Good morning, Dubai. And today we have Dr. Luis Lambert in the house [Music] with a lot of people. My name is This is Monday League. Good morning my dear friends and colleagues for a new episode of Monday legal. My guest for today is Dr. Louis Lambert and happiness matters. Thank you. Hi. Hi. Good to be here. Thank you. Thank you very much for coming. My pleasure. So my guest for today is not a lawyer. I've invited her because I've seen her talking to a very big audience um few months ago and I learned a lot and I was really astonished by how much someone would take something as simple as the word happiness matters and put them together in a very comprehensive nice presentation that explains a lot and I thought that it might be very beneficial for a lot of people as it benefit me that I invite Dr. Lewis today and talk about happiness. Fantastic. What a great idea. You know, this show is all about lawyers. Yeah. Legal stuff. So, it's very fitting. So, I'm I'm I'm going to tell you something and that's why I probably invited you is that we are perceived as we are one of the unhappiest professions. Yeah. in the world. The world. Okay. Um, one of the professions that does not reflect this kind of happiness and we have this image of not being happy or um or being stressed all the time or that some people do not feel happy as well when they hear that there is a lawyer in the room or you know these kind of emotions. And I want to ask you since you are an expert in happiness, what is that all about? Why are we unhappy? So, it's actually true. So, when we look at uh there's been a number of research studies looking at this topic looking at happiness levels by different professions and industries. Um so, when we look at those statistics, there's probably uh a recent study that was just done looking at 140 different professions. The unhappiest number one, two, and three, lawyers, dentists. Who knew? Wow. I have no idea. That'll be another podcast. Okay. Um, veterinarians and doctors, but lawyers were number one in terms of depression, 3.6 times more likely to be depressed, two times more likely to be anxious. Um, also very high rates of divorce, substance abuse, alcohol abuse, drug abuse and tragically um suicide. So for very uh lawyers who are very stressed, the likelihood of thinking about suicide is about 22 times more likely. Uh lawyers who report being moderately stressed, it's five times more likely. These are astronomical figures and other professions don't even come close. So it is sadly true. However, thank you. Please go ahead. Let let me help you out. Okay. However, I think what is also interesting and important to to say um because you know sometimes lawyers listening to this go, "Oh my gosh, what's wrong with us?" There's nothing wrong with you. So, nobody enters this profession being that way. But it part of it is in the way that lawyers are trained and it starts right at university. So, when we look at what makes a good lawyer, it's two things. One is perfectionism. Now, today we use that word in a bad way, but that's why lawyers are good at what they do. They double check, they triple check, a little bit of OCD, right? It's perfect. But again, that's what you're hired for. It needs to be perfect, but it also fuels a lot of anxiety. So, part of it is baked into the job description. The other thing is this notion of prudence. So, in the law, we call it prudence. So, this is really looking for problems, risks, um being very cautious, um basically looking for everything that could go wrong and that could harm your client. Again, it's exactly what you're hired for. But outside of the law, another word for prudence is actually pessimism. Again, I always use a lot of the research and evidence to inform what I do, but also the talks that I give, which you rightly mentioned. Um and what studies have found is that this sense of pessimism again unlike other professions is very very helpful in lawyers. So again in the US a number of studies looking at the rate of optimism and pessimism in lawyers and what we find is that the lawyers that are the most pessimistic have the highest GPA. They're better performing. They make more money over time and they are more successful in their career. Unlike other professions where example if you're in sales being pessimistic you'd quit in the first hour cuz 192 people are going to reject you each day. So the very thing that makes lawyers really successful prudence perfectionism also set them up for high rates of mental health issues and very high rates of unhappiness. That's quite yeah relatable a little bit. Uh I understand that the the accuracy and the stress of competition and the stress of we want to get things done. Yeah. Not just good but also fast. Yeah. To um to be able to be competitive because if it's done right and done quickly, uh you're ahead of the game. Yes. Exactly. You're the best. You're the the And we compete with a lot of uh people. We compete with a lot of bodies in this profession. We compete with ourself. We compete with our colleagues. We compete with other uh firms as well. And we compete with the other party in every transaction. Right. It's extremely competitive. Absolutely. And this does does the competition steers the unhappiness? Well, it certainly fuels some of that. Um because what it means is if you're competing against your peers now in any other organization, your peers should help you. You collaborate. you cooperate, you work together towards the same goals. In fact, competing with people makes things worse. But again, in law, we want people to compete because we get the best outcomes. So, it helps the firm, but it doesn't necessarily help individual lawyers. So, if you go into the office every day, you're competing with this guy, that one, that one, that one. And competition brings out a little bit of nastiness. Let's be honest, right? Um it like wow yeah that will drive your motivation it's also going to make you kind of miserable by noon well the one of the reasons I years ago I started the the community I started to bring some lawyers together and created Emirates legal network I wanted to promote a lot the collaboration yeah but believe it or not still there's competition within the community competition within the the colleagues because everybody body wants more business because they have to prove themsel and the way to prove yourself is to stand out. Stand up, make more money, have more clients, have a bigger firm or a nicer event or be invited to speak in Monday legal podcast for example and things like this. Um, you need to show off your skills, you need to show off your yourself and your firm and and all of this. So even within small collaborative communities competition arise and might be taken in a healthy way and might be taken uh in a negative way that might reduce the happiness level. What could be the solution? So, a couple of things you mentioned um and I'll and then I'll jump to the solution a solution of many um you know this idea that and I think it's true in all professions we're chasing likes we're chasing attention look at me look at me that's that drives a lot of pressure but in certain professions we also maybe focus on the wrong drivers of happiness. So another study looked at what lawyers thought were the contributors to their happiness. So they said things like, you know, the the status or the standing of their university, their own standing in their class, how much income they made, um how prestigious the firm was, you know, things that we kind of tie with uh external drivers of motivation. Now, just from psychology, we know that external drivers of motivation work a little bit, but they eventually just wear off over time. You're just like whatever, who cares? Um but those same lawyers then were tracked over time. So longitudinal study and then again asking them a couple of you know months or years later what drives happiness at work for you? Um and the answers were totally different. So there they said things like um collaboration, getting along with peers and liking the people that you work with and being liked by the people that you work with. They also talked a lot about being able to pursue intrinsic goals. So projects or cases that they liked, having autonomy, having a little bit of choice, and actually um prestige, status, and money were not at all linked to happiness or even success at work. So part of the solution is having conversations like that, like this, and you know, really getting people to think about what's a good day at work for you. And often it'll be having fun, getting along with my colleagues, getting this really interesting case because I'm really interested in this topic or that topic, or maybe, yeah, it's going to put me on the front cover of a magazine or on Monday legal podcast. Um, and that's okay. Everybody likes to be seen. But if you're chasing all the time just money, money, money, status, status, status, not that that doesn't help. Look, I won't say no to it, but it's not lasting. It's not sustainable. Yeah. And there's no ceiling for it. You'll be always chasing it forever. It never really ends, right? And I think this is important in two ways. So, one, for professionals in the legal um industry, if you will, um to think about, you know, what is driving my happiness and what what is meaningful about what I do, but also for law firms themselves. So, if you're trying to make people happy by just throwing money at them, this eventually stops working and you got to give them more than that. So maybe it is an opportunity to be on a podcast. Maybe it's an opportunity to do a few guest talks in a university. Maybe it's an hour or two per month to write an article uh in publications. Maybe it's setting up a legal summit. Um but but it's thinking about what do you like about this field and how can you start to think about how to build meaning again, how to fall in love with the law again and and not just the external drivers of it. Since we're talking about the individual happiness in this profession because a lawyer man or a woman is is at the end of the day is a human being and each of them have different aspects. So what we said that the money or status or even time with the family could be a motivation of happiness in in this profession. How hard is it for law firms to create a happy work environment? Yeah. And at the same time to not tailor that I'm going to make Ahmed happy by this and I'm gonna make Lewis happy by that because both of them work in the same firm at the same level. Yeah. So, I think a couple of things are going on. Um, particularly in law, it is difficult to make changes because you're paid to be perfect on time, fast, and win. Nobody hires a lawyer to lose, but necessarily somebody has to lose, right? So, law firms try to avoid that at all costs. So, you've got pressure coming from outside clients saying, "We want ABC." Lawyers themselves saying, "I want to be known. I want to be important. I want to make money. I want status. I also want this and the cost of that is work those long hours and not see your kids as much as you like. Um and then law firms themselves they need to make money. So it is difficult. On the other hand, there is room and there's lots of evidence of law firms saying hang on if we don't do this. We've got people um who are off on sick leave who are just don't come back. We're having a hard time recruiting people. A lot of these younger lawyers are saying, "Yeah, no, I don't want I don't want to do that." Um, by the way, lawyers have an extremely high rate of turnover. So, by different estimates is between 20 and 40% the first 3 years. That's massive. Um, and also retention is very difficult. So, there's a reason why everybody wants to work in house. So, uh, law firms are really starting to think about this and going, "Wow, actually there are costs to not paying attention to well-being. We just kind of assume, well, that's the way it goes, but that's not the way it needs to be." So, they are starting to factor what is it costing us. Um, can you make everybody happy? No, of course not. And maybe happiness is the wrong word, but can you at least make them less miserable? This is possible. So if we think about you know um although you're the miserable we try to make you less miserable. Okay baby steps people baby steps. Okay but it's you know there are tiny things that can be done. Uh so it's thinking about you know do we respectfully engage with people or do we just chuck work at them and say good luck with that goodbye and not even right um do we delegate mindfully and I'm using this word very particularly because a good example of this is I don't know if I can name drop you can edit it if not um Pinet Masons so they've got this new new a couple years ago the mindful business charter I might have mangled that title but something like this and and in short it's about no we're not here to make you happy but can we make work just not be so awful so can we delegate respectfully so literally a week ago I was having a conversation with a lawyer who's since gone in-house his whole life has been transformed but he would say things like oh no you know my firm used to respect my going home time so I could leave Friday at you know still 6:00 or 7 but just before leaving they'd say I'm mindful of time and I know you're going for the home for the weekend, but here's a new case. Can you have it prepared by Monday? This is not respectful. Yeah. Right. So, disrespect cost people. That that right there is where your turnover comes in. So, thinking about how do we delegate work? Can we do this a few days earlier? Probably the answer is yes. But sometimes, you know, people who've gone through the initial hazing as a lawyer kind of chuck it to others after. That's not very nice to do, but some people do it. Um, can we be more respectful of rest times and recognize that lawyers need rest just like pilots, just like heart surgeons? We don't ask them to do 72-hour shifts. They will cause accidents. This has an impact on people. This has an impact on making mistakes in a case which could cost billions of dollars. So, there are a lot of things that firms can do. They are maybe small, but if they calculate even these tiny small changes, this can translate into even retaining 5% more people, having an easier time recruiting people, having fewer people on sick lead. This saves a lot of money. Let's look at the other way around. I've seen a lot of firms complain uh about the lawyers being unhappy because they have everything done easy. They pay them very well. They have their extra activities. They have their uh afterwork drinks. They have the beautiful view with a lot of sun uh office space. And still lawyers, junior or senior, doesn't matter kind of get depressed or stressed. that put them out of work for few weeks or few months and it automatically reduced the productivity of the firm and the firm uh carries a lot of cost because making everybody happy is also very hard right but this is the problem this is not making people happy this is giving them perks these are distractions so this is like the equivalent of hey let's do yoga and here's some fruit what is this going to do so you can't out yoga a bad manager you can't eat your way to work satisfaction Right? These are perks. These are distractions and they're not really getting at the root of the issue. So, uh I mean there's many things here, but you know, part of it is, you know, if we look at the individual, um teaching skills like what to do with this pessimism, it helps you at work, keep it, carry on, you're doing great. But when you get out of work, how do you develop a sense of flexible optimism? Because if you bring that pessimism into your marriage or into your parenting or into your basketball team or into whatever it is that you do, you're quickly going to see your happiness drop. So, it's making lawyers aware of, you know, how do you use different mindsets? That could be one. The other one is thinking about, you know, coming back to this idea of meaning, right? How do we make work meaningful again? So confirms rather than you know giving you a perk or a beautiful view which is nice but again thinking about what is meaningful to you. Do you want an extra hour to do your podcast? Actually we'll sponsor it for you. Right. Yeah. So it's thinking about what are the drivers that are going to sustain people at a very real level instead of just like trivial trivial things. There is another thing we can do and that's thinking about how do we interact with one another. So again lots of surveys have showed that you know lawyers a need sleep. They're terribly fatigued. So even having little nap rooms I know it sounds very a little bit childish but getting extra sleep does a world of good for your mood. The other thing that lawyers often complain about is workplace incivility. So this is not so much that people are mean although sometimes they are. But what happens in these very competitive environments where people are stressed, people are on the clock, uh you know, it's it's a lot of high pressure stakes. The first thing to go is politeness. The first thing to go is kindness. The first thing to go is respect. So we end up saying, "I need this by two." And then we storm them out. Now, maybe we can avoid that and say, "I'm really sorry. I know you're busy. You need this by two. Thank you for doing Thank you for doing your best." Like that changes everything. Yeah. And if you can't do that, you can repair it. So at the end of the day, you come back in and you say, "I'm sorry, I was really short with you. Um, are we okay?" Yeah. Okay, good. Right. Like people are also very forgiving. So it's how we treat people. If at a minimum we can be kind, we can see them. We can appreciate their efforts. That also goes a long way. Yeah, I completely agree with you. I I I I have personal experiences. I was I started my company and I started hiring people when I was at the age of 31. Okay. Wow. I really did not ever work in a corporate or in a big law firm. So I was learning everything by doing and managing people was very very difficult. It's not obvious. Yeah. So I was learning everything and I had the experience of seeing how do I expect the lawyers to know everything and I don't need to brief them. So I was throwing works at them and then I I get to be uh disappointed afterwards. But with briefing uh comes a lot of uh good things you know a lot of uh time saving and and expectations met as well as encouragement. the difference between spotting someone and and uh showing them how bad they did the job. Sometimes in public and sometimes in private and sometimes not doing at all. And from each of these scenarios, I've done them. These mistakes I've done and I learned for sure being more kind and being more polite and more encouraging and more mindful to the people whether as a manager or as a colleague makes a big difference. It does. But there is one very important element that a lot of people miss is that dealing with a partner who is a lawyer or dealing with a friend who is a lawyer or dealing with a brother who is a lawyer is something that is very specific. Do you have any thing to say about this? Because I understand that the divorce rates is enormous lawyer. It's unbelievable and there must be a reason and it cannot be that all the lawyers are in the wrong. No, but certainly this pessimism doesn't help. Okay. Also long hours don't help. So if you're always away from your partner um and even if you're So two things happen. One is you know you're at work so you're not at home but when you're at home your brain is still at work so you're not fully being present. And that also takes a strain on relationships as well. Um so advice for partner of friend of I think sometimes it's saying you know what we're not going to talk about work let's just go out and have fun. So I think it's also um helping you set limits and helping you be present uh in the moment. So often, you know, people come home from a long day and partners are trying to be nice and they kind of give you your space and maybe what they should be saying is, "I actually need your help in the kitchen. Take my hand. Come here and we're going to spend time and I'm going to tell you how the kids day was." Right? So inviting you rather than letting you go off and be in your mind and your mental soup and stress of the day, but is pulling you into the family, pulling you into this life and not that life. So, it's really just again where's your mind at and and trying to be more in the moment. Now, I know that's difficult when you're stressed. You got a big case. Yeah. You're always thinking about it. It's either the forefront or at the back, but it it's kind of always working on you. So, being able to disconnect as difficult as that is, but even if it's just tiny little pockets of time and that will actually be helpful towards your case as well. Yes. Yeah. What has worked for you? I'm going to turn the question back on you. That doesn't work for me. what you said and I'll be very honest because I uh I I can be a bit stressed and I can be uh it can be a long day. I might need not to be pulled into tasks or into any other stressful situation because I have a lot of stress at work. I want to immediately go into entertainment or fun or let's go out. Let's have a drink. Let's have a uh just a a stark shift. Exactly. I want to go to the gym. I want to do something that is absolutely taskless. Okay. Yeah. Don't give me another task. Okay. I'm I'm tired. Okay. Yeah. I'm divorced, so it doesn't matter. It's just that it is just a caveat. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm not the only divorce lawyer. There's so many other divorce lawyers uh in in in this industry, men and women. And I understand that their partners also had an impact into uh this relationship. But it's not just partners, it's friends. Because I see friends all the time when I go out and they ask me the first thing they do is that whatever whatever but then hey I want to ask you a question and that's like try being a psychologist. That that is my my daughters don't know here we go. Exactly. And I'm happy to answer. I'm happy to help people of course but you can't stop being a lawyer. It's impossible. Yeah. But I'm going to go back to what you said and I and I think it's I think it's good. Um, so in the field of happiness, we study what are called positive psychology interventions. So these are strategies that raise our positive emotional experiences as well as our life satisfaction, meaning in life, subjective wellbeing. We have a whole bunch of different terms for this. Um, and just having fun is one of them, right? We don't give ourselves permission just to go do something stupid like whatever dancing on the table. Okay, not to be recommended but right can be dangerous and then you'd have a lawsuit against you and then then we need to ask you again, right? But you know positive emotional experiences are like vitamins. They help us become our best selves. They decrease stress. They help us uh connect with other people better. um they allow us to forget about ourselves and be in the moment. So things that you know help you you know feel you know sense of anticipation, joy, interest, curiosity, gratitude, love, hope, optimism. These are good for us and anything that is going to help you do that go for it. You have my permission. I'm a doctor. Trust me. Okay. Thank you so much. But what what exactly is happiness? I mean this is a big word and I think everybody is working towards it. They get married for it. They bring kids. They get divorced for it. They get divorced for it. They they they they make a new friend for it or Yeah. And I think everybody's seeking the happiness. But can you describe it? Yeah. I I think we don't talk enough about happiness. So we talk about misery all the time. Yes. Everybody knows the symptoms of depression, anxiety, major mental health issues, blah blah blah. Experts, everybody, everybody's an expert. And it makes us miserable because actually the more we focus on our emotions, the more miserable it can make us. So there are some theories in psychology that say just forget all that and go live your life and have fun. And there's a lot to be said for that. But I think these are good questions. What makes us happy? What is happy? So I work a lot in the space um called positive psychology. It's a branch of psychology. It's empirically validated. We use the same science as we do for everything else. But we study what makes life worthwhile, what makes life worth living. And what do we actually mean by happiness? But also, what are the strategies to get there? So in positive psychology, how we define happiness? First of all, we don't use that word because it doesn't mean anything. This is a word we use in popular culture. It means nothing. In positive psychology, we use the word subjective well-being. So it's you determining am I well is is am am am am am am am am am am am am am am am am am am am am am I living a good life. So you determine uh whether your life is acceptable to you. It also looks at the frequency of positive emotional experiences. So how often you experience positive emotions on any given day. Also how often you experience negative emotions. So we don't want to bring these to zero. We need a little bit of negativity cuz when you're, you know, competitive, right? Makes you makes you motivated. When you're jealous, makes you work harder. When you're a bit uh annoyed, it makes you get up and walk out of the room. So, we need some of that, but we don't want to be feeling negatively all the time, all the day. This is this is miserable. Um, so that's how we look at happiness. It's our our determination of is my life good, positive, and negative uh a ratio of how often you you experience those. Now, there's a lot of other different models. There's a a lot of um different theories around happiness and different ways of obtaining it but in short it's paying attention to our emotional experience and then how you feel about what you do. So it is it is a little bit loose but the advantage of that is you determine its content. Now in psychology we also have principles. We know what works better. We know what doesn't work. What doesn't work is, you know, we talked earlier about these exttrinsic drivers. Materialism, status, you know, wanting to impress others, likes, they work for like about a minute, but that's not really going to get you anywhere. We know what does work. Meaning, doing something you like that reflects who you are, having fun and being a bit ridiculous sometimes. um being engaged, losing ourselves in whatever it is we do, whether that's skateboarding, basketball, writing a brief, working on research, or doing a puzzle with your kids, right? Being good. So, it could be volunteering, it could be um giving to charity, uh it could be, you know, whatever, donating your time to a cause. and accomplishments. We need to feel good about ourselves, which is why in a sense, law is a great avenue for happiness, but sometimes it just the way it gets done, we kind of end up going left instead of going right. Yeah. Yeah. Um I want to tell you a very good story. I would not call it funny or interesting or whatever. It's it's a good one. So temp for my expectations. Okay. So since um since we uh got in touch together and I asked you to to come and you agreed. Thank you very much. I kind of invited myself. It was actually a very good thing that I I consider bringing you here because the topic is amazing. And we discussed that I will have to think of a few questions that and so on and uh since that day I'm asking a few people that I meet. So at least one or two people I ask them are you happy? Okay. What did they say? A lot of nonsense. But one of them answered me an answer that kept me thinking for a few hours. Okay. Okay. Afterwards, after I left, uh I asked him, are you happy? And he said, "It doesn't matter." And I said, "Sorry, what what what are you talking about?" And he said, "I'm doing the right things at the right time. I'm getting the right results. I'm a very responsible man towards my family. My family is happy. I'm a very responsible man towards my job. My clients are happy. My colleagues are happy with me. Me being happy or not doesn't matter. I'm a responsible guy and I'm doing the right thing. So happiness for me is not a big deal. I'm just happy that the people around me is happy. Then I told him like but seems like you're happy. and he says, "I don't ask myself that question." So, this is a great story. Um, I'm also a researcher and when I first arrived in the UAE, it's been many years. So, you can check how long it's been since that p that study was published. But what I wanted to explore was does happiness look different in different cultures? And it does. So in the west it's my feelings, my goals, my ambitions like it's all about me. When I asked um my Emirati students and just other Arab um different nationalities what happiness was for them. The word I never appeared. When my parents are proud of me. When my sister is happy. When my brother's doing well. Basically everybody else goes first and then that makes me happy. So that was very interesting. Now does that mean that person is happy or not? Maybe they are. Maybe they don't want to say because there's also this notion of you know don't say when you're happy. Or don't be selfish. Think of yourself alone. Yeah. Right. Because if you say you're happy. Another study I did was looking at the fear of happiness. So if you announce that you're happy, bad things are coming. Wow. Because God gives you happiness, not you. So this was also very eye opening for me. So we are different in the way that we understand happiness. Um in positive psychology we also have you know different u philosophical ways of thinking about happiness and one is this notion. So um Aristotle talked a lot about this uh this notion of udemonic happiness. And and this is the happiness I try to describe it as happiness that doesn't feel good. So this is the happiness you get from doing a university degree. It's kind of miserable. You're going to cry a lot. You're going to be super stressed, but it's kind of happiness. So it's doing hard things. It's applying yourself. It's taking risks. It's failing. It's living in line with your values. It's doing good for others. It's contributing to community. There's a lot that goes into that, but that's one form of happiness, and it tends to align with Islamic well-being. So, there's a lot of work being done in that area as well. There's another type of happiness. This is Epicurus. This is my kind of guy. He's like, "Woohoo! Party, but in a serious kind of way." So, Epicurus talks about heedonic happiness. And this is, you know what, life is short. Eat the cheese because you might not be here tomorrow. So although it's fun, there's a seriousness to it. And that is life really is short and we need to prioritize feeling good every minute of the day. But if you don't need to feel bad, then don't. And try to enjoy it. Try to be optimistic. Try to be hopeful. Try to be nice to those around you. Try to add joy to others because this is it. This is it. And wear a nice tie. Yes. All the time. I want you to tell us the things that would create a barrier between us and happiness because everybody have to find their way Yeah. into happiness. What what exactly make them happy because me and you we don't know it's a culture is the and there are many ways. There are many ways. Yeah. I I think the the way I find happiness is completely different than um the way my brother finds happiness. And we grew up in the same house. We got the exact same education. We're from the same culture and he's not a lawyer. Lucky. It's just that um he'll live longer. Yeah. Different people, different emotions, different targets in life and what makes them happy is different. And so I don't want to ask you h how to be happy because this is something everybody wants have to find within but maybe you can tell me what not to do or what could be the barriers between us and our happiness. Yeah. So I think and remember we are lawyers. Oh exactly. So I will be held liable for everything I say here. Please don't do this at home. You have to put a little uh a little disclaimer at the bottom. Yeah. Yeah. Um so I think I think a few things one is you know thinking about how do you how do you want to do this? How do you want to do life? So you can do it thinking of others giving which is one way that's good. You can also do it um thinking about joy and you know fun and there's nothing wrong with that. We sort of unfairly stigmatize fun because it can also be done to excess and then that's bad. overspending, overeating, over. So, I think what I'm trying to say is notice what works for you. Ask yourself when have I been happier or happiest in my life. Notice as you go throughout your day or week or month, what are those little peaks? And what are you doing at that moment? So, maybe you get your happiness from having really deep philosophical conversations with people. Great. Get more of those friends. But if you notice also that your downs are doing things because it makes other people happy, stop doing that or do less of it. You know, sometimes we just kind of go along. We also receive a lot of messages from society about what is supposed to make us happy in Dubai. Anything that's expensive is supposed to make you happy, but sometimes it doesn't. You just want to go to a little taco stand on the beach and that's great and it's actually funner than something really expensive. So, don't just follow the crowd, but but notice, do I like this? Is it fitting for me? Not because others tell me it should or because the media is telling me it should, but are you having a good time? Great. Then keep doing that. Like, keep repeating that. Um, and if you're not, then stop doing that. Right? So, I think it's it's listening to ourselves. It's kind of honoring our experience. It's determining what's the recipe for you. also knowing that it may change over time. So, a couple of years ago, my happiness came from, you know, one of the pathways is engagement. So, I was like full-on research. Now, I was also very productive. I published like a bunch of books and research and I like I think all my publications came from those years. And then I got into a point where I thought, "Oh my gosh, I'm burnt out and I'm not having fun. Like, I don't like this." And now I'm like, "No, bring on the cheese." Like, I want to go out with friends. I want to have fun because also I think as we get older we're more mindful of time. Um and this is I think in one of the talks that we did or I did with you is the notion and maybe it'll be good for listeners as well to calculate how much time you have left, how many Mondays you have left. So if we calculate average life expectancy of 80 years, we have about 4,000 Mondays. I'm now 50. My math is terrible. Anyway, uh that leaves approximately 1,500 and something or other. And every couple of weeks, I literally do the math. So, about taking time for granted, I invite everybody watching the podcast, this episode to count how many Mondays uh that's left in their life based on their countries uh or the global life expectancy. But for the same reason I would like to uh verse a piece of Quran. The meaning of this surah is that God takes all lives of everybody who's asleep and then release back some of them to a specific time that's known only by God. So you don't know how much do you have on this earth and you don't know when you're going to die. So better live your life in happiness and live it the fullest with this. I would like to thank you so much for your amazing um speech and for coming and giving us all your knowledge and I love it. Thank you so much. Making us more happy. Wonderful. Hopefully. Eat the cheese everybody. Eat cheese or coffee. Coffee is good. Or Yeah. Yeah. I mean, go to uh the gym, uh go play tennis, go to the beach, go propose, get a divorce, call the girl, tell her you love her, everything you want to do, you know, call Ahmed and tell him that you would like to come to Monday legal or you'd like to sponsor me, press subscribe, you know, share this episode, tell your depressed husband, ask for what you want. Do it. Life is short. Do what you want. Do everything you think of because life is too short and happiness matters. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thanks. Thanks everyone. Thank you.