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Episode summary:

When was the last time you witnessed a beautiful moment? Maybe it was a striking sunset, a kind exchange between strangers, or a hearty laugh between two friends. Beautiful moments surround us, and research suggests that taking the time to admire them can actually benefit our health and happiness. For our show, restorative justice advocate Darnell Washington looked for 9 beautiful things each day and reflected on them. In doing so, he recognized how admiring different types of beauty from nature to the goodness of others, can have a powerful impact on his own humanity. Later, we hear from the psychologist who created the practice, René T. Proyer, about how making it a point to notice different kinds of beauty benefits our happiness and reduces depression.

Practice:
Today’s guests:

1. Every night for at least one week, set about 15 minutes before going to bed to think about nine beautiful things that happened during the day, 3 each in the following categories.

2. Write down three beautiful things on human behavior (morally, positively valued behavior, ie good deeds).

3. Write down three things you experienced as beautiful in nature and/or the environment.

4. Write down three beautiful things in general that you noticed during the day (referring to aesthetics, like art, music, architecture, etc).

5. Note why you found each of these nine things beautiful.

Darnell Washington is a formerly incarcerated restorative justice advocate from California.

Listen to Darnell’s Ted Talk: http://tinyurl.com/cujz79fk
René T. Proyer is a professor and researcher at Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg.

Learn about René’s work:

Follow René on Twitter: http://tinyurl.com/3x5986u6
Resources from The Greater Good Science Center:

Finding Beauty in the Everyday (The Science of Happiness Podcast):

Why Seeing Beauty Matters, Even in the Midst of War:

How Nature Can Make You Kinder, Happier, and More Creative:

Finding Awe in the Ordinary: http://tinyurl.com/aavr2pkv
More Resources on Appreciating Beauty:

BBC – The neuroscience of beauty: What your brain finds beautiful – and how this shapes your thoughts:

TED – Nature. Beauty. Gratitude:

CNN – It’s the little things: Why animals, sunsets and coffee make us happy: http://tinyurl.com/yckephaf
We want to hear from you! What beautiful moment have you noticed recently? Email us at happinesspod@berkeley.edu or use the hashtag #happinesspod.

Help us share The Science of Happiness!

Rate us and share this link with someone who might like the show:

Transcript:

Darnell Washington I watched one guy walk down the street and he was pulling his hand out of his pocket. And some money dropped. And so this other guy, he was about to walk by, seen it, so he referred him back that he dropped the money. So the guy goes back and he picks up the money. And as he picks up the money, there’s an unhoused person walking by. He handed him the money. This is what people are about. You know, just things like that I can carry to my children and grandchildren and tell them about the moral standard of what he did. And he was grateful, and his gratefulness made him, he chose to do a grateful act as well. And this is what it’s all about in life.

Dacher Keltner When’s the last time you were inspired by beauty? The beauty of leaves on trees, the clouds in the sky, the laughter of children or song, or just the minutiae of everyday life?

This is Dacher Keltner. Welcome to The Science of Happiness. On each episode we explore a practice to help us feel more joy, compassion, and connection to ourselves and our natural environment.

This week we’re going to learn what happens when we go searching for beauty.

Research shows that when we make an extra effort to see beauty around us, it actually supports our health and happiness.

Our guest is a restorative justice advocate and my long-time friend, Darnell Washington. For our show, he tried a practice where he identified nine beautiful things each day. And what’s so inspiring is that when he did it, and he was able to appreciate beauty even more as a result.

Later in the show, we hear more about how, exactly, this practice helps from the scientist who created it.

Rene Proyer Our expectation were that the number of depressive symptoms, so like problem sleeping, general feelings of sadness, and so on, they would be reduced

Dacher Keltner All that, after these messages from our sponsor.

Dacher Keltner Welcome back to the Science of Happiness. I’m Dacher Keltner. And this week we’re talking about beauty and the different kinds of beauty we can find in the world. One of the places that I found some of the most striking examples of beauty was in the restorative justice work I was privileged to do at San Quentin [State] Prison in California, led by today’s guest, who for me is a person of moral beauty, who inspires me through his Courage and kindness and sense of justice, Darnell Washington.

I met Darnell when he was running that restorative justice program, leading a couple hundred men in San Quentin through the amazing process of restorative justice, probably ten years ago. And, just seeing how Darnell built what I would call the spiritual fabric of those gatherings of just getting 180 people together to think about soul and redemption and life.

Darnell was recently released from prison after 26 years of incarceration and he joins us after trying a practice, and it’s pretty amazing, where he really sought out different kinds of beauty after he’s provided so much of it to other people.

Darnell, I’ve been dreaming of this day for some time to have you on the show. So thanks for being here.

Darnell Washington You’re welcome.

Dacher Keltner For our show, you tried this lab-tested practice where each day you identify and write about nine things you found beautiful. Right. And that tells us there’s a lot around us. You write about three things about the beauty in human beings. You get out and write about three things in nature that are beautiful. And then you write about three things, you know, that are just like, In general, what do you find beautiful? How would you define beauty? What does beauty feel like, or what does it mean to you?

Darnell Washington I think beauty is anything that can touch your sensibility, touch your humanity. You know, to make you really just think about what’s going on with you. And maybe the privilege you have or the privilege you don’t have. But either one of them, there’s still beauty inside of it.

Dacher Keltner What do you see when you went in search for examples of beauty each day? What did you write about?

Darnell Washington I wrote about, This unhoused couple. I work in the Tenderloin. In San Francisco and basically we, try to keep unhoused people from using drugs, in front of businesses and schools and things like that.

We come and talk to them, talking to them compassionately, asking them to move along or, you know. And oftentimes, if they need something, I will go buy them a coffee or buy them a donut, you know what I’m saying?

But what amazed me one time is that I’m standing across the street, and I see this one couple, you know, they’re getting up, and this young lady is crying. And they’re both unhoused, and it’s a young man with her. And he just grabs her, and he started hugging her.

You know, and I’m just sitting there, it’s like, almost had me in tears, like, you know, what are they going through, you know?

And I watched this couple hug for like 10 minutes. And after he finished hugging her, it’s like he released her and she was glowing like a sunflower. And I said, it’s so amazing that people can have so much love for each other. So it goes to show it doesn’t take to have a roof over your head to have love. And that was a beautiful sight for me.

I can see negative things and that can block the beautiful things. So I have to be mindful of that to see like, “These people are beautiful. This community is beautiful, it can just be spending time out in the open with people. Those things for me are beautiful. Those little things like that. Yeah. To where you not only, sometimes you don’t even have to do anything. You just need to just be there.

Dacher Keltner The next part of the practice of seeing beauty is to write about three things each day that were beautiful in nature or the physical environment around you, you know, buildings and bridges and cars. And there’s just this, robust science, just kind of feeling nature, seeing its beauty is just good for your health and your concentration and your well being. We get a lot of the same benefits from focusing on the beauty of the environment. One of my favorite studies is you can look at the beauty of different urban areas in England, and the more beautiful the area is, the better people are getting along, right? It’s just like beauty helps us all get along.

Tell us about one of your three sort of looking for beauty in nature experiences with this practice.

Darnell Washington So I was taking pictures of San Francisco and this little squirrel, like one squirrel came up on a rock. So I took a picture of him and then a female squirrel came up as well.

So it’s like, it’s like, do they know the background that they have behind the view of San Francisco, the Bay Bridge? And they looking into the camera like I’m taking these pictures like they know it’s behind there. Yeah. And I’m just snapping these pictures and it’s like they’re just smiling and It’s juI’m looking like, this is something humans would do, but here it is, these animals are doing this. And it just tickled me, like, can you really imagine that these squirrels know that this background is behind them, and they taking this picture, sitting up like this, and knowing this is like a portrait. You know, just observing something like that to appreciate the time they took out to come take a picture for me. So that was — it was really amazing.

Dacher Keltner What else in nature struck as beautiful, that you wrote about?

Darnell Washington I was driving home one day, beautiful sunny day, and I’m coming across the Bay Bridge. And I look to the right and I see this beautiful sailboat and some ships out there. But I noticed this like, big span of water, it was just smooth. It’s almost like a shirt, how you iron wrinkles out, the water looked like that. And I was so amazed because I’ve never really noticed water to do that. And I was just like, curious. I wonder what made that happen in the water? Because, to me, it was a beautiful sight because it was in a large space, but outside of that space, it was wavy.

The water shows me that there is no limits. The ocean is just so free running and there’s no end to it.

Dacher Keltner Tell us about how doing this practice of looking for three moments of beauty in nature, what did it do, this practice in terms of influencing your relationship to nature?

Darnell Washington It makes me want to bring more children out of the city into nature. Cause I think from being in the city with all the hustle and bustle and all the drama they can really find a safe space in nature. When I was walking up, we had a little stream down here in Berkeley. Yeah. And it’s so peaceful. A lot of kids have never even seen a stream before. Yep. Yeah. So just imagine them coming up here and seeing squirrels running around, a stream, or a deer. What could that do for them? That could be that safe space that they can get away from the city and learn to go on their own. You know, just seeing things like that, it was peaceful. I think it was really peaceful. Yeah. And they need to see that.

Dacher Keltner Yeah. You know, Darnell, your, your stories are so powerful and rich and tell us like, There’s moral beauty all around us. There’s natural beauty. There’s beauty of the environment. And I’m curious, you know, as you did this practice and the final three things that you write about are just beauty in general. The beauty of ideas or the beauty of possibilities and I’m curious. What you became aware of in that last part of the practice, just, what’s beautiful for Darnell, in general?

Darnell Washington I seen a picture. And it’s a pond, and it had lotus flowers in it. And what I like about that picture is the lotus flower is such a beautiful flower.

And I look at how beautiful it is, but it grows in mud. And when I look at that and equate those two things, how could something so beautiful come out of the mud? And I think, you know, something like that drives me to say, like, “No matter what people been through, they can come out of it beautiful.”

So, when I look at that beautiful picture, you know, it just resonates with me to where like, what more can I see in this picture? Where is this picture at? Where is it going? You know, and it’s like I like to just sometimes just imagine about things. The not knowing of something, but just being able to look at something. And you know, that’s what the lotus picture does for me. Pictures that you just, you just, you can just run your mind wild and guessing. And not knowing the answers.

Dacher Keltner Wonderful. How has this practice of looking for three moments made you think about beauty and, and what it means to you?

Darnell Washington I think just in your life period, you have to be focused on beauty. Especially the beauty in people, because if not, you lose track of what your goals are in life.

Dacher Keltner Yeah, absolutely.

Darnell Washington And your humanity.

Dacher Keltner Darnell Washington, I am so grateful to be your friend and to, that you came by and shared some wisdom on this show.

Darnell Washington Thanks for being here. I’m glad to be here.

Dacher Keltner Hey everyone—we have instructions on how to do the 9 Beautiful Things practice in our show notes, wherever you’re listening. Try out it — and if you do, share your beauty with us at happinesspod@berkeley.edu.

We’re going to dive deeper into how to do this practice and why it works so well, with the psychologist who created it — after this break.

Dacher Keltner Welcome back to The Science of Happiness, I’m Dacher Keltner. We’ve been talking about the science of beauty and how to find more of it in our lives. Now our podcast’s executive producer, Shuka Kalantari, is going to share what she learned from the scientist who created the 9 beautiful things practice that Darnell tried for our show. Here’s Shuka.

Shuka Kalantari When we naturally notice and appreciate the beauty around us, it can lead to all kinds of different benefits. Studies show it can make us feel more satisfied in life, have a stronger sense of meaning, and act with more kindness towards others and the environment.

Knowing all this, one scientist decided to test out if training people to seek beauty would yield similar results.

Rene Proyer So can we find an instruction that people can work self administered and can use in their daily lives?

Shuka Kalantari Rene Proyer is the psychologist who created the 9 beautiful things practice.

Rene Proyer One of the main things I think we wanted to achieve was that we wanted to encourage people to find beauty in their everyday lives.

Shuka Kalantari He and his team at Martin Luther University in Germany recruited 119 adults online via the university’s website. They weren’t told much about the purpose of the experiment, only that it might help ‘strengthen their strengths.’

Rene Proyer So participants were instructed to set aside about 15 minutes for seven consecutive days, in the evening,

Shuka Kalantari Some were instructed to write about childhood memories, and the others were told to do the 9 beautiful things practice. Writing about 3 beautiful things in human behavior, in nature, and in general.

Rene Proyer The basic idea was that we wanted to cover different areas of the human experience.

Shuka Kalantari They avoided giving instructions to do things like go to a museum, or wake up to watch the sunrise …They wanted to emphasize seeking beauty in the day-to-day.

Rene Proyer So for example, on the way to work, on public transport, look out of the window. Is there a tree that you haven’t noticed before that blooms beautifully at this time, or on your way to work, do you see a street artist, for example, that does something exceptional?

We also asked them and that and I think that’s an important addition why they have experienced this particular thing as beautiful to help participants to relive this observation, and also we wanted to elicit the emotions felt again.

Shuka Kalantari Everyone completed questionnaires about their happiness and depression levels before the week began, then again directly afterwards —as well as one month, three months, and six months later.

Rene Proyer And our expectation were that the number of depressive symptoms, so like, problems sleeping, loss of appetite, general feelings of sadness, or feeling down, and so on, they would be reduced after the program.

Shuka Kalantari And that’s exactly what Proyer and his team found.

Rene Proyer Happiness increased and depressive symptoms were ameliorated. Same happened one week after the intervention. And one month after the intervention, we still found that people described themselves as more happy.

The thing that was probably most striking for me was, when talking to participants afterwards, that they really said this idea of finding beauty in my everyday life worked.

Shuka Kalantari Proyer says he wants to do this beauty experiment again—except this time with couples, or friends, trying it out together.

Rene Proyer I think this could also have some great potential because if you share your beautiful experiences during the day with your partner, and then the partner tells you about their experience. That’s a nice discussion to have over dinner, right? And the positive effect from my perspective would be that people start asking questions in the sense of, “Oh yeah, and what happened then? And what did you think when you saw this?” And, “Oh, have you ever seen something like this before? And I think this could have potential. To have even stronger effects.

Dacher Keltner Thanks, Shuka.

On our next episode of The Science of Happiness … is it possible to be mindfully angry, frustrated, or sad?

Tara Brach all the most difficult emotions is at the root they are life loving life. But they got torqued. I imagine sometimes like a hose with water going through it. And We need to un-torque the hose with awareness.

Dacher Keltner We explore the power of radical acceptance, and the science supporting it, with leading Buddhist meditation teacher Tara Brach.

I’m Dacher Keltner, thanks for joining us on The Science of Happiness. Our executive producer is Shuka Kalantari. Our producer is Haley Gray. Sound design is from Jennie Cataldo of Accompany Studios and our associate producer is Maarya Zafar. And our executive director is Jason Marsh. The Science of Happiness is a co-production of UC Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center and PRX.