[Editor's Note: Today's guest post was submitted by Dr. Monroe Laborde, an Assistant Professor of Clinical Orthopaedics at LSUHC. In his medical practice and research, Dr. Laborde has found a documentable intersection between the physical and psychological components of happiness and how it relates to financial success. We have no financial relationship.]
Happiness: Life's Most Important Skill
Chronic pain, depression, burnout, and suicide are problems for both patients and caregivers. The risk of surgeons getting HIV from needle sticks, cancer from X-ray exposure, and risk of malpractice suits causes psychological stress. Also, as an orthopaedic surgeon doing back surgery, I became very frustrated with post-operative chronic spinal pain patients. The lack of success of any treatment including surgery and narcotics, and dealing with lawyers, caused psychological stress for me and the patients I was treating.
Unexplainable Suffering
Some of my patients complained of severe disabling chronic pain they attributed to minor auto accidents. Most had no objective evidence of injury or a physical cause for their pain. This pain seemed to be caused by psychological factors. Much of the suffering from pain seems to results from the negative thoughts associated with the pain.
My experiences pushed me in the direction of the medical literature which concluded that psychosocial factors were important determinants of pain intensity and disability. The main psychological factors are depression, anxiety, secondary gain, maladaptive beliefs, and thoughts. Cognitive-behavioral therapy was found to be more effective than other standard medical treatments. Acceptance of the pain, less worrying, and thinking seem to decrease suffering.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Used to Increase Happiness
I decided to learn about cognitive behavioral therapy as a way to help me and my patients to be happier. I spent years reading and going to courses before starting a cognitive behavioral therapy group for my patients. I found this approach to be successful and published the results.
I used The Relaxation and Stress Reduction Workbook in the group setting. I found the chapter on identifying and changing dysfunctional and irrational thoughts particularly effective.3
Cognitive therapy is based on the theory that changing our beliefs alters how we react to the events in our life which transforms what we experience. Behavioral therapy is based on the theory that we can change our feelings by modifying our behavior.
Skills to Increase Happiness
Of the helpful books I read, my favorite title was Happiness: A Guide to Developing Life’s Most Important Skill by Matthieu Ricard. He described how meditation allows us to learn to discipline our minds to think and worry less, which makes us happier. He also felt that action directed toward the well-being of others generates happiness.
The most helpful book for me was The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. He gave the best explanation of how and why accepting what is allows us to be happy under any circumstances. If we can’t accept what is, if we can accept that we can’t accept what is, that also works. He explained the serenity prayer as meaning for God to grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change (others and the world), the courage to change the things I can (my beliefs and my thoughts) and the wisdom to know the difference.
As I read and learned about cognitive behavioral therapy, I found it very helpful. It improved my ability to cope with the stress of surgery practice and increased my enjoyment of life. I learned that changing my behavior, thoughts and beliefs changed my feelings and increased my happiness.
Financial Success and Happiness
In his book, The Happiness Advantage Shawn Achor found that financial success does not cause happiness. He found that happiness makes us less likely to burnout, more productive and more financially successful.
Sonja Lyubomirsky summarized the scientific literature in her book The How of Happiness. She found happiness results from acceptance, gratitude, exercise, laughter, relationships, and engaging activity.
I learned that how I interpreted events determined my feelings, not the events themselves. I learned that, by accepting what is, I could be happy no matter what was happening. I found that when I was happy, I was more likely to do the things which caused more happiness.

Dr. Monroe Laborde
I learned that activity meaningful to me, play, and laughter improved my enjoyment of life. As I decreased the sugar in my diet and increased my exercise, I lost as much weight as I wanted to. I stopped taking night call and started working part-time at the local university medical center, teaching residents and treating uninsured patients. By accepting what is, I now feel happy almost all of the time. These changes have made my life more fulfilling and enjoyable.
As demonstrated by the daily news, financial success can occur without happiness. Happiness can occur without financial success but makes us more likely to be financially successful.
Some people try to attain happiness directly by trying to be financially successful, getting the right possessions or spouse. If any of these work, the happiness is short-lived. Long-lasting happiness is only attained indirectly while we are trying to make others happier and trying to make the world a better place.
What do you think? Has financial success brought you happiness? Or did you find that you were more financially successful because you were happy?
Loved reading this! Congrats on your research and personal success. I’d completely agree that we often have things backward…happiness and fulfillment lead to financial success while things don’t work out the other way around. Finding our why is really the most important first step.
I enjoyed the post. Thank you!
Thank you for your insights and for sharing your work! Definitely agree that pursuit of financial success itself will not bring happiness. Yet, I noticed in your post that you went to part-time work and stopped taking night call as well. Certainly financial success helped with that decision?
As I am definitely struggling with burnout I consume as many resources as I can on the subject to learn and understand. I read time and again about changing our thought pattern in response to our circumstances to increase our happiness and decrease burnout, but most people from whom I read about this have changed their circumstances too. For me it definitely is call and lack of control of my schedule that burns me out the most.
Curious if you have any comments regarding how/if changing your circumstances helped with your overall pursuit of happiness and/or decrease of burnout?
Thanks again for sharing your work!
Changing my circumstances definitely helped. It is a feedback cycle. The more you accept what is , the more likely you are to do the things that will make you happier. That includes deceasing things you don’t enjoy & doing more of what you enjoy at work & while not working. On the airplane they tell you to put oxygen mask on yourself first so you can help others better. In the same way you learn to take care of yourself first so you can be more effective at helping others which makes you healthier and happier. You can’t give away what you don’t have.
You have devoted your life’s work to one worthy cause, for sure! With all this finical acumen, we are trying to be happier. But as you point out, that’s not how it works. It helps to remember that when choosing a specialty, hunting for a job, looking for someone to marry, choosing where to live or guiding your kids towards their chosen path. Finances are definitely important, but a greater purpose in life, supersedes all.
Warm regards,
PFB
This is an important topic — thanks for highlighting it. I’m a firm believer in the power of mindset. I try to view everything through the rose colored glasses of gratitude, and look to the future with a mindset of success. It’s tough at times, though I think becomes easier with practice.
There’s a lot of great books here to put on my Kindle reading list. Thanks again for this guest post, Dr. Laborde.
Great post. I am glad you found happiness and purpose. I also think there are huge psychological components in chronic pain. In OB/GYN some patients seemed unable to deal with what I suspect was “normal” cramping in others. This of course leads to multiple surgeries. There is no way to really measure pain and coping skills.
I loved this post! You boiled everything down and made a concise and relatable post that I think anyone and everyone will find helpful. Thank you for your wisdom and insight!
Although this is a bit “off-topic” from the typical WCI financial stuff – I love it. We all need to better understand and talk about these important issues.
Chasing money is usually in pursuit of some other goal. Or should be. Financial success is a means to an end. What is that end for you?
I’m still growing and learning myself.
I’m discovering a lot of these same lessons though. Especially the importance of exercise, nutrition, personal pleasures, engagement, meaning, achievement, acceptance, and relationships.
They are all more important than your Roth IRA balance.
The end for me is experiencing happiness & love which leads to experiences hard to put into words such as spirituality, oneness ( = God?)
I think control is the biggest factor in happiness. Stopping call and working when you want are huge aspects of control and therefore happiness. Financial success makes attaining such control much more easily obtainable.
sounds like book I read long ago ” Control Theory ” by Wm Glasser, 1985
This one really hits home. As an emergency physician, learning to accept what you cannot change was probably the best lesson I learned during residency that led to decreasing burnout.
Also, I am glad to see that I am not the only one who believes in the mind-body connection of chronic back pain. Very well written Dr. Laborde.
I first read the book, “Feeling Good,” by David Burns over 27 years ago. Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) was a life altering, game changing moment for me. Applying CBT concepts throughout my life propelled me to professional, personal and emotional happiness. Early retirement was a by product of those concepts. I’ve recommended the book to friends and colleagues. Those who were committed to doing the exercises benefited the most. I’ve also utilized the Stress Reduction and Relaxing Workbook. Social interaction, diet, exercise, meditation (including prayer) and CBT are the foundation of a happy, productive work and retired life.
great post! unfortunately in my case I think my natural tendency to be a happy guy blinded me from how much money I was losing to my Northwestern financial “advisor”. If I had been more sad, apprehensive, and suspecting in nature I likely would not have trusted NWM, and even if I had I would not continue to pay into whole life insurance so blindly.
Monroe, do you find this to be the case, where a general happiness with other aspects in your life may cause one to look over or balance out financial problems until it hits a higher boiling point of financial disaster and anger as in my case?
I have made some bad investments too. It is best to accept them as a learning experience so that they don’t interfere with your happiness but allow you to make better decisions in the future. It is also important to remember it is possible to be happy without a lot of money
Ha! tell that to my wife!
Great post. Thanks!
Great post with a lot of wisdom infusion. Have added a lot of these books to my read list. Recently read “The Body Keeps Its Score” by Van Der Kolk, MD. And it was eye-opening—has helped me understand patients a lot more. No wonder so many doctors talk about how great that book is! Your post aligns with his book. Thanks for sharing this.
Thanks Dr. Laborde. This post is a gem. Full of useful information as well as links to other wonderful sources.