Let’s start with the obvious, happiness is achieving profound contentment. Obvious? Not really. Most oftentimes, we define our happiness unwittingly as greed. We want something we don’t have. Surprisingly, once we get what we want, we are still unhappy because that is what greed is. It is insatiable. Greed creates an anxiety within us that whatever our current state whether “high or low” will still be deemed low. And even when we become higher, we will still express unhappiness. Even worse, if we lost what we had and now don’t have it, we live in even deeper despair.

In the book, The Art of Happiness, the Dalai Lama talks about how he loves supermarkets and all of the shiny things that can be procured at today’s epicurean über-markets. He starts with a deep lust and want for what is in front of him. He then understands that his pockets will soon empty by his fulfilling his wants only to leave him still wanting more. Instead, he replaces his desire for want with a thought of what he needs. The desire then quickly evaporates. Now, we all can’t be Buddhist monks. However, if we are filled with perpetual lust for what we don’t have, we will live in a state of negativity that in reality will never be satisfied by the very definition of greedy acquisition.

This does not mean that you cannot enjoy nice things or be wealthy. He in fact talks about two types of wealthy men in the book. One kind yearns and yearns for more and is never satisfied. When he loses any of his possessions, he suffers deeply at his loss. The other affluent gentleman appreciates his wealth but appreciates more a deep level of self contentedness that will not vacillate with his material status.

For myself, despite significant loss in the financial markets, I have still a very profound equanimity of spirit. Those material things that are lost are lost and so be it. I spoke with an individual a couple of years ago who lost a lot of money on certain investments and now lives by indiscriminately squandering his money simply because he could not make a go of his financial investments so why not just live for today and throw the money out the window? Well, neither situation is very good. Chasing money so as to horde it is not meritorious behavior nor is lustful pursuit of hedonism. Quiet contentment of your current blessings should be the root of happiness without the disquiet of chasing whatever else in front of us.

For an individual of unsettled ambition, this admonition serves me well and is something that I constantly battle. Fortunately, despite my love for beautiful things, at root I am very very happy with where I am today and work constantly to achieve a calm sense of happiness without regard to fluctuations in trivial acquisitions or monetary status. I was listening to my staff member, Darla, who expressed to me 2 weeks ago before I read The Art of Happiness, that she was contented. I then read the book and shared with her about the Dalai Lama’s teachings and how far in alignment she was with the attainment of happiness in her very expressed use of the word, “contented”. I think in the future I will try to use the words, “I am content” rather than “I am happy” since it truly reflects a calming sense of self-realization of where we should be today.

I just finished the book, The Art of Happiness, which involves teachings of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and his conversations with Phoenix psychiatrist Howard C. Cutler, M.D. Dr. Cutler tries to explore the ideas of Buddhist thought as preached and practiced by the Dalai Lama, as they would be explicable and applicable to non-Buddhists in the West. During this time of financial vicissitudes, we can perhaps learn a lot from global thoughts that antedate and continue to flourish during our lives from the Far East. I will not summarize the book but focus on select topics that have personal resonance for me that I thought would be helpful for my readership. These blogs represent an attempt for me at personal growth and self awareness and are letters written to myself that if burnished well will radiate to all those who are interested enough to read them.

The Dalai Lama believes that happiness is the singular purpose of life that supercedes all other concerns or at least represents the fundamental distillation of what our life should be about. At first glance, this comment seems to belie a monkish disposition and compel one to think that a monk is advocating some kind of dissolute, hedonistic life. Rather, as you read through this 5-part series, you will see that in fact the opposite is the case. In short, altruism and compassion are rooted in one’s own inner happiness.

As mentioned, we think that if we are to pursue happiness, we are in fact elevating our selfish nature. However, if we stop to think of how truly happy individuals can radiate kindness, compassion, and love to others; whereas, unhappy people pass on their disgruntled demeanor and horde and heave hatred and displeasure to all who encounter them. If we start with understanding how to reach a deep and meaningful happiness, we can use that as a launching point to help others. In fact, the act of helping others can be a truly happy action to take. But more about that later this week.

If life is for living, how else can we live but in a happy state. Living in a depressed, angry, or self-tormented condition will only lead to an unbearable state that contravenes our very nature. We were not born to live in misery. In fact, in one part of the book when Dr. Cutler asks the Dalai Lama about self-hatred, he received a befuddled silence in response. The Dalai Lama simply could not understand what this concept meant, as he had never encountered it in his sheltered world. If our fundamental nature is designed for happiness, then how can we achieve it? We will explore the following concepts over this next week: contentment, intimacy, compassion, and confronting suffering to draw broad strokes within which you can create finer etchings that will define your own existence.

The Roman Baths in Bath, England

As many of you know, I am a big proponent of taking a little time for yourself to decompress and to heal. As a spa owner, I frequent my own spa to attain much needed escape from my daily routine. One thing that I do for myself at home is take a bath with hydrotherapy jets at least once a week if not more frequently. I have some sea salts that I bought but ideally I try to sneak into my spa and mix Epsom salts with Dead Sea salts along with various other Chinese herbs to help my skin, muscles, and nervous system.

For time immemorial, hot baths and springs have served as a vehicle for healing and renewal. I remember fondly the time that I spent in the natural onsen (Japanese hot springs) outside of Tokyo. German studies have shown that high magnesium content found in the Dead Sea can help enhance one’s skin barrier and also reduce skin inflammation. Other studies have shown improvement in psoriasis as well as helping deepen one’s sleep. Minerals are absorbed during bathing that can lead to increased blood circulation to aid in minimizing different types of arthritic conditions. Skin aging can be improved with some studies showing a 40% reduction in wrinking. Certain acne conditions can be ameliorated as well. Bromides and magnesium can serve to control allergies and detoxify and cleanse the skin. Epsom salts, which have been widely studied, have been shown to heal a damaged muscular and nervous system. I always try to mix some Epsom salts in with my Dead Sea salts after a hard day or after a massage session. Bath salts can also minimize the pruning effect otherwise typically observed following prolonged water immersion because it maintains a better osmotic pressure gradient across the skin. Phosphates can help to soften calloused skin and to aid in exfoliation. These salts can also act to enhance the effect of soaps to clean one’s skin.

All in all, even if these touted benefits do not hold 100% true, the ritualistic bath can serve as a much needed time to heal one’s mind and soul as well as one’s body. I use it as a time not to think of anything or at times to enter a quiet time of deep reflection. I truly enjoy my bath time even without the rubber duckie.

Time truly flies. I literally cannot believe that 2008 has drawn to a close and the new year is already upon us. I think today should be a time of both reflection of the past year and what we have in store for us in the coming year.

Although 2008 has been a rocky year in the world, I am grateful that LFP has been relatively shielded from the effects so far of the economic downturn. Instead of dwelling on the negatives, I would like to focus on some of the positive milestones of this past year. First, I finished writing my 5th book in 5 years, Aging Face: The New Paradigm, which I am very proud of. This should be my last venture into the world of hard-core academic publishing besides ongoing book chapters and scientific papers. In a way what I foresee for myself is to transition from an ensconced academia into the mainstream (more about that in a moment). I am also proud that a year ago I took 4 months out of my life and studied hard to sit and pass the American Board of Hair Restoration Surgery and am now a diplomate with only 120 others in the world. This past year I had the good fortune of completely filling my building but then losing ground with the closure of the lap-band center and vein center upstairs. Nevertheless, my spa opened and is growing by leaps and bounds and the anti-aging center and rolfing center are going like gangbusters. Although in 2007 LFP had 1 or 2 slow months, this is the first year that we had complete uniformity with no slow months and bookings several months out in advance. I am very proud of the accomplishments of my staff and my building.

My next year will carry more responsibility in many ways. First, I will be carrying the title of moderator for my Entrepreneur’s Organization (EO) forum, which will demand much time from me. Second, I shall be turning up the heat as Editor-in-Chief of the academy’s Face Book that will be published as a major consumer’s guide to facial plastic surgery (don’t worry, we copyrighted Facebook before facebook.com did). My plan over the next two years will involve becoming much more of a mainstream presence on television, public speaking, etc. I am very much interested in getting my vision out to every household to the best of my ability. I look forward to a fun, exciting and growing 2009, and I hope you continue your journey with me.

I just finished this book, The E Myth Revisited, that focused on why entrepreneurs succeed or fail. In the book, the author Michael Gerber talks about getting to the root “feeling” that you are delivering to a customer. He argues that a company oftentimes focuses on the fact that they are selling a certain type of widget but in fact that may not be what they are truly “selling”. He used Revlon as an example. He said that in Revlon ads, they focus on a certain dream of how beautiful someone will look after using their product, so they were not at its core in the cosmetic business but in the business of selling hope.

I thought to myself, “What is the core thing that I would love a patient to feel after I work on them?” I came up with a pretty quick answer: confidence. It is not pride or arrogance. It is not even vanity. Those have pejorative connotations and to be honest do not reflect the feeling that I want someone to feel. I can tell you certain points in my own life that my confidence soared: getting into an Ivy League college, getting into a competitive residency and then fellowship, getting my first book published. I also remember small things in appearance that boosted my confidence: the end of my acne years, getting nice looking glasses, a good hair cut, and nice clothing. Although these are peripherals to aesthetics, they are all part of a sense of self and a sense of confidence.

I really enjoy seeing the beauty of my work and how I see a patient smile broadly and carry himself or herself a little differently. I particularly like it when I see someone shy and reclusive become more gregarious and open spirited in public. I can see the transformation and the feeling I have is a great one. Of course, I am in the beauty business and in a larger sense the wellness industry but at the core feeling that I am “selling” is confidence. I hope that is the feeling you get when I have finished with my work for you.

For fans of the television comedy show (a Brit export or adaption should I say) the Office, you may recall a couple of weeks ago they had a Moroccan-themed Christmas party. Along those lines, LFP combined our holiday festivities with the Spa at Willow Bend to have a Brazilian-themed party. Fortunately, no one caught on fire unlike the TV show. That would have probably made it more interesting. Fortunately, we had Donna’s husband Mike, a fireman, present to control the festivities.

We all really had such a fun time, and the experience that my extended extended family shared was deeply enriching. I would also like to thank Waleska, from my spa, who is Brazilian for connecting us with Mario, a real-life gaucho. Interestingly, he is Japanese, as there is a huge Japanese community in Brazil. He cooked a wonderful assortment of meats including picanha (which is really the best piece of meat for all you churrascaria-rodizio fans out there), sirloin with garlic, beef ribs, bacon-wrapped chicken, whole chicken, and chicken hearts. (Make sure you offer a wish before you have the latter. They actually are delicious). I would like to say muito obrigado (Portuguese = thanks so much!) and gochiso-sama (Japanese = thank you for the great food) to Mario and his teammate Max. Waleska also created the famed Brazilian cocktail caipirinha for us. That was a real treat.

By combining the spa and LFP into one holiday event, I think we really all shared how much WBW is a single extended family. I get a tremendous kick seeing everyone in my building every day, and I am really happy we could have such a massive party together. Unfortunately, the cold breeze outside made it impossible to light the fire pit, but we all stayed warm inside. I hope all of you are having a fun time at your holiday events for the office or with your family and friends this season. I hope you enjoy our little video and photos of our holiday event!

Fashioning myself a design pundit and a supercilious aesthete, I was looking for some new design inspirations on an old theme, the Christmas tree. I remember growing up with a fake Xmas tree that we unfolded every year from the attic and bent down the artificial branches with each passing year a branch snapping off, almost reminiscent of our own senescence. There was always something a bit contrived about a fake tree but, of course, something quite appealing in its flame-retardant safety, environmental recyclability, and not to mention economic frugality. And how do you fit that tree in your non-SUV anyway?

My mother said, “I’m really tired of another boring old Christmas tree. Any ideas?” I am always up for an aesthetic challenge, especially when it can be a fun exercise. We started our quest in this Christmas tree store at the nearby Shops at Willow Bend. It was anything but innovative. Standard old trees with over-embellished, filigreed ornaments that ran counter to my spare design aesthetic of “less is more.” I thought Neiman-Marcus, the epicenter of taste with a Texas twist, could be a source of inspiration. (Any great designer will own up that he or she steals ideas.) I saw a pair of very narrow, tall pine trees with echoing radial, spoke-like ornaments that flanked the escalator upon alighting on the second floor. These trees really captured my imagination, especially considering having it paired with its neighboring twin. However, I didn’t know how to acquire such a tree, or trees, nor how to attain all of these unique ornaments. The task seemed to be of Sysiphan proportions.

Marching onward to the third floor, I saw in the home design section, these naked tree limbs sprayed white and arranged in a vase with equally restrained ornaments. I thought brilliant! At this point, my mother insisted on going to this cool garden store in West Village in Uptown Dallas that she loves called, what else, Gardens to look for other ideas. Upon entering the store, my brain fixated on 3 design displays that had the same naked tree limbs with very spare ornaments. I asked if I could buy the display. Jeremy explained that “No, sorry these items are going to be moved to the front window for our holiday display.” Upon reconsidering what he needed for his display, he sold us the “Christmas tree” and related ornaments. With my design bug in a frenzy, I started to evaluate what vase would be best to fit this Charlie Brown Christmas tree (yes, the unwanted cultural legacy of this tree has been pointed out to me so let’s just get that out of the way.) I started with a small pot and pursued a course that transmogrified my tree into a Rauschenberg-like found-art piece until Jeremy cradled our tree into the pictured concrete vase that returned the design to a Zen-like simplicity. Pictured is the end product of an arduous design odyssey!

I conclude my travels in Asia with a place that has left an indelible mark in my soul, Bali, but not for the reasons you might think. More about that in a moment. I spent a week in Bali to attend the Oriental Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgery (OSAPS) meeting arriving on a Sunday night. The meeting would start on a Tuesday, and I had pre-booked time to go scuba diving on Monday morning. 7 am on Monday morning I stood outside of my hotel ready to go diving but with no divemaster showing up for an hour, so I gave up. Calling the dive agency, they apologized profusely and asked if I wanted to venture out on another day. I told them no and found another dive outfit for Friday morning.

Bali has always been a quiet Hindu community centered around tourism set amidst a chain of Indonesian islands that are mainly Muslim in outlook. The people in Bali are generous, warm, and indigent by Western standards. They make a hard living by catering to the mass of tourists that flock to the island. I remember for one dinner we had a spectacular live show near the hotel pool and a lavish buffet. The following night for closing ceremonies, we went all the way to this new multi-million dollar center that was built to resemble some ancient Incan-like ruins and ate a sumptuous feast on the lawn while being entertained with a perpetual tribal dance playing out in front of us. Friday morning came and I went to go to dive after about a 6-hour drive to the Eastern coast of Bali to a site famous for a U.S. WWII wrecked ship that had been even more splintered by the nearby active volcano that oozed into every cranny of the timbers. It was an amazing dive.

I was debating at that point whether I would be safe to fly out on my appointed 1:30 pm flight on Saturday given that it would be barely 24 hours to off-gas the nitrogen load. I went to Kuta to dine on some indigenous food that night and then retired to the local bar scene at Paddy’s nearby. I remember talking to a lot of Australians (since Bali is a favorite destination for proximal Australian tourists) and asked this one Austrialian woman why all of these men were in drag. She explained that they were the Australian football team (that’s soccer to us Yanks) that had just won a championship back home and were celebrating their victory.

I decided to fly out on my 1:30 pm flight on Saturday back to Hong Kong which served as my base camp for part of my travels in Asia. I rarely cannot sleep, but on Sunday evening I got up and opened my friend’s laptop to scan through the New York Times online, which is usually part of my daily morning ritual. I was astonished to read the story about the Bali bombings that occurred the night before at 11:03 pm Saturday night that literally decimated everyone at the night clubs, Sari and Paddy’s, where I had been the night prior. A chill went through my spine, and I lay now definitively awake for the remainder of the night. Fortunately, I phoned my parents the night before to inform them that I had safely returned to Hong Kong on Saturday so they didn’t worry when they heard the news themselves.

I heard that most of the individuals who survived were burned beyond recognition, had lost their sight and/or hearing, and were permanently crippled from the experience if they were not fortunate enough to die. I remember reading a story in the local paper of a Hong Kong man who bent over to pick up some coins he dropped at the precise moment the bomb went off and was spared significant corporeal harm because the bar served as a physical barrier to the blast. When he got up he saw everyone with at least 80% body burns and he held a teenage girl in his arms for less than a minute before she expired. That tale has stuck in my head.

I am extremely thankful for surviving but do not want to be so arrogant to think I am more special than anyone else who did not survive. I emailed the Australian girl that I had met at the bar on Friday, and she recounted that she had made it home prior to that night like me but that the entire Australian football team didn’t. I will always be grateful that I am alive and well, not burned, not deaf, and not blind. If anyone is fearful today or negative, remember well how close we are to having it all taken away and that we should live with an open heart of gratitude.

One of my favorite cities in all of Asia is Shanghai. Perhaps my feelings emerge from its magical history as the international, polished jewel of China a century ago. Perhaps my cherished view of Shanghai reflects half of my legacy, as my mother and her family hail from Shanghai. In any case, it has more to do with it being a fascinating, almost over-wrought, urban metropolis that bespeaks the decadence, opulence, and gusto of modern China.

I travelled with my mother in 1993 throughout China including the greatest-hits tour of Beijing, Shanghai, Guilin, and Xian. By the time I had finished my travels I became intensely appreciative of my home country, the United States, and foreswore a return trip to what I deemed a dusty, impoverished, and barren land. However, by 2002 when I returned to lecture in Shanghai I was floored at the transformation I witnessed. It was as if Sturgis, Michigan (sorry to my in-laws there) had become Chicago, Illinois over night.

I flew into the old airport that is reminiscent of one of the tiny airstrips in the Caribbean islands and flew out of one of the best, if not the best, airport in the entire world, Shanghai Pudong International. The old, dust-caked roads in 1993 gave way to superhighways that arced across the sky and linked every conceivable part of the city to another. The buildings that crowded the skyline were modern and distinct like a major U.S. city with a little less decorum, reflective of the nouveau riche status of China. I remember having a 4-dollar, one-hour foot massage followed by a luxurious French dinner in a restaurant called T8, dining on sweetbreads and foie gras. What a contrast!

After dinner I strolled through the cobblestoned streets that were fabricated to match Europe in a vibrant other worldly area called Xin Tiandi (literally new heaven and earth), partook of some Billie Holliday at a jazz club where the chanteuses sang in English, saw a music video being filmed with interracial couples embracing under a boom crane and was mystified at a McDonald’s version of Starbucks called McCafe. Shanghai is a must see if you are in the Far East even more than Beijing. It will stimulate you, shock you, and offer you a glimpse of the collision of cultures and tastes that is modern China.

Btw, if you haven’t read China Inc. by Ted Fishman, you should. It reveals a lot of the current commercial roots of how China is emerging as a world superpower and how it is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.

The greatest airports in my opinion are in Asia: Pudong (Shanghai), Incheon (Seoul), and Hong Kong. There is nothing like these wonderful ports of entry into a new city. Incheon is one of the best and rivals Shanghai’s Pudong. I have travelled twice to Seoul, once for an extended several weeks during the 5-month trip to Asia and the second time for a week in 2004 to lecture, operate, and actually recover from a flu given the incredibly arduous hours I spent that week only to feel that my self-pity was unfathomable when I stood in line at LAX immediately behind the brave young girl, Bethany Hamilton, who had just lost her left arm to a shark attack a few months before.

Seoul is a complicated city. It bears vestiges of a colonial Japanese past with an imperial palace rebuilt to stucco over that legacy. It shows the strain of a city rapidly industrializing under the shadow of a totalitarian regime a stone’s throw away (with the discovered secret of multiple carved tunnels that the north covertly created to lead to rapid deployment of military southward at a blink.) For cosmetic surgery in Asia, it represents the height of both academic and clinical accomplishments, that have influenced my thinking and practice. It is also filled with warm and inviting individuals with whom I have bonded for life.

I wanted to tell the story of a good friend of whom I am very proud. Dr. Kim was recommended to me by Dr. Shu in Japan for me to visit and to observe. When I first visited him, he practiced out of a small, grayish clinic, and I remember very fondly that one night he wanted to take me out to an “expensive dinner” so he picked Bennigan’s. I informed him that I would rather dine on local fare, to which he first reacted with a puzzled expression that slowly gave way to understanding of sorts. Upon my return 2 years later, he had moved into a lavish new clinic and surgery center in neighboring Bucheon with a lecture hall and had been training fellows and international visitors. In fact, he even translated my book into Korean and got it published. I was wondering about the impetus behind his meteoric transformation. His wife confided in me that I had really changed his life by having him think big and getting him excited again about his work by publishing him in international journals. She mentioned that he had been suffering from ulcers and that his stomach conditions had since dissipated. I was thrilled that my initial short visit would have such a profound and lasting impact.

I remember that when I returned in ’04 to lecture and to operate, we drove up to the Hilton hotel where the lecture series was being given. Dr. Kim had plastered on the side of the hotel my clinic’s name. I really had done no work to organize the meeting but that was what he thought of me and he had me sign all of the program certificates as co-president. Another great surgeon, Dr. Jung, invited me to go to lecture next year 2009 in China but I simply cannot make these long trips away from my practice. I loved training with Dr. Jung and had the good fortune to invite him as a special lecturer in Washington D.C. for a course for which I was the director last year dedicated to the Asian face. I really cherish Drs. Kim and Jung for their convivial hospitality, genuine goodheartedness, and brilliant surgical acumen. They are the core of my remembrance of Seoul and to me are the embodiment of Seoul. Tomorrow we get Shanghai’d to Shanghai.