Happiness Lab is five years old. To mark our birthday, Dr Laurie has picked her favorite five episodes from the archive. The show Why Nostalgia Ain't So Rosy was certainly a memorable one for her.

Actor Rob Lowe LOVES the 1980s. And who can blame him? He was one of the most famous men on the planet. But, as he tells Dr Laurie, he's careful not to wallow in nostalgia for the music, fashions and events of his youth too much - and happiness science backs him up on this.

Research suggests that our memories of the past can be very selective and highly unreliable - causing us to misremember events and cast them in a rosy glow. Sadly, this also causes us to make very bad decisions about what will make us happy in the future.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

To mark the podcast's fifth birthday, Dr Laurie is revisiting some of her favorite episodes. And this show - Working Your Way to Happiness - has a special place in her heart.

Marty kills rats... but if you asked him what his job is he'd say it was "solving problems" and "helping people". How we view our work can contribute greatly to our daily levels of happiness - far more than money or status.

Dr Laurie examines how we all came to ignore the importance of job satisfaction and hears from Professor Amy Wrzesniewski about "job crafting" - the reframing skill that happy people like Marty use to see their careers as more than just a way to make money.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Happiness Lab debuted back in fall 2019. To celebrate our fifth birthday, we're revisiting Dr Laurie's favorite shows. We kick off with one from way back.

Technology allows us to bank, shop and dine without talking to another human, but what toll is this taking on our happiness? So in this episode, the inventor of the ATM and the Talking Heads singer David Byrne joined Dr Laurie to explore the ways in which talking to strangers can bring us all genuine joy.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.