
Why Be Happy?
The Japanese Way of Acceptance
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Narrated by:
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Gary Furlong
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By:
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Scott Haas
About this listen
This beautiful and practical guide to ukeireru, the Japanese principle of acceptance, offers a path to well-being and satisfaction for the anxious and exhausted.
Looking for greater peace and satisfaction? Look no further than the Japanese concept of ukeireru, or acceptance. Psychologist Scott Haas offers an elegant, practical, and life-changing look at ways we can reduce anxiety and stress and increase overall well-being. By learning and practicing ukeireru, you can:
- Profoundly improve your relationships, with a greater focus on listening, finding commonalities, and intuiting
- Find calm in ritualizing things such as making coffee, drinking tea, and even having a cocktail
- Embrace the importance of baths and naps
- Show respect for self and others, which has a remarkably calming effect on everyone
- Learn to listen more than you talk
- Tidy up your life by downsizing experiences and relationships that offer more stress than solace
- Cultivate practical ways of dealing with anger, fear, and arguments - the daily tensions that take up so much of our lives
By practicing acceptance, we learn to pause, take in the situation, and then deciding on a course of action that reframes things. Discover a place of contentment and peace in this harried world.
©2020 Scott Haas (P)2020 Hachette AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
"Scott Haas has written a valuable book that is enormously helpful for integrating our Western approach with Japanese practices for stress reduction. Both anecdotal and grounded in research, the book is extremely pragmatic. By focusing on Japanese methods to reduce stress, he then suggests that the subsequent calm can enable people to better address the systemic and institutional causes of their stress." (Robert B. Saper, MD, director of integrative medicine, Boston Medical Center)
"Why be Happy? is a fascinating, suggestive contemplation, filtered through experiences in Japan, of the happiness perplex in America. Haas perceives the basic elements of contentment in Japan as acceptance and empathy and asks if these aren't more satisfyingly found in the connections between people than in the isolated (American) individual." (Merry White, PhD, professor of anthropology, Boston University)
"Scott Haas's insightful and engrossing exploration into the Japanese way of acceptance is a road map to a more meaningful life. This wonderful book excites with food for thought that is sumptuous, savory, and nuanced." (Drew Nieporent, restaurateur: Nobu, Tribeca Grill, Bâtard)
What listeners say about Why Be Happy?
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- PaticoD
- 03-30-25
The examples provided to explain some of Japan’s customs. Made me immerse in the experience.
I’ll be traveling soon to Japan and a friend recommended this book to help me prepare for my trip. Have found it very useful and informative in expanding my knowledge of Japanese culture. So looking forward to experiencing, exploring and observing the soul of such an interesting country.
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