PDF Summary:The Courage to Be Happy, by Ichiro Kishimi and Fumitake Koga
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1-Page PDF Summary of The Courage to Be Happy
What can the earliest days of psychology teach us about being happy? In The Courage to Be Happy, counselor Ichiro Kishimi and author Fumitake Koga explore the work of early 20th-century psychotherapist Alfred Adler and discuss why his ideas are still relevant. This is a sequel to the best-selling book The Courage to Be Disliked—however, while The Courage to Be Disliked was simply an introduction to Adlerian psychology, The Courage to Be Happy discusses how you can find happiness by applying Adler’s principles to your life.
This guide will explore the authors’ interpretations of Adlerian psychology’s main goals: independence and a strong sense of community. We’ll then discuss how you can raise and teach children in ways that guide them toward those goals. Our commentary will compare and contrast these ideas with other influential self-help books. We’ll also discuss which of these principles are supported by modern psychology and which aren’t. Finally, we’ll provide some strategies so you can start putting Kishimi and Koga’s ideas into action.
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The authors say that humans are social by nature, so interpersonal relationships are a fundamental part of life and happiness. In fact, Adler taught that all hardships and joys stem from our interactions with other people. Therefore, the quality of our relationships shapes our well-being and overall life satisfaction.
In this section, we’ll discuss why contributing to your community can boost your happiness, why you should offer respect freely to everyone (and what “respect” really means), and the three fundamental types of relationships in Adlerian psychology.
Contribute to Your Community
The authors start by saying that contributing to your community is essential for your personal happiness and fulfillment. Adler taught that happiness comes from feeling useful; that feeling, in turn, helps you develop a sense of worth and belonging in your community, which are crucial for your overall well-being.
(Shortform note: This theory that you need feelings of worth and belonging in order to be happy closely resembles what social worker Brené Brown says is needed to live wholeheartedly—which is to say, to boldly pursue the life you want. In Daring Greatly, Brown says that every person needs to connect with others in order to be happy because we all need to experience feelings of love and belonging. She also says that shame—feeling like you aren’t enough as you are—is the greatest obstacle to connection. While Kishimi and Koga say that usefulness is the key to developing a sense of self-worth (or, as Brown would say, overcoming shame), Brown disagrees; she says that being open, honest, and emotionally vulnerable is the key to overcoming shame.)
However, Kishimi and Koga also say that value can only exist in relation to others. Therefore, it’s not enough to just try to be productive—you have to be useful to someone else in order to feel valued. In other words, no matter how much you accomplish, it won’t be satisfying if it’s only for your own benefit.
With that said, Adler taught that you don’t always need to perform concrete acts of contribution to experience this sense of belonging and worth. You can improve the lives of those around you simply by participating in your community.
(Shortform note: In addition to bolstering your sense of self-worth, becoming useful and well-liked in your community is likely to have more tangible benefits as well. In The Happiness Hypothesis, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt says humans have an instinct that he calls the Reciprocity Reflex: a drive to repay others for what they do for us, whether those actions were helpful or harmful. Therefore, if you have a good reputation and frequently help others, the people in your community are likely to also do nice things for you. Conversely, if you have a bad reputation—for instance, people think you’re unfriendly, or you’re known for bullying others—the other members of your community are likely to work against you in order to get payback.)
Respect Others for Who They Are
Another important aspect of Adlerian psychology that Kishimi and Koga highlight is the free offering of respect to others. In Adlerian terms, respect that’s freely given starts by recognizing someone for who they are as an individual.
Once you recognize someone’s individuality, you don’t try to alter who they are—instead, you accept them in their current form with no stipulations. If you try to manipulate someone to make them be different, you’re not showing them respect. It may help if you consider “respect” to be synonymous with “trust.” The authors say that respecting someone means you have complete confidence in them, and therefore you don’t feel any need to change or manipulate them.
The authors also say that respect (or trust) is a choice that you make based on your willpower and courage; respect comes from within you, not from the other person's character or abilities. This means that you can offer respect to all people: loved ones, passing strangers, coworkers, and people you’ll never meet.
Developing Universal Feelings of Respect and Love
This description of respect closely resembles the Buddhist practice of metta, commonly translated as “lovingkindness.” Put simply, metta is a wish for universal health and happiness—it means respecting and caring for everyone, even people you’ve never met and people whom you dislike.
Metta is traditionally achieved through meditation. You begin by cultivating a wish for universal health and happiness. Start by focusing on yourself, reflecting on your own innate goodness, and offering yourself wishes for peace, joy, and feelings of metta. Recognize that you, like all beings, deserve happiness and well-being.
Next, expand your circle of lovingkindness to include the people closest to you. Choose a single person whose goodness is easiest for you to see, such as a child, parent, grandparent, or friend. Meditate on what you love about that person and offer them the same wish for happiness that you offered yourself.
Once you've done this, widen your circle of metta to include other people you're close to, then people you don't know as well, and eventually, people whom you don't know at all. Extend your wishes for their peace, joy, and well-being, recognizing that all beings desire and deserve happiness.
Nurture Your Fundamental Relationships
To strengthen your sense of community, Kishimi and Koga say you must nurture three fundamental relationships: working relationships, friendships, and loving relationships.
Fundamental Relationship #1: Working Relationships
You can help others simply by existing and participating in your community, but what does that really mean? Adler identified three fundamental life tasks that each person needs to undertake in order to find happiness, but these “tasks” really describe different types of relationships with the people in your community. The first of these fundamental relationships is working relationships.
Kishimi and Koga explain that society functions most effectively when individuals focus on their own strengths and areas of expertise. This concept is known as division of labor. For example, when you need a new car, you don't attempt to build one yourself; instead, you buy from a manufacturer that specializes in automotive production. This allows you to focus on your own job and expertise—the ways you’re best able to contribute to society—while benefiting from the skills and knowledge of others.
Kishimi and Koga also say that all professions, regardless of their prestige or salary, are valuable to society. If a job exists, it means there’s a societal need for that role. Therefore, there’s no difference in importance between, say, the CEO of a multinational corporation and an entry-level employee at a fast-food restaurant; both people are filling necessary positions that help keep society functioning.
(Shortform note: The authors are understating the importance of division of labor here—it doesn’t just make society more efficient, it makes our entire lifestyle possible. To illustrate this, a video from the channel How To Make Everything shows how difficult it would be to make a simple chicken sandwich if you had to do everything yourself. Between growing the wheat for flour, raising a chicken for meat, and everything else involved in making the sandwich entirely from scratch, the process took six months and cost $1,500. By contrast, because we live in a society with extreme specialization and division of labor, you can cheaply buy that same sandwich at any deli, or just make it at home using ingredients you bought from the grocery store.)
If all jobs are important, then your worth as a person isn’t determined by the specific job you hold, nor even how well you perform in that role. Instead, Adler taught that your attitude is the best measure of your value as a worker. This is because your attitude ultimately determines whether people will turn to you or to one of your competitors (remember, Adler’s “life tasks” are really about relationships). When you approach your work with honesty and enthusiasm, you’re better able to form working relationships with others, and therefore you become a valuable asset to your employer and society.
For example, a salesperson who has extensive knowledge of every product their employer sells, but has an off-putting attitude that drives away potential customers, won’t be very valuable to the company despite their expertise. Conversely, someone who doesn’t yet know as much about the products, but is eager to learn and happy to serve customers, will be much more valuable in that role.
(Shortform note: Recent research backs up the authors’ assertion that attitude has a larger impact than job skills on an employee’s success. For example, the compiled results of two studies—one from 2011 and the other from 2020—show that 89% of employees who are fired within their first 18 months fail because of their “soft skills” rather than their job skills. Soft skills include things like an employee’s willingness to learn, their ability to work on a team, and their readiness to adapt to change; in short, their attitude. Meanwhile, just 11% of those new hires lost their jobs due to a lack of competency.)
Fundamental Relationship #2: Friendships
Kishimi and Koga say that you learn about others and develop a sense of community through friendship, the second of Adler’s fundamental relationships. Building strong friendships starts with respect for others—you have to like people for who they are, not for who you think you can turn them into.
The other key component of friendship is empathy: Strive to put yourself in your friends' positions, and consider what choices you’d make and what you’d want if you were them.
The authors add that, frequently, what people want in a friend is somebody who really listens to them. By demonstrating genuine interest in your friends' concerns and interests, you show them that you value them and their perspectives. It's important to note that this doesn't necessarily mean agreeing with everything your friends believe; rather, it means respecting their ideas and opinions.
(Shortform note: Although they don’t use these terms, the authors are talking about using active listening skills and emotionally validating your friends. To be a better listener and show empathy more effectively, it’s often helpful to focus on understanding and accepting your friends’ emotions rather than immediately trying to fix their problems. Also, avoid interruptions, distractions, judgments, and personal agendas, and instead ask questions about how they’re feeling; this shows that you're really hearing them and encourages them to further express their emotions. Respond with statements that acknowledge their emotions, express your support, and ask how you can help—avoid comments that dismiss or minimize what they're going through.)
Finally, unlike working relationships, friendships are selfless and unconditional. Your connection with your friends is based on genuine fondness for one another, rather than the hope of any external benefits or rewards. By cultivating these authentic, unconditional friendships, you not only enrich your own life but also contribute to a stronger sense of community and belonging for yourself and those around you.
(Shortform note: The importance of friendships is well-documented, but more recent research has suggested that casual acquaintances can also provide an important boost to your mental and emotional health. For instance, acquaintances might include the employees at stores you visit often. In short, the more acquaintances you have—and the more frequently you interact with them—the happier you’ll be.)
Fundamental Relationship #3: Loving Relationships
The last fundamental relationship that Kishimi and Koga discuss is love, and they say that it’s the most important task in life. It’s also a unique kind of task, because it belongs to you and to someone else at the same time: When you’re in a loving relationship, your task is to build happiness together with your partner.
Remember: Adler taught that you can’t find happiness when you’re focused solely on yourself. He also taught that, from infancy, our main concern is receiving love because we recognize that our survival depends on the love and care of others. Therefore, to grow as a person and find happiness, you must shift your focus from receiving love to giving love.
The authors say that you can achieve this growth through a loving relationship. This is because, when you’re in such a relationship, your priorities shift from fulfilling your own needs and desires to fulfilling the shared needs of you and your partner—your focus changes from “me” to “us.” As a result, you finish growing past the self-centeredness that you developed in infancy and discover the joy of contributing to others instead.
Connection: Love as the First Step Toward Selflessness
This principle of shifting your focus through a loving relationship builds on a major point in the authors’ earlier book, The Courage to Be Disliked. In that book, Kishimi and Koga said that the main difference between happy and unhappy people is what they try to accomplish with their relationships. Note that, in this case, they were discussing all relationships rather than just romantic relationships.
In brief, unhappy people are concerned with earning others’ approval (receiving love), because they believe that their worth is determined by what others think of them. On the other hand, happy people are concerned with how they can help others, and they derive their sense of self-worth from feeling useful (giving love).
The Courage to Be Happy presents loving relationships as a bridge between those mindsets: Being useful to your partner teaches you to think about how you can be useful in every relationship. Therefore, love is one way to start moving past self-centeredness and toward the selflessness that Adler believed brings happiness.
Educating and Rearing Children
Adler’s work frequently discusses how to raise and educate children, so Kishimi and Koga spend a lot of time on that topic as well (recall that the Youth originally went back to the Philosopher because he was struggling in his role as a teacher).
According to the authors, instructing children—whether as an educator or a parent —means guiding them toward the same goals that everyone else has: independence and a sense of community. In this section, we’ll discuss how common mistakes in raising and educating children sabotage those goals. We’ll start by explaining how interfering too much in a child’s development stifles their ability to grow into independent adults, then we'll discuss how imposing punishments and rewards (rather than letting children experience the natural consequences of their actions) hinders their ability to develop a strong sense of community.
Excessive Interference Stifles a Child’s Independence
Kishimi and Koga say that well-meaning parents and teachers often hinder children's ability to become self-sufficient by meddling too much in their lives. When children are constantly subjected to direction and supervision, they may struggle to function independently later in life.
(Shortform note: Not only does excessive interference in a child’s life stunt their ability to make decisions and live independently, it’s likely to make them frustrated and resentful as well. Every time a parent or teacher takes a decision away from a child, they’re insulting that child’s intelligence—there’s an implication that the child isn’t competent enough to make the decision alone. It becomes even more frustrating when that decision is something trivial, like which clothes to wear each day; though the adult is only trying to help, it comes across as them thinking their child is incapable of picking their own outfit.)
Offer Children Respect and Guidance
To foster independence in children, it’s essential to show them respect (as Adler defined it) and trust them to make their own decisions as much as possible. Children will almost certainly make mistakes along the way, but that’s just part of learning.
Therefore, the authors recommend that instead of just telling children what to do, you should offer guidance and support to help them make their own choices and learn from their experiences. Consider approaching your relationship with your children or students as a friendship rather than a work relationship—by treating them as equals and providing them with the tools and support they need to make informed decisions, you can help them develop the skills and confidence to become more independent.
Tip: Consider Each Child’s Unique Needs
Another way to think about how you approach your role as a caretaker or educator is to consider whether you’re supporting each child’s unique needs and goals.
In Grit, psychologist Angela Duckworth presents a spectrum of parenting attitudes ranging from unsupportive to supportive. She explains that unsupportive parents don’t recognize their children’s individuality and try to push them toward what they (the parents) would do or would want for themselves. For instance, an unsupportive parent might try to force their child to join the Boy Scouts or a sports team because it aligns with the parent’s interests. This also applies to perfectionism: An unsupportive parent might demand perfect grades because they regret not working harder in school—or, conversely, they were gifted and did earn perfect grades, so they see no reason why their less-gifted child can’t do the same.
(Note: Although Duckworth is specifically talking about parents, these principles are equally applicable for teachers to consider whether they’re supporting their students.)
On the other hand, supportive parents accept their children’s unique strengths, weaknesses, and interests. Therefore, supportive parents don’t try to force their children to become idealized versions of themselves; instead, they help their children toward goals and decisions that are appropriate for the children.
Rewards and Punishments Stifle a Child’s Sense of Community
Kishimi and Koga say that, in Adlerian psychology, neither punishments nor rewards are considered good ways to influence children’s behavior. There are various reasons why these approaches are ineffective, but they all stem from the idea that it’s inappropriate to interfere with another person’s tasks—in this case, the children’s tasks of learning and growing. Remember: according to Adler, your role is to offer guidance and support so that the children in your care can reach the goals they’ve chosen.
The Problem With Punishing “Bad” Behavior
Kishimi and Koga say that punishment isn’t an effective way to address problematic or disruptive behavior in children. This is because, when children misbehave, they’re rarely trying to cause actual harm; they’re often just trying to get attention or find their place in a social setting.
Since the goal of these behaviors is to receive special attention, even if it's negative, punishment and reprimands are counterproductive. To create lasting change in a child’s behavior, it’s crucial to uncover and address the underlying issues that motivate their actions. Your ultimate goal should always be to protect the children under your care and reach a point of mutual understanding with them.
(Shortform note: The authors say that punishing children is ineffective, but there are times when children need to be reined in and controlled, which can be challenging without the threat of punishment. Talking isn’t always a practical solution because the child might be unwilling to talk to you or unable to articulate what’s wrong—or, if you’re a teacher, you might not be able to devote that much time to a single student. One way to correct behavior without explicitly punishing it is to just allow the child to face the natural consequences of their actions. For example, a child who makes fun of their classmates might find themselves eating lunch alone; that’s an opportunity to point out that people won’t want them around unless they start being nicer.)
Kishimi and Koga describe some types of problematic behavior in children and what the underlying problem might be for each.
Some children demonstrate positive behaviors as long as they’re praised for those behaviors. However, if they don’t receive praise, they’ll no longer practice those positive behaviors and may start acting out instead. This is because receiving praise from an authority figure makes them feel like they have an advantageous position over their peers—but, failing that, they’ll do whatever they can to keep your attention on them (and not on the other kids).
You can avoid this kind of attention-seeking behavior by offering every child the kind of unconditional respect we discussed earlier. When you allow each child to be themselves and support their interests and personal goals without judgment, no child will feel the need to act out in order to stand out from their peers.
(Shortform note: Overcoming attention-seeking behavior will be easier if you help the child understand why they’re doing it—in other words, what emotional need they’re trying to fulfill. This is called emotion coaching, which means helping a child to understand and manage their own feelings. This is a skill that even many adults struggle with. For instance, in Atlas of the Heart, social worker Brené Brown says that people experience dozens of different emotions, but many of us can only recognize three: happiness, sadness, and anger. Helping a child build their emotional vocabulary and specifically identify what they’re feeling will go a long way toward overcoming this unwanted attention-seeking behavior.)
The previous type of behavior was a social power struggle between kids; another type of problematic behavior is a power struggle between a child and an adult. In these instances, the child may frequently engage in provocatory behavior and is likely to resist any guidance teachers and parents try to offer.
Reprimanding the child or arguing with them will only make matters worse because you’re giving in to their provocation, thereby showing that they do have power over you. Instead, focus on reasoning with the child: Help them to understand why they’re acting this way, and teach them how to behave more appropriately.
(Shortform note: The authors say that you should try to reason with a misbehaving child, but some psychologists argue that it can be harmful to assume a child’s behavior is deliberate. In many cases, their behavior is driven by emotions rather than logic. Remember that children’s emotional regulation skills aren’t fully developed yet; if they feel stressed or unsafe, they won’t be able to work through those feelings and engage with you rationally. Therefore, before you can correct a child’s behavior, you need to build trust and create an environment where they feel safe and loved.)
The Problem With Rewarding “Good” Behavior
According to Kishimi and Koga's discussion of Adler's ideas, praise and reward for positive behaviors can be just as harmful as punishment and reproach.
As we’ve already mentioned, in social settings like classrooms, praise can create an unhealthy environment for children. It can cause children to focus on doing good things to receive favor from authority figures, such as teachers or parents, rather than doing good for its own sake. The children will also view praise as something to be coveted and fought over and therefore start to see their classmates as competitors. This type of competition can be detrimental to a classroom community; it drives students to undermine each other and show off in order to stand out from their peers.
Instead, the authors say that you should promote a cooperative, communal atmosphere where the children can work together and support each other. This is preferable to a setting where they feel the need to fight over what they view as a limited resource (your praise).
Tip: Leverage Children’s Intrinsic Motivation
The overarching problem with rewards and punishments is that they’re external motivators. An authority figure hands down punishments and rewards, and so the children learn that they must please authority figures rather than developing independence and learning to support one another. Therefore, a more effective approach may be to take advantage of the children’s intrinsic motivations—their natural desires to learn and to overcome challenges.
Here are a few ways you could do this:
First, give children appropriate challenges: difficult enough to push their limits, but not so difficult that they give up. When an activity is just the right level of difficulty for a child, they’ll develop intense motivation and focus as they work to meet that challenge.
Secondly, grant children autonomy (within reason) to make their own decisions about what to do and how to do it. Involving them in the decision-making process and giving them a sense of control will greatly boost their motivation and engagement—recall that Adler taught that people naturally strive for independence.
Finally, emphasize that the learning process is more important than the outcome. Celebrate the children’s efforts, creativity, and perseverance; this approach fosters resilience and an eagerness to learn, while reducing the pressure and anxiety that often accompanies a fixation on performance.
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