A researcher on how to live a happy life

I think these are bad tips to be honest. Cognitive Behavioural Therapy - really?

People in countries where psychotherapy is not as prevalent as in the US aren't necessarily unhappier I think.

Some occupations have earned their bad reputation. My opinion. I am not happy with it, but generally quite happy I believe. I don't feel too happy about changing my prejudice towards this field.

Appreciation of what you have is a form of self reflection. Would be good for the occupation to be honest. Suggestion of this form are also often used as a form of psychological abuse. Also a field where this occupations excels in.

happiness is a vague concept

as long as you're not depressed, you're fine

For me, I have become happier in the moment via insight meditation, which focuses on noticing thoughts and feelings without action or reaction.

Part of the wisdom of meditation lies in the following: There is baggage we all carry, the self, this belief we're the center of it all, the author of (and subservient to) our own thoughts. How do I stop doing what makes me unhappy, if that's "who I am"? But, in reality, I can abandon "who I am" and find new processes of living and new ways of thinking about the world.

In practice, this resetting of your mind is achieved without training by various psychdelic drugs, which peel back the layers of the onion in an effortless fashion. In meditation, you train your mind to actually pay close attention, eventually achieving an effortless open-ness that drugs achieve very simply. Once you're good at following your breath, you can turn to thoughts and feelings, recognizing them as mere arisings in consciousness.

Mere arisings in the mind do not require response: there's no need to act upon our desires, urges, distraction, and regular patterns, they are just heuristics or mental shortcuts the brain uses over and over to save time/effort of decision making. Do we have to respond to all our noticing sounds, light, smells? If not, why do we have to respond to negative thoughts?

Negative thoughts may become crystallized into negative actions. However, if you know what behaviors of your own contribute to unhappiness, you can always pause for 10-15 seconds, meditate briefly, drawing upon your training of the brain's meditative ability, and you will notice the actual feeling of the urge to behave, and not act upon it. It will disappear like very other appearance in consciousness.

I found it strange that there was not one mention of the ancient Stoics, who, disregarding their non-materialist viewpoints, came up with much of this philosophy. I'd argue they are a more accurate original source of these viewpoints on mindfulness and contentment than the Epicureans.

Happiness comes when you realize that's impossible to be happy all the time and that's fine.