Happiness for me is partnership and creation

The formation of a positive “emotional culture” in our difficult time is an important task. How to achieve it, knows the head of the “Department of Happiness” of the Eurasian Peoples’ Assembly Marina Volkova.

– Marina, it’s great to bring positivity in any situation, but how does everything happen in a practical plane?

— Most of the work takes place just in the process of practical implementation of projects, although preparatory and research work also plays a huge role. Since 2015, I have been managing the charity foundations “Give Peace of Good” and “Give Love to the World”, whose projects were initially developed for socio-cultural rehabilitation, comprehensive socialization of people with disabilities, all our projects are inclusive, i.e. open to absolutely everyone. We already have several dozen large projects, and you can get acquainted with all of them not only on our website www.give-world.combut also to participate. As for the “Department of Happiness”, my long-term close cooperation with the Eurasian Peoples’ Assembly led me to it, including on the basis of promoting a culture of positive thinking. Our joint projects inspired its general secretary A. Yu. Belyaninov to create the “Department of Happiness”, which I was offered to lead and carry out projects aimed at unlocking the internal potential. The most global of them is “There is happiness”. The most popular track of the project is “Letters of happiness”. For me, a letter of happiness is a postcard written by hand, it is a memory from childhood. We recently returned from Ufa, where adults and children wrote these postcards with pleasure. This project is very popular in hospitals, nursing homes and among pupils of schools. I saw vivid emotions of people who received postcards. It costs a lot! It seems to be just a message from a stranger, but it becomes a source of joy for the recipient – a letter of happiness. Such an impulsive positive emotion is very relevant for many categories of the population, it helps to tune in a positive way. A striking example of the implementation of the project is the exchange of letters between inmates of a colony for teenagers who have committed especially serious crimes and children with disabilities. Now this is a full-fledged correspondence, which can result in another project – “There is happiness under any conditions.”

— How are projects born?

— Of course, each project is born differently. For example, we are faced with the need to develop a method for withdrawing a person with negative life experience from destructive patterns of self-assessment and reality. This is how the project “A fairy tale in each of us” was born – I came to the assembly with this project.

Last year, we held an international competition “The Cultural Heritage of My Country”, and we were sent about 10 thousand essays and drawings about happiness from the LPR, DPR, African countries, even China joined in. On the basis of creative works, we created postcards – postcards of happiness, which are now participating in the project. The best literary works were included in the collection “Happiness inside”. Now we are going as an assembly to Egypt, where the Days of Happiness festival will be held in December.

“I see you have the Aggregator of Happiness magazine on your desk.

– Just the project “The Tale in Each of Us” resulted in the magazine “Aggregator of Happiness”.

Children and youth, including those with disabilities, participate in its publication on an equal basis with adults. It all started with the Career Guidance Through Fairy Tales project, within which we taught journalism, the art of photography and the basics of journalism to everyone, and the magazine became a platform for the practical implementation of the acquired knowledge. Now our publication collects on its pages not only the positive content of our young media volunteers, but also articles by leading experts in the field of psychology, rehabilitation and coaching. We publish the results of scientific research in the field of positive thinking and personal experience of overcoming negative emotions, including by media people.

The magazine tells not only about our social projects. We give NGOs, public organizations the opportunity to tell a wide range of people about their activities and inspire the public to develop similar ideas in their regions. Such an exchange of experience very often creates the condition for new ideas. For example, in Bashkortostan there is a project “Women’s Territories of Happiness” – we will talk about it in a magazine, and, perhaps, someone will implement them at home.

– How to let happy moments into life if a person does not believe in his strengths and capabilities?

– I’ll tell you about the international project “Happiness to fly”. Anyone can take part in it and take the first step into the sky. The goal of the project is to help people not only experience the feeling of flying, but also allow themselves new happy experiences, let positive into their lives. We invited people with disabilities to the SKY Therapy project, and we saw how the perception of life changes in people who soar in hang-gliders, skydive or fly in a wind tunnel. We give people not only the experience of flying, but also self-confidence. Having taken their first step into the sky, many completely change their lives and find happiness in every moment, gain wings.

Is happiness possible?

– Of course! There are many examples when a person who does not have the usual material well-being is happy. Or remember examples when people won millions, but did not become happier. Happiness is the ability to perceive life beyond the physical and social comforts. Happiness is the ability to see and appreciate the depth of life. Our team recently visited a military hospital, and everyone remembers one person – he had two legs amputated. We talked about life, about rehabilitation, and he suddenly says to me: “I am a happy person, because I stayed to live.” And the sincerity of his answer struck me to the core. Sometimes, in order to learn to appreciate, you need to sacrifice something.

What is your attitude towards happiness?

– I don’t remember who I read: “Happiness consists of parts: with – part – me.” This component – part – revealed a lot to me. It is important for me to be involved, to be useful. I get a lot more when I see the return. Happiness for me is partnership and creation.

– The Department of Happiness is a partner of the Moskovskaya Pravda competition “In the Best Traditions”. Why did you decide to become a member?

— We could not remain indifferent to such a consonant project for us. Creativity is a public resource that allows a person to find a special kind of joy and happiness. We have created a separate category for works about happiness.

Nina DONSKIKH.