Happy!

 My nephew Ron passed along to me an interesting finding.  About thirty years ago or more, Finland and the U.S. were about neck and neck in the lowest international rankings for academic performance.  At that point Finland took a step to revamp its educational system and changed its approach to children’s school experience.  They cut down school hours to four, forsook homework, instituted more play, music, and creative activity. Finish education expert Pasi Sahlberg, the director of the Center for International Mobility and Cooperation in Finland’s Ministry of Education and Culture, reported in one article, “the (Finnish) curricula are very much focused on critical thinking and problem solving, project-based learning and learning to learn.” The focus lays squarely on providing a dynamic environment that prepares children to learn and find their passion. In this way, the concern is not standardized performance but the child’s happiness. Furthermore, in the 1970s Finland’s government instituted that all teachers acquire a state-funded master’s degree. Education positions are prestigious and highly competitive: only one in 10 primary school teacher applicants are accepted. Sahlberg explains, “It’s harder to get into primary school education than a medical program.”

            The net result has been Finland now ranked number 1 in the world’s rankings, with students and teachers joyous and engaged, while the U.S. remains mired way, way down. The U.S. society is not a happy one.  I know this to be the case.  The social atmosphere here is rife with anxiety, sadness, drug and alcohol addiction, much chronic disease that remains impervious to conventional medicine’s attempts at remediation.

I have ideas about the genus of these problems: false emergencies; not following 10 cosmic laws; expectations; attachments; etc.  To learn about these ideas, read _______