For as far back as he could remember, Robert Mack had been anxious and depressed. Despite the fact that he thrived academically, athletically, and socially, he couldn’t shake his feelings of self-loathing and self-hatred. He thought he would grow out of it, but the dark feelings only got worse. He was suicidal for decades, and the anxiety was so overwhelming that it would wake him up. Unable to calm his mind and his thoughts, he struggled to fall back asleep.
After coming to the conclusion that there was no alternative, Mack researched suicide and attempted to take his own life. He slashed his wrist and dug the knife in, hoping to end the pain once and for all.
But then something incredible and unforeseen happened.
He suddenly felt peace. Joy. Love. His mind, at long last, was quiet. No negative thoughts. No pressure. No disappointment. Just peace.
He stopped, and survived.
“It took me about 20 years to realize something simple,” the author and television host says. “My mind was quiet for a few moments, and in that quiet, everything was fine. No thoughts, no problems.”
Grateful to still be alive, and with a suddenly fresh perspective, he poured his energy into a different kind of research, focusing on happiness and positive psychology. Slowly but surely, Mack dug himself out of his deep hole. He became a positive psychology expert after earning a master’s degree in Applied Positive Psychology (MAPP) from the University of Pennsylvania — only a few dozen people in the world have this elusive degree — and his life transformed seismically.
He went from feeling like the “unhappiest person on the planet,” as he describes it, to coaching people to be their best, happiest, most positive selves. He works with elite athletes, entertainers, and senior executives, and consults for leading global brands and organizations. In 2022, he released his second book, the critically acclaimed bestseller Love From the Inside Out: Lessons and Inspiration for Loving Yourself, Your Life, and Each Other.
Mack sat down with us for an exclusive conversation about small shifts you can make to increase your happiness, how to ignore automatic negative thoughts, manifestation and positive visualization, and more.
Mental health struggles continue to plague us as a society, and the issue only seems to be getting more problematic. According to Gallup, 29 percent of American adults have been diagnosed with depression in their lifetimes, up nearly 10 percent from 2015.
There is likely a myriad of reasons for this — the aftereffects of the COVID lockdowns, screen time getting even more out of hand, social media driving us to compare and get down on ourselves — and to combat it, people need to focus on specific things that make them happy and give them pleasure. But why is this so hard for so many?
Mack says — “with love” — that people are generally “sloppy, undisciplined thinkers and sloppy, undisciplined consumers of information.” If happiness isn’t a top goal of yours, he explains, it’s so easy to get distracted by everyone and everything that doesn’t make you happy. It has to be a conscious decision. You have to be intentional.
Mack suggests prioritizing these three primary steps to begin living a happier existence.
1. Happy Activities or Actions: Identify the things that bring you joy and make you feel more alive. Once those are identified, schedule them more frequently into your routine. Simultaneously, do your best to eliminate everything and everyone that doesn’t give you that sense of enjoyment and excitement. (That isn’t always easy, of course, and in some cases it isn’t possible.) But to the extent that you can add happiness-producing activities and remove happiness deserts, the better you’ll feel.
2. Positive Stories: This seems obvious, but it’s easier said than done. Focus on telling happier (but truthful) stories to yourself and other people, emphasizing, focusing on, and appreciating the positives.
3. Just Be: Ah, of course. Mindfulness. Mack advises practicing not thinking at all. No analysis. No evaluation. No questioning. No judging. Try to be truly (and deeply) present in the moment. Remember that your life could end at any moment, and the only moment guaranteed is this moment. Simply experience what is front of you at this very moment.
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“No matter how much you think and how well you think,” Mack says, “it won’t bring you the kind of deep, lasting, meaningful, abiding, peaceful aliveness — which I call happiness — that not thinking will bring you.”
Mack also suggests practicing gratitude — reminding yourself of three things that you’re grateful for on a daily basis — optimism, exercise (moving your body is so important), self-care, and savoring.
Automatic negative thoughts. We all have them. They’re the unhelpful, intrusive thoughts that can enter our heads at any moment — in many cases, they come at the worst moments — and cause us to doubt, question, and lose confidence. They’re extremely hard to ignore or dismiss (hence the ANT abbreviation), and trying to eliminate them is a fruitless (and agonizingly frustrating) endeavor.
So how do you learn to largely ignore them and quiet your mind?
Mack simply encourages people to practice.
“If you practice dismissing and ignoring thoughts as consistently as you can, you'll be surprised by how much better you get at it,” Mack says. “And when you don't feed those automatic negative thoughts, they don't come back so often. They don't stick around as long.
“It’s like a bully. When you don't feed the bully with attention, and you find other places and ways to spend your time and energy, you find that you can get really good at dismissing and ignoring thoughts.”
For those who are struggling to swat away those ANTs, Mack suggests doing a simple micro meditation, where you simply remind yourself that you only have this one moment. Only this moment is guaranteed, so try to make the most of it. Enjoy it as deeply as possible. It’s not about trying to accomplish anything, or being spiritual, but rather attempting to enjoy the moment before it’s over.
“If you practice that throughout the day,” Mack says, “you’ll be surprised at how good you get at it in about two months. Your brain literally rewires itself. Your brain can be the greatest tool on the planet, but it can also be the greatest weapon that you use against yourself. So, you have to be intentional.”
We’re big proponents of positive visualization and manifestation at IIN, but many are understandably skeptical and suspicious of it. Does it really work? Is there evidence to support it? Or is it just playing tricks on your mind?
Mack is a firm believer of the practices, and he’s seen the power they can have time and time again with his clients. It comes down to a simple formula, a domino effect, that’s directly correlated to the undeniable mind-body connection.
“There's a lot of scientific evidence that supports the idea that what you think directly influences how you feel, and how you feel directly influences what you do, and what you do directly influences what happens to you in your life,” Mack explains. “There's also a lot of scientific emphasis to support that what you think, and how you feel, also influences how other people think and feel. Emotional contagion is a real psychological phenomenon, and you can pass it through a screen. It's more contagious than anything else on the planet, in both positive and negative ways.”
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Happiness directly leads to increasingly successful outcomes, Mack says, including longer lives, healthier lives, more financial security, and stronger relationships. Those who are happier also tend to be kinder and more charitable, resulting in more fulfilling and well-rounded lives.
“What you think and how you feel matters,” Mack says. “And when so many things around you feel so uncontrollable, it's so much more important to control the one thing that you can always control or have influence over: what you think and how you feel.”
Robert Mack will be speaking at our upcoming virtual summit, Wellbeing 2024: Charting Your Path to Enhanced Health and Vitality, on Oct. 18-20th. Register now for free for a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to hear from Mack and an incredible panel of fellow health and wellness experts.
If you are struggling with suicidal thoughts or are experiencing a mental health crisis, you can dial the 24/7 National Suicide Prevention hotline at 988 or go to SuicidePreventionLifeline.org.