s the silent guy whose feeling are all bottled up who is susceptible to self-harms or suicide and everyone including his mates are surprised. That’s at one end of the spectrum. At the other is the enraged man who flies off the handle at the smallest thing or uses violence or the threat of it to resolve their issues.

I’m no stranger to unregulated emotional man syndrome. My teenage years were dominated by an anger, the cause of which I’ve never really got to the bottom of. It manifested itself through fighting and verbal aggression. My genetics are Irish and my hair red so you might put it down to that. Temperament is hereditary but the way it’s acted out isn’t. Myth busted! The explosion of testosterone at the onset of puberty could be another explanation, but that angry man with an axe inside didn’t go away when the Clearasil was no longer needed. 

Both types of individuals, and those in their orbit, suffer as a result. The emotionally barren or emotionally under-developed struggle to form meaningful relationships and through lack of social interaction mental health problems often arise. However the ‘rugged individual’, a romanticised term derived in Hollywood which is a much lionised archetype, likewise comes at great cost. 

The cortisol and adrenalin created from the fight response (sympathetic nervous system) when in overdrive has serious long-term effects on the body. There are the obvious mental health impacts of anxiety and depression, as well as physical health detriment of heart disease, high blood pressure, weight gain, cholesterol increase, memory impairment and learning difficulties.  In many cases our home-grown solutions to curb these excesses and responses to stress in themselves are harmful. Here excessive alcohol consumption, drugs and other addictions like gambling may become our panacea. Often the angrier we are the greater the panacea has to be and we all know that moderation is the key to most things.

So here’s some suggestions, from my own experience, for dealing with your inner man with an axe: 

• Seeking professional help. We tune our car, so tuning the bloke that drives the car is a good thing;
• Move  your mindset from ‘hard’ to ‘tough’. A hard man is often admired but this is most often to do with physical prowess. Anyone can go toe to toe. A tough man does things that no longer involve a confrontation and demonstration of brawl-craft. A tough man does stuff that would generate derision from a hard man.
• Recognising that you are not impervious to stress – in fact you might even be more of a stress sufferer than the average bloke!
• Share your feelings with family and mates.
• Meditation- too woo woo? Don’t knock it until you try it. It’s pretty tough actually.
• Exercise and diet – yeah these old chestnuts again. Actually, on the subject of nuts; walnuts are good!
• Accept your emotions and control them but don’t look to repress;
• Use breathing as a tool. 4-7-8 is great for this. Breathe in 4, hold 7, out 8..repeat;
• Reframing – looking at the situation in another way. Perhaps the problem that someone is causing that’s giving you grief isn’t about you at all? Perhaps they are having a real bad day too?
• Use a trigger taming tool. For that moment when you feel your adrenalin about to kick in try this:

Stop – whenever you feel triggered just stop. This allows a different path to be taken. Don’t use the trigger as a justification for the usual inevitable outcome.
Breathe – focusing on breath holds the pause and calms the body. Special forces use this technique before smashing through that door!
Notice – get a sense of what part of your body has reacted to the trigger.

Reflect – try to determine where the emotion is coming from. Is there history here?

Respond – think about what your response should be to achieve a positive outcome.

This doesn’t come easy or naturally. Like playing State of Origin lots of practice is required to build muscle memory for when the crunch comes.

•  If you have an employee assistance scheme use it. Reaching out for help is the domain of the tough man.

We are all works in progress and to get to good mental and physical well-being it’s necessary to go on the journey of self-improvement. It might be a long one but it’s worth the effort.

Day two on my challenge to write five blogs in five days for Men’s Health Week and I’m tired already! Shouldn’t have watched that ‘inspirational’ David Goggins video clip last night. Nice segue to today’s topic which is sleep. Is sleep a health issue you might ask? Well no…until it becomes one. Getting a good night’s sleep is critical to our physical and mental health. By ‘good’ the experts tell us two things are required:

1) 7-8 hours;

2) good sleep hygiene (quality) during this time.

Before I go on and share some of the alarming and interesting facts of sleep I thought I’d start with mindset. Unless you have a young baby, or someone who’s keeping you up due to illness etc. the insufficiency of your hours slept is no bragging right. The fact that you only need 3-4 hours a night is indicative of nothing to be honest, unless you are someone who has a condition called short sleeper syndrome (SSS) and can function without detriment for less than six hours a night. Even then it only equips you to fill more of your day with stuff to do.

All too often there is a machismo to how well we can function on only a few hours sleep as though it’s some pointer to how hard we are. Guess what – unless you actually do have SSS deluding yourself around your sleep hours is robbing your physical and mental  health and here’s why.

1) There is a clear line between poor sleep and higher body weight. Good sleepers consume less calories;

2) Poor sleepers are at greater risk of stroke and heart disease;

3) Sleep affects glucose metabolism and type 2 diabetes. You can see why I led with diabetes yesterday!

4) Poor sleep impairs your immune function. People say they caught a cold because they are run down. That’s often because they’ve had inadequate  sleep;

5) Poor sleep is also linked to depression. 90% of people with depression list poor sleep as a major complaint.

6) Our concentration and mood are impaired without sufficient sleep causing among other things issues in our home and work life;

7) Poor sleep is linked to inflammation. Inflammation is the ‘flavour of the month’ in medical research and it’s not a good thing.

Sleep volume is important but as mentioned above sleep quality or hygiene as it’s called is very important too. Did you know there are four stages of sleep and having all four is important. The diagram below shows the stages and what happens.

Stage 3 (deep sleep) is important because growth hormone is released and tissue regeneration occurs building muscle and bone and strengthening our immune system.

REM sleep is particualrly important as it allows certain things to be committed to memory and for dreams to occur. Dream are our blueprint for living and also our way of sorting some of our shit out so it’s important that we experience this stage each and every night. It’s the REM component of our sleep that gives us the get up and go for the next day. The phases cycle through during your 7-8 hours taking around 90 minutes to 120 minutes each time.

So if you need more, better quality or both here’s what the experts say we should try:

Oh no not these again;

1) Get regular exercise;

2) Reduce blue light exposure at night and f you can get greater bright light exposure during the day do so (but be sun safe!);

3) Consider your diet particularly heavy food intake and alcohol and other drugs that may act as a stimulant. Coffee and nicotine also to be avoided. They tell me kiwifruit is good which might explain the All Blacks?

4) Make the bedroom a haven for sleep including getting the ambient temperature right (20 Celcius). Stimulation by smashing-out some Netflix is not recommended.

5) If you can’t get to sleep or back to sleep don’t lie and count sheep. Get up and do something;

6) They say avoid naps but maybe you napped because you couldn’t sleep the night before in which case a micro-nap is good but no longer than 20 minutes;

7) Create a pattern of going to bed and getting up at the same time;

8) If you wake during the night try flipping your pillow so that you lay your head on the cold side to get back to sleep;

9) If you’re older and needing to pee during the night make sure the path to the loo is clutter/trip/slip free so that you can navigate there and back without needing to get fully awake;

10) Consider melatonin but speak to your GP first as the jury is still out on its side effects long-term.

OK I’m heading home now. Didn’t sleep well last night and don’t want to doze off behind the wheel…which is a compelling reason to get more and better sleep…to avoid accidents. It’s believed that 20-30% of all accidents are as a result of sleepiness. If you haven’t slept for 17 hours straight it’s the equivalent of being over the blood alcohol limit.

After scouring the internet the only cure I’ve found for sleepiness is sleep.

Night night all!