Yarra Libraries

Come and celebrate the International Day of Happiness at this panel that discusses the age-old, ultimate question: how to be happy? Hear three experts in the fields of cultural history, social psychology and mindfulness discuss their personal experience and knowledge of what makes humans happy in the 21st Century.

Including tips and tools for happiness, a discussion of how pain and suffering can create happiness, plus a look at how humour is essential to society’s wellbeing, this fascinating discussion will leave you with a spring in your step, a deeper understanding of humankind, plus some knowledge and motivation to live your happiest life.

Panellist Bios

Dr Lynne Reeder is a Board Director of the public good think tank Australia21, and in that role she created the Mindful Futures Network to map new innovations in mindfulness, empathy and compassion within Australian organisations. She trained as a meditation teacher with Deepak Chopra in the US and currently teaches mindfulness at a regional hospital-based Wellness Centre. Lynne is an Adjunct Research Fellow in the Faculty of Health at Federation University Australia, and in 2015 she completed a research study which examined the role of empathy conversations as a policy tool, presenting the findings at the 2016 Global Empathy conference at Oxford University, UK.

Brock Bastian is an Associate Professor in the School of Psychological Sciences at the University of Melbourne. He is trained as a social psychologist and his research broadly focuses on the topics of well-being and morality.

In his research on well-being, he has addressed questions such as why promoting happiness may have a downside, the cultural factors leading to depression, and why valuing our negative and painful experiences in life is a critical pathway to achieving happiness.

Dr Tony Moore is a cultural historian and Associate Professor in Communications/Media Studies at Monash University, where he is Director of the Graduate Communications and Media Studies Program, and former Director of its National Centre for Australian Studies. Tony is author of Dancing with Empty Pockets: Australia’s Bohemians since 1860 (2012) and Death or Liberty: Rebels and Radicals Transported to Australia 1788–1868 (2010), adapted as a documentary film screened in Australia, Ireland and Britain in 2016. He is a former ABC TV documentary maker and current affairs producer and commissioning editor at Pluto Press and Cambridge University Press. Tony was a Creative Fellow at State Library Victoria and expert adviser to its Bohemian Melbourne exhibition. He leads the ARC Discovery Project Fringe to Famous: Contemporary Australian Culture as an Innovation System.