University of Minnesota - UMN Executive Leadership Insights
The Five Thieves of Happiness
Book

The Five Thieves of Happiness

John Izzo
Berrett-Koehler, 2017
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Editorial Rating

8

Qualities

  • Applicable
  • Eye Opening
  • Inspiring

Recommendation

Leadership trainer John Izzo explains that joy and happiness are natural aspects of every human being. During an eight-month sabbatical spent walking the Camino de Santiago in Spain and living in the Andes of Peru, he identified the five elements – which he calls the “five thieves” – that prevent people from being happy. The challenge, he says, is to remove the mental barriers that prevent you from accessing your happiness and living a fulfilling life. In this gem of a self-help book, Izzo skillfully constructs a watertight case that happiness exists inside each person: You don’t have to acquire it – just dust it off and put into effect. getAbstract believes his optimistic, accessible outlook may challenge your thinking and lift up your attitude.

Summary

Happiness Is at Hand 

Modern culture seems obsessed with finding the keys to attaining and maintaining happiness. The belief that people must work to acquire happiness makes the problem worse. Most people assume that events in their lives determine their happiness – even though many individuals seem happy despite their hardships while others remain unhappy despite numerous blessings. To achieve true happiness and long-term “contentment,” disconnect your sense of “happiness from happenings.” Happiness can endure regardless of life’s ups and downs. Society conditions people to believe that being happy is hard. But happiness is readily accessible. Being out in nature calms and soothes you because you don’t need to take any particular action to connect with its serenity. Tranquility is available to every person. Eastern practices such as meditation and yoga help you unite with the stillness and spiritual calm that is already within you.

Looking at the world through distorted “thought patterns and internal filters” enables the “five thieves of happiness” – “control, conceit, coveting, consumption” and “comfort’’ – to steal your joy. They render you...

About the Author

Author of The Five Secrets You Must Discover Before You Die and five other books, John Izzo, PhD, has spoken to more than one million people worldwide at conferences and corporate events.

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