The Happiness School

It’s a thing we’re all pursuing, but are we looking in the right places? One WH staffer heads back to class to find out...

- Alex Davies

Between, ‘Did I actually shut the front door?’ and, ‘These tights are too see-through,’ a slightly more profound concern sometimes hits me: ‘I don’t always appreciate life as much as I should.’ Maybe it’s the over-thinking Gemini in me, but I do worry my 90-year-old self might shake her fist back at this 31-year old for being glued to her phone when there’s a view to enjoy, or half listening during chats with her mum.

Turns out there’s a class for this kind of musing – which is where I wind up one Thursday evening at the Sydney branch of The School of Life, a global body dedicated to boosting emotional intelligence. Leading the workshop, called ‘How to enjoy life’, is anthropologist Dr Monty Badami, whose life credentials include moonlighting as a celebrant, school educator and trainee army officer.

Over the three hours, Badami takes our assorted crew of 12 strangers (from the twenty something French yogi to the entrepreneur dad) through topics that I expect (gratitude, value, living in the present) and ones I don’t (death, art, advertising). Initial hesitancy aside, trading our stories and ideas becomes connecting, humbling and, at times, a bit emotional. I leave feeling drained, but uplifted. Is that what Badami wants?

“The challenge is to get you folks acknowledging the value of experiencing and just sitting with the whole range of human emotions. So, the fact that you were uplifted and drained I think is really important to recognise,” he tells me. “We all have different experiences, reactions, feelings, and that’s cool because we have so many different ways to navigate the complexity of life.”