EP #173: What the Happiest Countries Get Right About Solitude with Isak Macody Falck

(upbeat music) Welcome back to another episode of Everyday Endorphins, a mental health podcast focused on the importance of finding joy and happiness and daily living. I'm your host, Stella Stephnopoulos, and this week I got to explore some of the cultural differences on happiness between America and Europe, specifically between New York and Norway. I had the pleasure of bringing Isaac Makodi Falk on the podcast who is an aspiring actor from Oslo, based in Copenhagen. We had met a few months ago when I was traveling in Copenhagen for vacation and immediately just headed off. And I really just wanted the opportunity to get to speak to someone who grew up in Europe to give a little bit of their perspective on what contributes to happiness in these different cultures around the world. Isaac is also seven years younger than me, so it was fun to get to think back to my 19 year old self and try to put myself in his shoes and think about how did I see happiness at that age? And what's changed in my life that's made me deep in my perspective on joy. I'm really excited for you guys to listen to this episode, but before we get into it, reminder to like, rate, and review this podcast on whichever listening platform that you prefer. Hi Isaac, thank you so much for coming on to Everyday and Dorfins, it is so great having you here. Thank you for having me. I'll be looking forward. The funniest thing is that we met like a little over a month ago at a bar in Copenhagen. You were so friendly and just outgoing and like willing to chat people up. Like I felt like we were just immediately friends right when I met you. And it's really hard to find that kind of outgoing adventurous spirit, at least from what I've seen in New York or just like across the states in general. So it was very refreshing for me to just walk in, be at this bar, I was on vacation, I was traveling, and you just had such good energy. I feel like I strive to be that way in a sort of way. I feel like we're here talking about happiness and Dorfins and stuff like that. And I get, I feel like I make myself happy in a sort of way when I try to be actively outgoing and talk into people. I haven't always been like that. I feel like me and I, it's something that I've grown kind of into, feel like it's better than not being talking to people or being outgoing. I feel like if we take those two, it's better to be more outgoing and it's not being outgoing in a sort of way. I totally agree. I feel like when you're a bit more closed off, you're not really inviting opportunity to meet new people, to learn something different. And it's interesting that you share that you haven't always been this way. So before we dive into what we're going to talk about today, I would love for you to share a little bit more about yourself, like where you grew up, where you're from, what you're doing in Copenhagen now, to really orient my audience and give them perspective around who you are and also like how we're sitting here today. Yeah. So I'm from Oslo in Norway. I'm 19 years old, so I just got out of high school seven months ago. Straightfully moved to Copenhagen to try to pursue acting and I've done some acting before at my school. And I just thought it was really funny. It's like the perfect way to just make yourself like more available and outgoing. And it's like you force yourself to be like almost funny and get out of your shell in like a perfect way. I've had a really good time here and in Oslo I had a really good time as well. I had a lot of friends, parents who always supported me, and they always support me now as well when I'm here in Copenhagen and I'm living my life. Yeah, no, if I could rewind the clock back to 19, I, wow, how fun would that be? But like we were talking about earlier, I do believe that every year it just gets better and although more responsibility comes onto your plate, you also just, it's such a steep learning curve and you're, I mean, you're not even 20 yet. Like once you hit your 20s, it is such a steep learning curve. But you mentioned that you're from Oslo, you're from Norway and I only have one point of reference. I have one friend who is half Greek and half Norwegian. His mom is from Norway and his dad is from Athens and Greece. And it's funny because him and I like have joked about how he can be very like not cold, but just a bit more guarded than maybe the typical American culture or at least myself. Like I'm very outgoing, warm in the whole thing. But I'm curious like is this typical of Norwegians to be a bit more reserved? - I mean, in Norway, so I've heard in New York people somewhere, like talking to each other, and they're chatting around with you, sit on the bus in Norway and try chatting to another like person on the subway or like the bus. They're gonna be like, this is the crazy person. Why are you talking to me? It's like just any time of day, you, if you can sit alone, whenever you do that in Norway, because it's like people are so reserved and to themselves and really don't talk to other people other than friends and family in that sort of way. So it's really weird to be honest. And that's why I like envy you Americans, because it looks like everyone just goes around talking to each other all the time, which is like more like I want to strive to be in a sort of way. - Interesting. Well, you know, I do feel like the grass is always greener. And I've been thinking a lot about that too, because there are parts of European culture that I really romanticize and that I really admire. That's so different from American culture. I think if you put it on to ends of the spectrum or two different extremes, my understanding, and maybe I'm, I mean, you can tell me what you think about this, but I feel like a lot of Europeans think that Americans are dumb and like very loud. - Do you want to agree? If you look at who is in our, you know, the politics right now and who's in our presidency, yeah, I mean, most of America, I don't know what's happened to this country, but at the same time, it's interesting, because I feel like you have this maybe more romanticized view about Americans being lively and chatty and outgoing, because it's so different from what you're used to. - I mean, if we talk about power figures, that's something we were talking about in also all the time. It's like we're almost like poking fun at you guys. No offense, I love you. I love you got Americans, but it's crazy what's happening over there. And I'm like, it's whole polarized in a sort of way. And like we're looking at it like from an outside point of view. - I know. - We're thinking Donald Trump standing on stage talking about all types of like crazy things. And so we're just like, how is this like happening in a sort of way? Why aren't everyone just talking about it in like, because I feel like it's normalized now, but it's really, really scary. And it's almost spitting to other parts of the world. - It's definitely quite frightening. You know, I don't have the answer as to how this all came to be, but something I've noticed is that it's very easy, especially for people in power to just pull on a motion, or just in general, when you think about trying to win an argument or persuade like the art of persuasion, a lot of it is tied to, you know, how you get at people's emotions and make them feel things. And you can either twist it in a really negative way or you can influence in a really positive way. And unfortunately, I think the state of the world now is that people in power are not using it to the benefit of most people, right? And that's why I think America is so polarized. Things that shouldn't be causing such, you know, a left or a right opinion. Like people can't ever understand or appreciate the nuance. And I think it's because to your point, there's like not a willingness to engage in discourse and conversation. And the irony is that, you know, you just mentioned that the people in Norway are a bit more reserved and like no one's really going up and talking to people. But in a way, there's, it seems like Europeans are able to hold more space for the nuance and actually want to engage in harder conversations. Do you agree with that? Do you have any builds on this? Because I'm just speaking from my own observation. I could be totally wrong. No, but I mean, of course, and it's like, for example, politics in Norway, at least. It's like people are like, no, we want to vote for that. We want to vote for this. And why do you think that? But it's in the same way it's like this, like big, like the things where you can vote. It's like, even though we don't agree on stuff, it's still like really small things, which in America is like this big now, and people are either here or they're old, not heard about like family splitting up because one of them doesn't vote for the person that the other family wants to vote for, which I think is like complete, we have served because at least in my household, and in Norway in general, I think it's people vote for different groups. And we still get along when we still just think, okay, but that's your view and I have my view. And you win. And it's still going to be that much of a difference either way because we agree on most things, but we disagree on some older things. But I think at least in Europe, we're better in that way. And I'm in America. Yeah. The places. I've seen friendships, families split up because of opposing views on big world issues. And it's quite heartbreaking, honestly. Maybe that's a tangent, but I would love to get back to really unpacking how the culture and Norway shaped you growing up. Now you are super outgoing, you're studying to be an actor. That's a whole other perspective. We can also dive into what it means to perform and have stage presence because I don't think I even got to share with you. But when I was growing up, I sang in the Metropolitan Opera here in New York City, which is like a very famous opera house. I wanted to be an actress as a kid and my parents were trying to shield me from what happens when you're a child actor. I ended up falling into opera and I did that for like eight years and I performed on stage and there is, there's a lot we can talk about around stage presence and like how how I think that actually sharpens your social skills. But coming from a culture where people are a bit more reserved and keep to themselves, keep to their immediate social circle, do you feel like it's benefited the quality of your relationships or made it harder to find new friends? Like how has it impacted your social life and the way that you relate to other people? Yeah, it's actually really fun because I was, I wasn't really that into acting before I played in the TV show, a small TV show when I was like 14, 14 years old, which was a really fun experience. But I didn't really think much about what I was young. I just wanted to be there and make friends and stuff like that. So it didn't really impact me that much. And then I really had a break from doing those kind of things from my 13 until my first year in high school where we have like, what's something called the other V, which is like you just full played eight actors from the school, some dancers and stuff like that. And then I really didn't want to go because I was scared of like, oh my god, I don't want to do this. And then because my mom is an actor and then she said, I'll give you 1,000 Norwegian donors if you go to the audition. Now, like, okay, I'm going. And then I went and then I got to get into it and I went as like, the first edition, second edition and then third edition and that's got in. And then after that has been uphill. That's all I want to do because it's just something about standing on the stage. And it's more like comedy driven, the thing you did to be. So it's like, you have to like get the timing right and just pay every people laugh and getting that response and getting off station. People are coming up to you and saying like, good job. I look really, really cool. That was like the best feeling that I ever felt like in the world and my parents crying afterwards because they wanted to just felt like it was so emotional watching your son like almost like go back to their childish self in a sort of way, which they probably really missed because I was small like, I don't get teenager. I do, depending on seeing that, I'm like, ah, jazz hands up on the stage. It's really good. And that's what I want to do now in Oslo. It's something called like a dish to this. We roll like 30 days whole whole of May. And then it gets really like 28 people are on that. And then the other people can't participate in the sort of way. So it gets really like excluded from everyone else. And it's like, that's what I mean is against the cool people, the cool people on the part of us. And then it's almost like not, not the cool people. That's not on the party bus. So and it's also like really like alpha male type of mentality and those kind of it was good to get away from that and just get into people who want to do acting and make people laugh. Yeah, absolutely. You know, even before we got on to this interview, you were sharing about kind of like that hierarchy in high school. Like there's, it's, it's very much of a culture of like respect your elders, which I think is ridiculous because there's what like a year or two difference between each grade and a high school. If you're open to it, I'd love to hear a bit more about how that impacted the way that you build friendships and relate to people. I think across cultures, you can find social climbing anywhere and cloud chasing anywhere, of course, but I am curious if the way that the culture is in Norway, if that like perpetuates or or kind of creates that to be more apparent, do you feel like the way that people operate in Norway? Is that contributing to more of like that divide between people or do you feel like the because people maybe stick to their own friends and their own circles? Maybe it's like a mentality of will quality over quantity and it's actually stronger relationships like what would your reflections be on that? A really big problem in Norway now is those party buses. So actually the government has banned those buses now from rolling because it excludes so many people when people walk around. It's almost like what's it called in America? It's like it's like those Alpha Sigma houses, stuff like that. Like Greek life, like fraternity houses. Yeah. So it's like it excludes people when people go around in like hoodies, with their name on the back in a logo. So it really likes it makes the people that's not on the party bus really stick out and the people on the party bus sticks out. So it gets really like polarise like who's the cool people who's on the party bus and who's the not full people who's not on the party bus. And then it's like is really good at a government now in Norway spanning those things because I went to a school is really, really, really like popular with those things. It's like a business school. So it's all like direct people from all over us. So roasted at school, I'm not from a really rich family, but I want to go there because a party was cool when I was 16. Like, oh, shit, that's like the hard school to get cool. I was like, what I want to try to go to like test my luck in the sort of way. And but it's awful to be honest. So people hold to themselves and the people on the bus only talk to people on that party bus, the same party bus. And the other people just don't get talked to by the like blonde party bus. That's very interesting. The government is now starting to ban the party bus. And so the party bus is this something that happens like right at the end of high school. It gets an annual thing that happens and you can only go on it when you're in your last year of high school or can any grade go on. I mean, it's for it usually starts in first grade or our first year. Wow. Then yeah. So then they build the bus. Then it made, didn't it take 28 people? Eat that a bus. And then it's like that gang from first, second and third, but it's so great because it's a lot of money involved. If I was lucky enough to be on one of those buses and we paid the $210,000 for the bus. Wow. What are you doing on the bus? It's like loud music. You send it. Yeah. Other people like that's also on the bus and like once stop sites and stuff like that. But it is so dumb. And when I look at it now in hindsight, it's like, Jesus Christ. What was I doing? Well, in a way, there's social pressure to do something like this. Even if at your core, it doesn't feel aligned or it's not an activity that actually is going to give you a lot of joy, it's easy to feel wrapped up in what other people are doing and want to participate based off of how people will then, you know, therefore judge you. And I do think that that parallel to the way social life is organized in American universities here with Greek life. Like it's very similar. Maybe it's not as expensive as like that down payment of $210,000 to get on a bus. But, you know, if you're in Greek life, you're paying dues every semester. Like it does, of course, you know, get expensive and there is, of course, that financial barrier. But, you know, I was not in Greek life in college. I did go through the whole rush process, which is where you're going and you're meeting different people at different sororities and you try to get selected for one and the whole thing. But I never ended up sticking through once I ended up being in a sorority. I just, I didn't like it. I really didn't like it. I also felt like the process of rushing was so superficial. People were judging you based off of how you looked or if they thought that you were valuable to them, like it was just very, very surface level and transactional. And what bothered me the most was thinking to myself, well, why am I letting a university and a small subset of this university, like only 50% of the students were in Greek life at my school? Like why am I letting these other 20 year olds dictate what my social life is going to look like. And it was really hard to kind of break away from the mold because everyone was doing it. Most of my friends were doing it. I even did it. But I felt very ostracized in a way because I was not part of that social group. But it's really hard when you're in these social pressures, feeling like you need to behave a certain way or do certain things to quote unquote fit in. So that's really interesting that you can kind of draw this parallel between the way you see American universities operate with Greek life and like culturally what this party best situation is in Norway. I think from an American perspective, American see Europe as like the ideal place to live, the ideal place to be for many reasons. But coming back to the theme of my podcast, which is around happiness, after being in Copenhagen, I really felt like, okay, the people here are happy. And Denmark, Norway, these are some of the happiest countries in the world. So having grown up there, do you think about happiness differently? Yeah, I mean, my myself is really happy. I mean, I will go around and I think it's also has a lot to do with like health. care and stuff like that because we have free health care and we can do whatever to free school and people really don't stick out that much so it's like getting friends it's not really a hard thing in Norway even though we're like quite preserved and we don't talk to each other on the bus and stuff like that it's like also I feel like also that makes you like happy with yourself in a sort of way to not always have to be around people it's normalized to just sit with yourself would be take on your head and listen to some music you want to listen to and not have to be social all the time but still add some good friends you you can talk to when you need them and I think it's it's really good growing up in Norway and Scandinavia like generally because it's nice with a nice atmosphere it's not that many not that much crime is really good and I feel like the difference between us and America in a sort of way is that maybe it made this because it's like a more unreliable day to day we don't can't really just properly relax I think as much as you can Scandinavia if you know what I mean yeah especially in New York yeah it's like you don't have you don't really have that much I mean at least in New York or you live it's now noises everywhere all people are like hey sorry come on I'm going to come in passion in Norway sites so how many people live there so it's easier to take care of each individual in a sort of way it's a good reflection I think health care is a big part of it what I really loved was your comment on people being willing to sit with themselves I think we are in a very distracted world we are in an attention economy now especially with social media scrolling like everything is just fighting for our attention people rarely take the time to be alone to sit with themselves maybe there's there's a cross-cultural thing we can talk about here as well but just generally speaking I've noticed that sometimes when I'm around a group of people and I I don't feel connected to them I feel lonelier than if I were sitting alone having a night in doing the things that lit me up by myself you know it's it's interesting like socializing and being around people doesn't always mean that you're gonna feel not lonely right you're you're young you're 19 I'm like I mentioned I'm also young but I I think at that period in life as well when you're transitioning into your 20s it's very easy to be distracted and pulled in so many directions do you ever think about how this willingness to sit with yourself shows up for you like do you ever reflect on the value of solo time for you and and how that fills up your cup in a way that enables you to be more present with the people that you are around when you are being social I mean definitely I mean when I was in Oslo especially my I mean it's like it's easy to be outgoing and stuff like at least I feel like it's that for me but when I have to have those after school maps at least two hours just to recharge myself after whatever that day was it was like because if I'm going around it hey hey it was like it really drains me in a sort of way so that really that quality time just to go down in my basement with like under my father and mother it's it's really good just have that okay put on some music take a nah watch a movie all by myself with no one around just to like almost recharge and just because the most important thing is that you can manage to be good with only yourself and have fun with only yourself because if you can't be alone you know handle being alone and it's like it is a more fundamental problem than just being social because I know my sister has like FOMO deluxe is like she can't not be home she can't be she has to be everywhere all at once if it's wonderful to her friends are out being together she's like okay where are you going I'm coming right now I'm there will be the rest 15 minutes and I can tell that she like she has to try to be alone with herself also sometimes and just almost like get to know yourself like only by yourself and with yourself in a sort of way so I think I really really value my alone time and I feel like it's lacking a little bit now and I'm a copenate because I live with two people as well I don't really get that fundamental alone time that I really need having a good time I'm happy I resonate with your sister I think I have struggled in the past with like being alone I mean I've reflected a lot on this because I have no siblings I'm an only child so I've spent a ton of time by myself growing up but I was always very social lots of friends all the things and even in my adult life you know I'm always around people and it definitely lights me up I would say I'm more extroverted but now I am realizing if my calendars filled with so many social plans I've left no time to reinvest in myself and I've seen it take a toll on my my well-being so something I'm working on maybe you can teach me a thing or two about this is like actually slowing down and focusing more on just solo time and again I think there is a cultural element here because being in New York it's incredibly fast-paced so you feel like you have to be doing so much when I was in Copenhagen I've never been to Norway but I can imagine it's similar when I was in Copenhagen it was peaceful like people were out in doing things but it was civilized and I really feel like the environment invited stillness and what I'm trying to work on right now is like how do I cultivate that within myself rather than feeling like I need to travel to Copenhagen every three months to get a sense of like inner peace I want to shift gears and ask a question on how you see this kind of show up in the way that you process emotions and I know this might be kind of a more philosophical question but you know when you think about Scandinavian Norwegian culture lifestyle it feels more minimalist and introspective and I want to hear from you your thoughts around how you express and experience emotion and even more difficult emotions because while Norway may be one of the happiest countries it's not as if every single person who's in Norway is happy all the time so I'd love to hear you know you talked about being a bit more reserved more introspective people Norway keep to themselves more my hunch is that that doesn't mean that they are closed off emotionally like there's a difference between between being introspective and reserved versus being closed off and not being able to communicate your emotions so what is your perspective on that I feel like I handle my emotions really well for example I mean I don't really know because it's hard when I'm writing a hard time I almost like put almost push it down in a sort of way which is really not a good thing to do but at the same time in it's almost like it works a little bit I almost like if I trip myself into thinking it's okay just keep on like acting like it's all okay then it then I start to feel okay in a sort of way and I think that's like a psychological thing where you can just pretend almost I'm adding I don't have a it's hard for me to also cry so it's it's really weird but I'm having it really good I think it's I'm not wolf your mom it's like a concert stone in my I'm like I'm having like I'm depressed and stuff like that but I mean I'm pretty lucky because it hasn't really happened that much that I'm something really devastating almost like sunshine hey how are you doing like an acupointing podcast you look perfect it's like this you know I haven't really had like that big or like a big thing in my life where I'm really needed to feel the pain or like be feel like grief and stuff like that I mean I lost my grandfather a couple of months ago but it's really really sad but at the same time I feel like he's in a better place and I can talk I talk with my mother and my grandmother and stuff like that and everyone's handling it pretty well and when people around me are handling things pretty well and it also makes me like relaxed in a sort of way and makes me feel like it's fun to be okay if you know what I mean yeah absolutely and I do think that's a really good point you bring up if you feed more positive thoughts into your mind and you focus on like having a growth mindset what can you learn from this experience rather than having a fixed mindset you do kind of trick yourself into feeling happier when I was in high school I was on a rowing team and it's a very physically intense sport but I would always try to like smile when I was working out because just smiling like literally tricks your brain into thinking you're happier so you can ignore the fact that it's a very painful workout I love your response because something I try to really promote on my podcast is that you don't have to be in crisis mode to understand your happiness is a choice and it's really within your own hands. So it's actually, and it's a blessing that you to this present date have an experience, a lot of grief or sorrow or tragedy in your life. You don't have to experience that to learn how to build the resilience and the mindset shifts to seek and create joy in your day to day. You know, I think it's it's a refreshing perspective and my, my hunch, my hypothesis is that when there are points in time in your life where maybe something does go wrong and you're, you're faced with a lot of difficulty and heartache, you will have the tools because you are in this practice of introspection to, to make yourself feel better in times that are challenging. I hope so. We'll check in in a few years. Yeah, I feel like it's a good way to handle my emotion. I feel like I'm doing it well, but I don't really, I'm still, I'm still young. I don't know anything about these things really because like I said, I haven't really experienced that much that has taken a real big light toll on me. But I mean, I hope that I'm working every day and it's like almost like working in my mind that if eventually and it will happen that I get to, I've been good and tied to myself and made myself like a good headspace for when things go bad because it's doomed to happen to everyone at some point. So, yeah, so it's also, I think it's also good to have that kind of position. I mean, it's not like you can't really avoid bad things happening because it's not gonna happen. I mean, unless you just lock yourself in a room for 24 hours a day and don't go out ever. So it's something something's bad's gonna happen and I feel like I'm preparing myself for that in a way. Not like I'm in constant fight or fight mode. It's more like some conscious kind of way. Yeah, very, very stoic of you. I love it. This is a perfect transition into a few final questions that I want to ask you, Isaac. And these are questions that I ask everyone on the show. So my first question to you is how do you define happiness? Ooh, there's our question. I think I define happiness with, you know, what do you mean, define happiness in a sort of way like what it is? Yeah, what does it mean to be happy? Because we talked about how bad things are, you know, bound to happen. You carry yourself with an optimism and an openness, but also you recognize that not everyone is like that. You recognize that there are things in this world that are gonna cause negative emotion. Right? So when we think about happiness, like something I've come to learn is that it's not about just being happy all the time. So what are your reflections on that? And when you think through that, what would your definition of what it means to be happy be? I mean, waking up in the morning with like a good feeling inside myself and like wanting to grip the day is what I mean. That's how I've experienced my day. I have to choose that in a sort of way. And I think everyone has to choose that in a sort of way how how they approach it. And it's like, I feel like the first 15 minutes of your day are like the most important minutes because it's like, that's when you decide how your day is going to be. I do believe happiness is a choice. I talk a lot about that on the show. And especially how you start your day will set the tone for the day. Something I've been trying to do is waking up early in the mornings, giving myself extra time to make a nice cup of coffee, to journal, to practice gratitude. And I've noticed when I give myself time in the morning to really prioritize myself and have like a whole day before my work starts, I feel better equipped to handle the craziness and chaos of what the day will bring. So I do love that response. I think it's spot on. My final question to you is something that I end every episode on. And you can interpret this however you would like. But what is something that brings you a bit of endorphins or joy every day? Every day? Making people laugh, I think. And at least when after I've had my like the performance I had on Friday, that's what if I think like the most endorphins when I get the most endorphins is when like the second the light turns off while I'm doing the performance. And I'm like, anyway, I don't care how it went or anything like that. It's just that constant like treading lightiness or the way having hyper focus on what your lines are and what you have to do and that is and stuff like that. And then finally being able to work finished now I can take in all the positive responses from the people who are watching. That's when I feel them get the most endorphins. But every day I think it's making people laugh and also having me like some deep conversations in a sort of way that makes something that I feel like I learn something from having a conversation on my ghost, just surface level. I was a nice weather today, a small talk, but like big talk, love love a big talk. So I think I'm out. Big talk is in. Yeah. I love it. I love it. And yeah, there's no other feeling than like you're done. The performance has been completed and it's like this rush of it's like adrenaline. It's like, wow, I did that. You know, I created this emotional experience for people. I love it, Isaac. Thank you so much for being here on the show. I really hope that we get to cross paths again in Europe because I would love to just go and visit Oslo and go back to Copenhagen. But come on over to New York. Your nervous system will be in fight or fight, but it'll be a good change. Where can my listeners connect with you on social media? On Instagram, I have Isaac McCodie Fowl and then I also have a TikTok, but I'm not really that active. But I'm active on Instagram. And then hopefully I'm a really big actor in the future. And then you look back and this is hey, you're about to blow up. Just do wait. This is your this is your entry point into that and you can pull out the interview when you've made it big. Well, thank you so much. Isaac. This was amazing. Thank you. (upbeat music)