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My junior year of college a friend and I were driving back from a ski trip during a Vermont snowstorm when I shifted gears and lost control. We swerved across several highway lanes into a ditch, flipped, and rolled three times before landing upside down. Somehow, despite the airbags not activating, we both climbed out unscathed. A couple days later, while trying to retrieve our luggage, I called the car wreck center. The person on the line did not believe who I was. “That’s not possible,” he said. “No one could have survived that.” Yet, somehow, we did.

Although we suffered no physical injuries, we did experience a profound mental change. We both felt profound inner peace and joked that we had become enlightened. This must be how it feels: deeply calm, yet gloriously joyful—filled with love and exuberance. We wanted to run around telling everyone, “Wake up! Be happy! You are ALIVE! Everything else is irrelevant—why in the world are you so stressed out?!” We could see clearly how petty our daily worries are, how sweating the small stuff is such a waste of energy, and how much we all have to be grateful for. We were on cloud nine.

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At workplaces and in families across the world, communication has gone online. We send endless emails; we video chat rather than travel across town to meet. Actually sitting down and interacting with someone in person can seem like a rare luxury.

But as technology spreads, are we losing our ability to connect and empathize with others — and with it, the happiness and success that empathy brings? How can compassion happen if face-to-face time is disappearing?

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The holiday season is filled with gifts—and empty of what people really want.

We’re seeing a loneliness crisis in our society with 42.6 million adults in the U.S. suffering from it (and that’s not including people under 45)—representing a literal public health epidemic that leads to earlier death… but we keep insisting on buying things, exchanging material goods as if that can somehow make up for what we truly long for: connecting, kindness, love, meaningful non-technology-driven exchanges, eye contact, touch, humor.

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“Follow your heart.” “Go with your gut.” “Find yourself.” “Speak your truth.” We’ve all heard these phrases ad nauseam. Each one is supposed to encourage us to live authentically and in line with our own wishes, desires, values, and ideas. Yet we can also find it so very difficult and challenging to do so (or even to fully understand what doing so means).

First of all, what is our “heart” or our “truth,” exactly? And is it really ours? As someone who has taught in high-achieving environments, like Yale and Stanford, it’s easy for me to see how one’s culture completely shapes what one thinks is “truth.” High-achieving students (and high-achievers generally) buy into the idea that “I am what I do.” They think their value stems first and foremost from their productivity — whatever shape or form that takes. As a consequence, their well-being depends entirely on whether they are getting rewards and achieving their goals: receiving A’s, founding a start-up, getting an internship, or landing a coveted leadership position. You are a worthwhile human being if and only if you are successful, powerful, wealthy, or have reached a certain status.

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Phubbing is the practice of snubbing others in favor of our mobile phones. We’ve all been there, as either a victim or perpetrator. We may no longer even notice when we’ve been phubbed (or are phubbing), it has become such a normal part of life. However, research is revealing the profound impact phubbing can have on our relationships and well-being.

There’s an irony in phubbing: When we’re staring at our phones, we’re often connecting with someone on social media or through texting. Sometimes, we’re flipping through our pictures the way we once turned the pages of photo albums, remembering moments with people we love. Unfortunately, however, this can severely disrupt our present-moment, in-person relationships, which also tend to be our most important ones.

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How often have you had the following conversation at work?

How are you?

Good. You?

Fine.

It is a script we stick to even if we are dying inside.

It’s hard to build real connections with your colleagues if you never get beyond superficial chit-chat. And yet people who have a “best friend at work” are not only more likely to be happier and healthier, they are also seven times as likely to be engaged in their job. What’s more, employees who report having friends at work have higher levels of productivity, retention, and job satisfaction than those who don’t.

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Most of us don’t like confrontation, but it’s a fact of life that we can’t run from forever. We have to assert ourselves, our boundaries, and our needs — and others have to do the same with us.

There are a million terrible ways of expressing your frustration. Here’s how to do so with better emotional intelligence to get the results you actually want.

The Role of Anger

Anger — both direct and indirect (or passive) — is meant to communicate something important. But it can also drive people away. What you really want is to connect and be heard, but when anger is involved, the result is often just the opposite. Aggression in any form is the biggest impediment to emotionally intelligent communication.

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Mind over matter: How true is this statement? More than you think.

Stress has a bad reputation, but not all of it is bad. The “good” kind of stress gets you across the street quickly when you see an oncoming vehicle or can motivate you to work toward a deadline. Your body enters self-protection mode and puts you in tip-top shape: your immune system, heart rate, attention, and memory all gear up for survival.

However, when stress is chronic (think of pulling all-nighters and waiting until the last minute to get things done), it turns into bad stress—also known as distress. It can impact your health and cause you to feel under attack. It’s not just a feeling, either. Your body physically and automatically reacts as if under threat of siege.

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Americans generally believe that they need to “deserve” their vacations—that they should work hard, even push themselves, before they actually take a break.

In researching my book, The Happiness Track, I came across these startling statistics:

– Although Americans have fewer vacation days than people in any other country, they have been taking less and less vacation over the last 15 years.

– Fifty-five percent of Americans did not use all their vacation days in 2015.

– Even when they actually do take vacation, 41 percent are checking into work while away (i.e., they are not fully unplugging).

– 84 percent of U.S. executives have cancelled vacations in order to work.

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Most parents want their kids to be successful in life , so we teach them attitudes we believe will help them achieve their goals. But as I learned while researching my book, many widely-held theories about what it takes to be successful are proving to be counterproductive: They may produce results in the short term, but eventually they lead to burnout and  —  get this  —  less success. Here are a few of the most damaging things many of us may be teaching our children about success, and what we should tell them instead.

1. We tell our kids: Focus on the future. Keep your eyes on the prize.

We should tell them: Live (or work) in the moment.

It’s hard to stay tightly focused. Research shows that our minds tend to wander 50 percent of the time we’re awake. And when our minds wander, we can start to brood over the past or worry about the future  —  thereby leading to negative emotions like anger, regret, and stress.

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As a happiness and workplace well-being researcher, I hear these questions all the time: What’s the best way to master difficult conversations? How can we give feedback with a good outcome?

After all, such talks are inevitable, at home and at work. I’ve written a number of articles on the topic; here is a summary of that work, including great advice from my colleague Kim Cameron, author of the highly informative book Positive Leadership:

1. Deliver more positive than negative feedback.

High-performing organizations deliver roughly five times as many positive statements (supportive, appreciative, encouraging) as negative ones (critical, disapproving, contradictory). This is because bad is stronger than good; our brains focus on negative feedback more than positive feedback. (You know this if you’ve ever had one bad conversation ruin your whole day.) Positive communication correlates with much higher worker engagement, our research suggests. You can correct your employees, even criticize or confront them, but you want to do so in a positive context. That is when you will see the best results and maintain morale and engagement.

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A famous survey conducted in 2004 showed that our social networks are decreasing dramatically. In fact, the #1 reason people are seeking out therapy is loneliness. The New York Times calls it an “epidemic of loneliness.” And yet loneliness has powerful repercussions, including earlier mortality.

The Healing Power of Pets

Those often-repeated statistics hide something important: the simple fact that animals are often the ones healing the wounds of loneliness in our society. Pets are often lifelines—fulfilling not just the need for company, not just the need to be loved, but our own profound need to love. Of course this applies not just to people without other people. So many of us who have plenty of human companionship also feel a special bond with a pet.

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Wellness programs are becoming an integral priority for most human resource managers. After all, research shows that a happier workplace is more productive. To this end, workplaces are adding health-related perks from exercise rooms to yoga classes. Leaders participate in mindfulness and compassion trainings and are coached to learn emotional intelligence. However, there is one important wellness factor that many are forgetting even though it may be the most potent of all: access to green spaces.

Green Spaces Boost Your Health and Well-Being

Greenery isn’t just an air-freshener that’s pleasant to look at, it can actually significantly boost employee well-being, reduce stress, enhance innovative potential, and boost a sense of connection. Yet most of us don’t spend much time in nature. Richard Louv, author of the Nature Principal, argues that we’re collectively suffering from “nature-deficit disorder,” which hurts us mentally, physically, and even spiritually. Adding a little wilderness to your corporate offices may just be the smartest move you can do this year.

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In our over-stressed world, many healthcare providers, social workers, and caregivers are suffering from slow yet painful burnout. Many of the rest of us, working long hours and raising families, seem to be approaching burnout, too. Sometimes we may feel that we’re too exhausted to keep giving to others, even though giving is a primary source of happiness in our lives.

So how can we keep giving without burning out? We’re told that self-care is the answer: Give yourself a treat; you deserve it. Take some time for yourself. Say no.

Indeed, a research review found that psychologists in training who practice more self-care report feeling less distressed and stressed and more satisfied with life. The question is: What does self-care look like, and how much of it do we need?

As it turns out, the trick is to be other-focused and kind, but to balance that with taking care of yourself as well. Here are some practices to help you do that.

1. Self-compassion

One particularly potent form of self-care involves transforming our relationship with ourselves—in particular, practicing self-compassion.

Self-compassion is treating yourself as you would a friend—with kindness rather than self-judgment—especially at times when you fail. Self-compassion is remembering that we all make mistakes, instead of beating ourselves up. And it means being mindful of emotions and thoughts without getting overly immersed in them. Self-compassion doesn’t mean being indulgent or letting yourself off the hook, but it also doesn’t mean being overly self-critical and harsh.

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A group of about 20 men — all fathers in their 30s and 40s — gathered at a home in Oakland, California, a month ago to talk fatherhood. Alarmingly, when asked how many of them had “real friends” — confidantes with whom they could talk honestly and vulnerably about life on a regular basis, through good times and bad — only two raised their hands.

It might be tempting to interpret this sense of isolation as a crisis of masculinity in the U.S. But the available research suggests that loneliness is a problem that supersedes gender. In a revealing sociological study, a large percentage of Americans report having shrinking networks and fewer relationships. The average American has only one close confidante, the same study showed. And the leading reason people seek out counseling is loneliness. Robert Putnam’s popular book Bowling Alone brought this epidemic into greater awareness for the general public.

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When Sheryl Sandberg, author of Lean In, lost her husband, she said no one knew how to talk to her. People felt awkward around her and didn’t know what to say. One of the goals of her new book, New York Times Bestseller Option B is to talk about how we can both build resilience when we face life challenges but also how we can support friends in need. Sheryl brings up such a good point. How many times do we find ourselves with a friend who is going through a breakup, a loss, unemployment or another difficult life transition and find ourselves at a loss for what to do or say? Here are some research-validated ways that you can support others in the kindest and most effective way.

• Be 100 percent present. Put away your phone, your computer, your work and be there for them. Listen to them, support them without judging them. Don’t even offer suggestions unless they ask for them. Just be with them. They will heard and understood and may experience some relief. Research shows that positive social relationships with people help us feel better but that many people actually feel quite lonely – by listening in this way, you can help that person feel connected and supported…

• Invite them for a healthy meal. New research shows that simply boosting your intake of fresh fruits and veggies can dramatically increase your happiness and well-being. Take your friend to a vegetarian restaurant and load up on those fruits and vegetables to beat the blues.

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