Natural energy ... Reverend Miao.Credit: Ken Robertson
When the holiday is over and the suitcase is unpacked, how do you manage the daily humdrum? Do you walk on the beach at dawn? Play sport or do yoga? Or do you start planning your next break - longing for white sand beaches and azure seas to take you away from it all, at least for another week?
What if there was a way to keep the good mood alive for more than a few days?
That's exactly what a group of psychologists from Lifeline and the University of Wollongong has created - a three-day positive psychology retreat that is the first of its kind in Australia. The journey of self-discovery takes in the beaches and the bushland of the South Coast as well as spiritual retreats Jamberoo Abbey and Nan Tien Buddhist temple. At the same time, there are workshops in optimism, mindfulness and gratitude - all the evidence-based skills that positive psychologists believe are required for living the good life. It's called psychological tourism - and it starts with the idea that positive psychology is best taught in places of natural beauty.
My own Good Mood Safari begins at dawn on Wollongong's North Beach. I'm handed a stopwatch and instructed to walk north for 20 minutes. At the end of the beach, I'm told to stop and go back.
After a few minutes, the natural beauty of the ocean floods my grumpiness. The morning star is high and fishermen are sleeping in fold-out chairs. It's the kind of thing I would do daily, if only we lived in a perfect world.
When I return, our safari tour guide (a trained counsellor) asks me to reflect on how I feel. Awesome, I say. She tells me that early morning light has amazing powers. It suppresses melatonin in the blood stream, shifts our circadian rhythms and catapults us into a more positive mood. It's why getting up early always feels so good, eventually.
"We suggest that you combine some early-morning outdoor exercise with exposure to natural light to achieve two aspects of healthy living at once," she says. Next, it's on to breakfast. Our hotel, the Novotel Northbeach, has an extensive buffet breakfast and we sit in the sun on the front verandah watching as swimmers and surfers hit the water.
We're already feeling good when we visit Nan Tien Temple. At the Southern Hemisphere's largest Buddhist temple we meet Reverend Miao You - a former Sydney accountant who took the robe seven years ago. We ring the temple's historic bronze gratitude bell. Later she shares her secrets for a beautiful life: meditation, tai chi and a patient understanding that from all difficulty beauty arises.
"Like the Lotus without the dirt, there are no nutrients," she says.
"Without defilement, you can't grow."
Next day we share lunch with another nun. Sister Therese joined Jamberoo Abbey 11 years ago - leaving her life as a married mother of three to live in the monastery perched on the edge of the Illawarra escarpment. She felt called to do God's work.
The Benedictine Order has vows of poverty, obedience and stability. Sister Therese is not permitted to leave the abbey and spends most of her day in prayer.
"It was very difficult to tell my children but they handled it very well," she says. "Christmas is the most difficult time."
The monastic life is not for everyone. But the serenity and inner strength of both women is compelling. It becomes clear the safari is not just about teaching positive psychology but also a taste-test from a smorgasboard of ways that people create a more meaningful life.
Most intriguing is our optimism workshop. Presented by University of Wollongong psychology lecturer Dr Lindsay Oades, the session is held in a conference room that overlooks the ocean. I enter with a glass half-empty view of the world and leave with new skills to tip my natural pessimism on its head.
Those tiresome thoughts that unravel your sense of wellbeing? Try answering back to them, he tells us. Always believe that bad things happen to you? Challenge and then change your habitual reaction. It sounds simple but the research shows that it works. Being mindful enough to change our habitual reactions improves mood, leads to increased functioning and puts us on the path to a more pleasant life.
"This is the most exciting thing I've been part of professionally," Dr Oades says. "It's a novel approach to living a better life. And it's much more than just bumper stickers."
My Safari is the second retreat run by Lifeline and Wollongong University. It's the brainchild of Lifelife South Coast executive Grahame Gould.
The planning team started with Lifeline counsellors and psychology professors.
Then Gould brought in religious leaders, martial arts experts, fitness instructors, artists, musicians and chefs - anyone who could share their own proven recipe for happiness.
Our final session is African drumming with musician and psychologist Jeremy Prangnell - a bald-headed former radio announcer who took up drumming to fight depression.
"I had taken a redundancy that I probably shouldn't have and my marriage had ended," he says. "I was clinically depressed."
Today, Prangnell oozes serenity and self-mastery and seems genuinely happy. It's contagious. As our group of 10 belts out an African beat, I lose the rhythm to laughing. It's the perfect way to end the weekend.
The writer was a guest of Lifeline South Coast.
TRIP NOTES
* The Good Mood Safari costs $3575 a person for three days - includes four-star accommodation in Novotel Northbeach, travel, entry fees and breakfast and lunch daily. Participants set a goal at the end of each retreat and trained psychologists follow up at regular intervals over the next 12 months. The next safari is September 20-22. Phone (02) 4226 7206, see goodmoodsafari.com.au.
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