The seven secrets to happiness. I endured shattering deaths and rejection then met a genius psychiatrist who shared the very surprising rules that work for anyone, reveals GYLES BRANDRETH

The great Dr Sigmund Freud, the founding father of psychoanalysis, said that to be happy you need to love and to work.

I used to think that Freud was spot on.

Thirty years ago — when I had just turned 45 — I felt I had never been happier. I was blessed with friends and family to love, and a job that seemed to me the best job in the world. I was an MP and a government whip.

And then, suddenly, it all began to go wrong.

I can remember the exact moment when my happiness started to unravel. It was my 9/11. It was the morning of Saturday, September 11, 1993.

I was standing in the kitchen at home, squeezing the breakfast orange juice, when the telephone rang. It was my best friend. ‘You are going to have to be brave,’ he said. ‘It’s not good news. I’m riddled with cancer. It could be just a matter of days.’

My best friend was the actor Simon Cadell. You may remember him as the holiday camp manager in the TV sitcom, Hi-de-Hi!.

Simon and I had met at school when I was 14 and he was 12. Even as boys we had common interests and shared values. We were equally self-absorbed, I suppose, narcissistic and ambitious, but never in competition with one another.

We were never critical of one another, either. Simon and I never had a cross word — not once in 35 years.

We didn’t discuss our feelings, ever, not even when he was dying, possibly because we were middle-class Englishmen of a certain vintage. But perhaps, too, because each knew instinctively how the other felt and there really wasn’t any need.

Then, that day 20 years ago, we had our comeuppance.

In the event, my friend struggled on bravely for two-and-a-half years. And he was funny to the last. When I was visiting him in hospital, a young nurse (she was very pretty) whipped back the bedclothes to give him an injection. ‘Just a little prick,’ she said.

Simon looked at her indignantly. ‘Darling,’ he murmured, theatrically, ‘I’m dying, there’s no need to be insulting.’

He died on March 6, 1996. He was 45. And, unfortunately, he was not the only one.

Suddenly, my closest friends started going down like flies. Next to go (to pancreatic cancer) was a brilliant entrepreneur called Fred Docker. Six months later, Colin Sanders, my second best friend and first business partner, was killed in a helicopter crash.

Soon after that, my sister, Hester, died of lung cancer. And then my brother, Ben, died of asbestosis.

And then there was my best friend at Westminster, a fellow Conservative MP, Stephen Milligan.

We had been friends since university, where we became student politicians — both proud presidents of the Oxford Union.

We were elected to Parliament on the same day in 1993. During our first months in Parliament, we were something of a double-act. We started a dining club for other new MPs and went on an expedition to Brussels (organised by Stephen) to sort out the problems of the European Union.

And then, one Friday early in 1994, we had a happy lunch at the House of Commons and, after it, went our separate ways.

As I remember, Stephen told me he was off to play golf.

In fact, he went home for the weekend, and played a solo sex game that went disastrously wrong and led to his death.

At Westminster, Stephen was the first of our intake to be promoted. He was destined for great things. He was talked of, seriously, as a future Foreign Secretary. I was not talked of seriously at all, but I was destined for the Government Whips Office — and that’s not a bad place to start your climb up the parliamentary ladder. I spent two years as a government whip. It was the most satisfying job I have ever had.

Essentially, the whips are Parliament’s human resources officers. We are also Parliament’s secret police.

Our basic job is to get our MPs to support the Government and vote in the right lobby. Each whip has 25 to 30 individual MPs in his or her flock.

To be in a position to persuade these MPs to do ‘the right thing’, to be able to apply appropriate pressure when it is necessary, we need to know their strengths, their weaknesses, and their secrets.

It was exciting work: the Government at the time had a majority that ranged between nine and nil. Every vote counted. I went beyond the call of duty.

My proudest hour came when one of the MPs in my charge died and I organised two funerals for him — one in his constituency, for his wife to attend, and another in Westminster, for his mistress to go to.

I loved the job but it came to an end. As Celia Johnson’s character reminds us in the film Brief Encounter (my favourite weepie): ‘Nothing lasts really. Neither happiness nor despair. Not even life lasts very long.’

In 1997, at the General Election, I lost my seat in Parliament and my job in the Whips’ Office. Tony Blair and New Labour were swept in and I was swept out.

I had lost jobs before. But this was different. This was personal.

For five years, I had worked my socks off as the MP for the city of Chester. But, at 10pm on election night, as I arrived at the count, it was already clear what the result was going to be.

Outside the town hall, people in the crowd jeered as I went past. Inside, when my defeat was announced, everyone cheered.

This was a very public humiliation. The electorate’s verdict made me feel worthless. No one likes to be rejected, of course, but public rejection is particularly painful.

Some of my colleagues who also lost their seats had breakdowns. Others, because of their age and because they had little experience outside politics, found it impossible to get another job.

I was lucky. I found other work quickly, but it was not the same. ‘To love and to work,’ I thought, ‘that’s easy for Freud to say.’ But what do you do when those you love die, and the work you love is suddenly taken away from you? That’s when I began my journey looking for happiness.

I wanted to find a lasting happiness that would help carry me through life’s inevitable troughs — because loved ones do die and, these days, no one can be sure of a job for life.

I wasn’t going to give in to despair. I was going to find answers to my problem. I decided I needed professional help.

So I went to see the only living psychiatrist I had heard of — Dr Anthony Clare.

He was as delightful in person as he had seemed when I heard him on his radio programme, In The Psychiatrist’s Chair.

His welcome was wonderfully warm: ‘And what are you after?’ ‘I want to be happy,’ I said. ‘And what do you mean by ‘happy’?’ he asked.

I told him my story and explained that I wasn’t looking for something that simply made me temporarily feel good — like a bar of chocolate or a lazy bath.

He seemed relieved. ‘So, you’re not after elation or ecstasy,’ he said, ‘or even just a nice feeling? Sometimes people confuse them with happiness, you know.’

‘I am after the real thing,’ I assured him. ‘I want true happiness. Can you define it?’

He paused. ‘The essence of happiness is a conscious appreciation of the rightness of being.’

That day, and subsequently, Dr Clare and I talked together about every aspect of happiness.

I learnt a lot. He taught me about the number of biological systems that are bound up with our feelings and how activities that we engage in can stimulate them — jogging for example, or when we put ourselves in danger, such as climbing mountains or clambering naked into hold-alls and zipping ourselves inside.

People do strange things in pursuit of happiness.

I asked my happiness guru some important questions. For example, why do some people talk of World War II as the happiest time of their life?

‘Among those who fought in war, there was a comradeship,’ he explained. ‘There was a shared philosophy, a common purpose. ‘The basic fighting man felt he was doing something worthwhile. Happy people are rarely sitting around.’

We talked about who gets to be happy and why. Are the rich happier than the poor? ‘Not necessarily,’ he said. ‘It has suited all sorts of people to equate material possessions with a state of happiness, because that keeps you pursuing them.

‘But money and material things are a means to an end. Often they free people. It is difficult in situations of struggle to be happy, but it doesn’t follow that in situations of plenty you will be happy.’

At one of our meetings, I said to Dr Clare: ‘I want the seven secrets of happiness.’

He laughed. ‘Are there seven?’ he asked. ‘There must be,’ I replied.

So here they are, the Seven Secrets Of Happiness, based on what I learnt from Dr Clare — who sadly died of a heart attack at the age of 64 in 2007 — and what I have discovered since.

And the joy (the genius) of the seven secrets is that they are all you need.

Rich or poor, young or old, single, hitched or polygamous, with children or without, with a job or unemployed, blessed with health or not, fat or thin, bald or beautiful . . . whoever you are, these secrets — and the rules that go with them — will bring you happiness. That’s a promise. That’ s guaranteed.

ONE: CULTIVATE A PASSION

To be happy you must have something that you enjoy doing. Something that will sustain you, distract you, and delight you, when all else fails.

On June 20, 2013, Queen Elizabeth II, then 87, attended Royal Ascot races and saw her own horse, Estimate, win the Ascot Gold Cup. It was the first time a horse owned by the monarch had won the race in its 207-year history.

‘To win the big one at Royal Ascot means so much to her,’ said the Queen’s grandson, Peter Phillips. ‘This is her passion and her life and she’s here every year and she strives to have winners.’

The photographs taken of the Queen at Royal Ascot as her horse won the Gold Cup showed a picture of pure happiness.

The other day, I happened to be with the singer, Rod Stewart, when he was given a model train as a present. Model railways are Rod’s passion. To see his happy face light up with delight as he opened his present was positively heart-warming.

Building a model railway, breeding horses, singing in a choir, going to grand opera, playing Bridge or golf or bowls or Scrabble, ballroom dancing, stamp collecting, cooking, gardening, studying Wittgenstein, spotting UFOs … It doesn’t matter what it is: cultivate a passion.

TWO: BE A LEAF ON A TREE

To thrive, you have to be both an individual — with a sense that you are unique and that you matter — and at the same time you need to be connected to a bigger organism: a family, a community, a company, a club. You need to be part of something bigger than yourself. Yes, a leaf off a tree is still unique and it has the advantage that it floats about a bit — it feels free — but it’s disconnected and it dies.

The research shows that people who are best protected against certain physical diseases — cancer and heart disease, for example — are likely, in addition to doing all the other things they should do, to be part of a community of some kind; to be socially involved.

I once asked Archbishop Desmond Tutu: ‘Will there be people in Heaven?’ He opened his eyes wide, looked directly at me and smiled happily. ‘Oh, yes. Heaven is community. A solitary human being is a contradiction.’

THREE: BREAK THE MIRROR

It won’t bring you seven years bad luck.

Break the mirror — stop looking at yourself. Stop thinking about yourself — have done with narcissism and self-regard — avoid introspection.

Years ago, I wrote an account of the life of Prince Philip. While I was writing it, His Royal Highness allowed me to ask him anything I liked and if it was a ‘matter of record’, he would do his best to provide a detailed answer.

If it was a matter of ‘mere speculation’ or, in his phrase, me ‘hoping for a bit of colour to spice up your book’, he would just look at me balefully and say nothing.

Prince Philip did not like talking about himself. It is as simple as that. His youngest son, Prince Edward, summed it up when he said to me: ‘One of his best pieces of advice he gives to everybody is talk about everything else, don’t talk about yourself, nobody’s interested in you.’

Nobody’s interested in you. Get it?

NOBODY IS INTERESTED IN YOU!

Self-awareness is good: self-regard is fatal. Break the mirror. Introspection is a killer.

FOUR: DON’T RESIST

Change is important. People who are fearful of change are rarely happy. We don’t mean massive change, but enough to keep your life stimulated.

People are wary of change, particularly when things are going reasonably well, because they don’t want to rock the boat, but a little rocking can be good for you.

This, for me, is the most challenging of the seven secrets.

Instinctively, I do resist change. I like things as they are. Or, better still, I like them as they were.

I know that new technology is amazing, but, to be frank, I don’t want to learn another flipping password. And as for those machines in the supermarket … ‘Unidentified object in bagging area’ … Aaargh!

That said, I have done the research and seen the evidence and I accept that my instinct is wrong and that this rule is right.

Uniformity is a tremendous threat to happiness, as are too much predictability and control and order. Don’t resist change. Go with it.

FIVE: AUDIT YOUR HAPPINESS

A study in 2011 reported that happy people live 14 per cent longer than unhappy people, increasing their longevity by seven-and-a-half to ten years.

How much of each day are you spending doing something that doesn’t make you happy? Check it out and if more than half of what you’re doing makes you unhappy, then change it.

Listen to Dr Anthony Clare. He is addressing you directly from his consulting room. His message is to the point: ‘Don’t come in here and complain. People do, you know. They come and sit in that chair and tell me nothing is right.

‘They say they don’t like their family, they don’t like their work, they don’t like anything. I say: ‘Well, what are you going to do about it?’

SIX: LIVE IN THE MOMENT

The other day, I went back to my old prep school to give out the prizes. Before the prize-giving, drinks were served in the old headmaster’s study. That man’s name was Mr Stocks and when I was ten he was 80.

I can picture him clearly, but I can only remember one thing that he said to me. ‘Keep that Latin accurate.’ He said it whenever he spoke to me — without fail.

Looking back now I think I understand the full import of Mr Stocks’s message.

At school, I wasn’t that bad at Latin, but I wasn’t as good as I could have been because I did not concentrate.

I larked about. I told jokes. I did not concentrate on this lesson, because I was thinking about the next one, or about tea, or about choir practice … Keep that Latin accurate. Concentrate. Focus. Live in the here and now.

After the prize-giving, tea was served in the school dining room and there, carved into the wood panelling above the fireplace, was the famous line from one of the Odes of Horace: Carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero. It translates, more or less, as: ‘Seize the day, trusting as little as possible in the future.’

When I visited the Queen of Denmark at her palace in Copenhagen, she said to me: ‘Being Queen involves a lot of repetition — the same ceremonies, the same functions, the same routine. Sometimes you think: ‘Here we go again!’

‘But my parents taught me something useful that I have tried to pass on to my two boys. Whatever you are doing, be aware of it and stay involved.

‘I have to listen to a lot of boring speeches, but I have discovered there is nothing so boring as not listening to a boring speech.

‘If you listen carefully, the speech is very rarely as boring as you thought it was going to be. ‘You can disagree with the speech in your head. You can think: ‘He’s saying it very badly,’ but don’t switch off. It is much better that way.’

Stop thinking about what’s coming next, stop checking the mobile, and relish what’s happening now. Seize the day. For all you know, it’s the only one you’ve got.

SEVEN: BE HAPPY

And, finally, if you want to be happy … Be Happy. Act it, play the part, put on a happy face.

Start thinking differently. ‘Choose to be optimistic,’ says the Dalai Lama. ‘It feels better.’

If you are feeling negative, simply say to yourself: ‘I am going to be positive’, and that, in itself, can trigger a change in how you feel.

That’s it. And it works. It really does, I’m happy to say.

•  The Seven Secrets Of Happiness by Gyles Brandreth (Short Books, £12.99). © Gyles Brandreth 2024. To order a copy for £11.69 (offer valid to 21/07/24; UK P&P free on orders over £25), go to www.mailshop.co.uk/books or call 020 3176 2937.