We had the good fortune of connecting with Skip & Bobbie Work and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Skip & Bobbie, what was your thought process behind starting your own business?

I fully retired from work after a lifetime of hanging out with the happiest people I could find serving “my country tis of thee, sweet land of liberty,” living & flying all over the world. My many duties allowed me to travel the back roads of the United States from sea to shining sea. American Taxpayers thanked me for my service with generous monthly paychecks for my battered & bruised military service and my final tour of duty riding off into the sunset on so-called Social Security. 

This means for the first time in my life I was getting paid to do whatever I wanted. What I wanted was to earn a PhD in Happiness and open a business to share my wealth of happiness with the world. My vision quest was driven by a desire to thank American taxpayers for their generous monthly allotments by becoming a worldwide Happiness Philanthropist. 

I already had a bachelors & MBA thanks to taxpayers who gifted me with the GI Bill. Earning a PhD in Happiness was an end-of-the-line bucket list item that I thought would be the perfect ending after spending a lifetime following the pièce de resistance advice of songwriters Craig Wiseman & Tim Nichols to “Live like you were Dying.” Luckily, Craig & Tim found Tim McGraw to bring their secret to living a wonderful life to life.

I wanted to earn a PhD in Happiness because my sixth sense told me humankind was losing the war against GRIEF. This is evident watching grief & human unkind tear humankind apart doing everything in their power to drag happy people into their personal pit of pain. I figured out a way to show humankind how to beat the tar out of human unkind and escape grief’s prisoner of war camps once & for all. I then flipped the emotional script of unhappy emotions to show the six levels of happiness once humankind makes their great escape from grief. 

To expand my level of happiness expertise I searched high & low for a college or university that offered a PhD in Happiness. Low & behold, I could not find a single institution of higher learning anywhere in the world that offers a PhD in Happiness. Turns out there is no such thing as a Happiness Doctor. 

How can this be or not to be, philosophically?

In reality, I could not believe my lucky stars. This was an opportunity of a lifetime to happily go where no man or woman has gone before. I was given a free pass to Star Trek into the happiness universe with the love of my life, my beautiful wife, as my guiding light. I was offered a one-in-eight-billion chance to take one small step for our kind, one giant leap for humankind. 

To those of us who have lived & thrived in the cold-blooded unemotional fields of science, technology, engineering & mathematics, we know human emotions are strictly & objectively forbidden in favor of facts, scientifically. With this in mind, it is easy to see why happiness and subjective human emotions are forbidden fruit in the realm of higher education. 

This also explains why the scientific solutions for dealing with grief is to manufacture over 114 pills for anxiety & depression so humankind can go through life unemotionally & comfortably numb. Money may not buy happiness…but it sure buys a whole lot of drugs, alcohol & antidepressants.   

Speaking of science making lots of money off grief, there is an unexpected financial gain for having to venture all alone into the vast happiness universe in pursuit of a happiness PhD that does not exist. I would not have to spend tens of thousands of dollars to buy a PhD from someone who was professionally trained to be an unemotional robot. It felt so right I could not wait to write. All right, all right, all right! 

Proving life has an up & down rhythm & rhyme, I am now in the ABC’s of Happiness philanthropy business full time, on my own dime. Working on happiness day & night is a real-life afternoon delight. Where the scientific solution to grief offers therapy & drugs to turn off hurtful feelings, I designed the ABC’s of Happiness to reignite human emotions and show my kind, humankind, how to turn feelings back on and use them to rock their world.

My business evolved into a non-profit enterprise where being happy & funny was more important than making money. I created a website that includes all my work on my Happiness PhD. The best part about my happy Intellectual Property, aka IP, is that it is free, for the whole wide world to see. It is a happy place where we FEEL what it is like to embrace all our emotions, the good, the bad & the ugly.

My first-of-its-kind doctorate dissertation website, The ABC’s of Happiness @ https://abcsofhappiness.com let us humankind SEE-READ-HEAR-FEEL-SENSE twelve distinct & unique levels of the happy & sad emotions, feelings & senses we all SHARE. 

Even though I will never get to see an unemotional Wizard of ED crown me with a Happiness PhD, my ABC’s of Happiness website is designed to fulfill my impossible dream to “Make Humankind Happy Again.” I am earning my happiness bones without student loans.

Who knows? I just might win the Happiness Doctor title by default since there are no Professors or PhD’s in my happiness heavyweight class. Poor, poor, emotional me, just might be awarded an honorary PhD. We will just have to wait & see.

Below is the chart outlining the 12 levels of grief & happiness in a Sensational Emotional Battlefield Triage “beat grief” cheat sheet. It is an emotional how-do-you-feel chart that a happy doctor, if there was such a thing, would have plastered on their wall. 

This emotional graphic would serve a happy doctor so they can triage, diagnose & treat people with empathy & sympathy and prescribe the ACTIONS it takes to make it to the top of the happiness charts. Not only is my website free for all to see, but it is also empathically & therapeutically drug free. 

But luckily for thee, this interview is not about broken down old me. I am here to give a shout out to all the Music City songwriters who brought my happiness doctorate dissertation website to life.

Is there a person, group, organization, book, etc. that you want to dedicate your shout out to? Who else deserves a little credit and recognition in your story?

SONGWRITERS are the shining stars of my ABC’s of happiness website. They are freedom fighters who lead humankind into battle against grief every single day. Songwriters are humankind’s first & last line of defense against grief. They lead the charge of the writer’s brigade into the valley of the shadow of death to help Humankind win the war against grief and grief’s conscripts, human unkind, once & for all.

Without songwriters & music, my Happiness doctorate dissertation website would have no heart or soul.

The biggest challenge I faced when I started my happiness exploration was trying to figure out a way to bring my doctorate dissertation to life. I knew music was the answer. Thanks to Apple Music, the ABC’s of Happiness website includes links to carefully selected playlists for each & every stage of a Sensationally Happy Boot Camp & Emotionally Sad Boot Camp. I created these boot camps to help Humankind reignite our emotional arsenal to win the war against grief. One boot camp lets us know the enemy to defeat & escape the enemy. The other boot camp shows why happiness is worth fighting for, till death do us part.

But here is the thing. Any old song & dance would not do the trick. I needed honest-to-God lyrics that captured a specific human emotion during each stage of every level of grief & happiness. Whenever I think of honest-to-God lyrics I immediately think of country music.

In other words, I needed to find the perfect pitch of lyrics & songs that would allow humankind to SEE-READ-HEAR-FEEL-SENSE a specific human emotion. Songwriters gave me what I needed. I need to give them a shout out with my emotional gratitude. Songwriters are humankind’s black & white knights of the round table in this never-ending battle against grief.

While Nashvegas is indeed Music City, the heart & soul of the entire community belongs to the songwriters. Songwriters from all over the world flock to Nashville sharing their passion, love, sadness, happiness & most important, their empathy in the symphony of their emotional words & stories.

The hard part about really listening to the lyrics is FEELING the message in a bottle the songwriter is sharing with humanity. So many popular songs are about mama, trains, trucks, prison, getting’ drunk or being down on your luck. Some are gangster, vindictive, even cruel, and sweet revenge is always a best seller. Some songs you can dance to & fall in love with and others are filled with heartache & sadness beyond comprehension dedicated to those who have been ambushed & emotionally left for dead by grief. I had to listen to hundreds if not thousands of songs before I could find the 86 perfect pitch lyrics & musical heartbeats that captured a single emotion humankind shares with one another. 

Great songwriters spark the fires of empathy and ignite burning human emotions. Empathy is defined as “the ability to understand and share the feelings of another.” When we feel the pain of great song lyrics we weep with the songwriter & singer. When we feel the happiness of great song lyrics we rejoice with the songwriter & singer. I would go as far as to say, successful songwriters are the epitome of empathy.

When I needed a song to SEE-READ-HEAR-FEEL-SENSE the barely controllable emotion you feel when you chase an impossible dream and follow your “Passion,” I found Kacey Musgraves, Shane McAnally & Brandy Clark’s “Follow Your Arrow.” 

When I needed a song to SEE-READ-HEAR-FEEL-SENSE the thrill & excitement of what “Euphoria” feels like, Dierks Bentley, Deric J Ruttan, Brett Beavers gave me what I needed with “What was I Thinkin’.” 

When I needed a song that captured what it feels like to be sensationally in “Love” I locked into Troy Verges, Lori McKenna, and Hunter Hayes song “I Want Crazy.” 

My emotional work would have been so much easier if songs were listed by the specific human emotion the writer was trying to capture instead of being grouped by genre. When I was searching for the perfect lyrics for what it feels like to navigate through the 6 stages of Blindside Grief, I had to find songs that allowed Humankind to experience “what does it FEEL like when someone you loved & trusted with all your heart stabs you in the back.” 

To illustrate how hard it is to find the perfect combination of great song lyrics and just the right artist to capture the very intense emotion of “Melancholy” that comes with an “Et Tu Brute?” sneak attack better than anyone else, I present this example. A rock & roll songwriter named Trent Reznor who wrote the song “Hurt” that was a hit for the rock band Nine Inch Nails. The song received a Grammy Award nomination for Best Rock Song in 1996. No question, the original song is a hit.

However, it was not until Johnny Cash covered the song before Trent’s message in a bottle made the cut for the ABC’s of Happiness soundtrack. If you ever get stabbed in the back by someone you loved & trusted I guarantee blindside grief victims will feel a whole lot worse than just feeling “Hurt.” They will feel completely battered & shattered. When you listen to Johnny Cash sing it, you will know exactly how intense the pain & suffering of betrayal FEELS.

When I needed a follow up song for the melancholy feeling of Judas Kiss, I found the perfect song to express the 5th Stage of Blindside Grief. I needed a song that would let humankind experience how devastating it feels in the aftermath of melancholy to feel utterly lost, alone & completely “Rudderless.” Dwight Yoakam saved the day with his powerful lyrics of a broken-hearted aimless drifter who FELT, “A Thousand Miles from Nowhere.” 

The hardest part of my musical research was finding the perfect “escape hatch” song for all six distinct levels of Grief prisons. The entire point of the grief emotional bootcamp was to show humankind what it feels like to break free & escape grief. In the 6 Stages of Blindside Grief case of escape, I needed the perfect lyrics/song so that blindside grief victims trapped in a prison of their own making who had been stabbed in the back could know & FEEL what they had to do to make their escape. As you might expect I uncovered Christian singer/songwriter, Matthew Joseph West, who came to my rescue with his picture-perfect rendition & testimony of feeling “Forgiveness.” 

I followed the emotional trail to great lyrics wherever it took me. When I needed a song for humankind to FEEL what it is like to be “Paralyzed” during the 5 Stages of Pure Evil Grief, like so many military veterans who return from war mentally scarred, broken, and traumatized, I discovered Nate Feuerstein (aka NF) & Thomas James Profitt’s Hip-Hop/Rap song of the same name. Try to imagine the courage it took to put these comatose feelings into words & present them in song so humankind would know exactly how it feels to be emotionally paralyzed. 

These examples show my musical research was not limited to country music. The heartbeat & soul of all music is driven by honest-to-God lyrics which is why country, Christian, R&B, Soul, & even Hip/Hop & Rap and all genres of music walk hand in hand when songwriters share their open & honest humankind emotions and document them.

While country music fans worship incredibly talented stars like Garth Brooks, my admiration & focus of attention goes out to the likes of Anthony Michael Arata. Tony was the solitary soul who sat in a room all by himself capturing the essence of feeling the incredible memories of still being head over heels in love with a love he lost. His painful rendition of, “I could have missed the pain, but I’d have had to miss the dance” is a ray of light in the deep dark world of devastating loss & grief.

Tony’s brokenhearted song lyrics embraced a critical component of the 6 Stages of Mourning Memories, or Mourning Sickness as I like to call it. He summarized his undying love perfectly in “The Dance”. Tony brought Alfred Lord Tennyson: “’Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all” to life in lyric & Garth Brooks magically presented it in song.

 It makes perfect sense that two genres of music, Hip-Hop/Rap & Country Music, would both share the exact same title of “See You Again” in two unique songs written about Mourning Memories acceptance. DJ Frank E, Charlie Puth & Wiz Khalifa on the hip/hop side with Carrie Underwood, Hillary Lindsey & David Hodges on the countryside. Both wrote perfect lyrics for having the undying faith that they accepted the grief they suffered… knowing in their heart & soul… both would see the love they lost again in a better place and that this is not where it ends. 

Thankfully, to close out the 6 Stages of Mourning Memories, the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin would be called upon by songwriters Burt Bacharach & Hal David to sing, “I Say a Little Prayer for You.” Together they helped me allow website viewers to SEE-READ-HEAR-FEEL-SENSE the perfect pitch ending to Mourning Memories using the incredible power of prayer.

These are the types of lyrical songs I endlessly searched for to amplify 86 emotions humankind shares when we are sad and when we are happy. It took years of musical research where I will never stop looking for emotional song lyrics & music to highlight what a single shared human emotion feels like. Great songwriters remind us we are never alone in how we feel. Songwriters are the glue that binds us all together and proves humankind thrives on our emotional connection.

It is fascinating when you dig deep into the lyrics of emotional songs. You get a feel for just how hard it is to capture openly & honestly what a particular human emotion FEELS like. When song lyrics are genuinely great, it connects humankind together with EMPATHY, so the listener ends the song knowing exactly how the songwriter felt. In the best-case scenario, a great song is a hit because it ignites human emotions. 

I mean look at me. I just met you, and this is crazy, but here is my number so “Call Me Maybe” if you do not believe me. Tell me these whacky song lyrics do not make you FEEL better.

Those who spend the time going through the ABC’s of Happiness website will quickly discover it is an emotional symphony of humankind’s grief & happiness. This website is musical therapy for humankind with a proven guidance system to sensational happiness thanks to songwriters. This is why I am so excited to give a shout out to my down-home Music City songwriters that connect with me through thick & thin. 

My goal for the ABC’s of Happiness is for humankind to graphically SEE the up & down road map of emotions we all share. I aimed for humankind to READ the detailed text & song lyrics before they HEAR the song, so they get a SENSE of what it FEELS like to be on the emotional Rollercoaster Ride of a human life. Thanks to songwriters I was able to accomplish my dream of humankind FEELING & SENSING every stage along the way. 

This website is proof positive that humankind weeps together & rejoices together. Our togetherness is all thanks to the one emotion humankind shares with one another called empathy. Human unkind, who lacks empathy, is the only exception to this empathetic humankind rule.

How did you get to where you are today professionally? Was it easy? If not, how did you overcome the challenges? What are the lessons you have learned along the way? What do you want the world to know about you or your brand and story?

I got to where I am today professionally thanks to the unalienable right to life, liberty & the pursuit of happiness given to every American. Life is easy when I feel happy & free. Life is hard when grief attacks & condemns me to a life sentence in a sad & lonely prison filled with anxiety & depression. This means the only challenge I have ever faced was learning how to escape grief’s six prisoner of war camps and then exercising my God-given right to chase another impossible dream. 

When you cut to the core of human emotions, happiness can easily be defined as, “The absence of grief.” This means to experience sensational happiness, having the fortitude & refusal to allow grief to lock you up in a solitary prison is the key to unlocking the many secrets of happiness. Ironically, this also means in the simplest of terms, grief can be defined as, “The absence of happiness.” 

The comfortably numb gray area that lies between happiness & grief is defined as, “The absence of human emotions.” These are the grief prisoners of war who surrender their human emotions to grief and shut down their emotions completely.

Let us just say after 5 magnificent years researching happiness in hamlets & towns across this beautiful country where alabaster cities gleam, and you get to SEE-HEAR-TOUCH-TASTE-SMELL-FEEL our purple mountain majesties, I was inspired to build a “R-O-C-K in the USA” doctorate dissertation website about happiness. The emotional musical soundtrack brings this website to life.

My brand is sensational happiness. My story is I want to be the first of my kind to earn a PhD in Happiness. I am also in the Philanthropist business of working day & night to “Make Humankind Happy Again.”

Let us say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where you would eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc. In your view, what are some of the most fun, interesting, exciting people, places, or things to check out?

The first thing I would do is book a couple of rooms with a balcony at Hampton Inn & Suites Nashville-Downtown on 4th street. This location offers walking distance to the heartbeat of the city. The first excursion would be a short road trip for dinner & drinks at “The Bluebird Café.” The next night we would take a short walk down 4th street for dinner, drinks, and back-to-back shows at “The Listening Room Café.” We would end every night bar hopping on Broadway jamming & dancing the night away. 

The next 5 nights would be a repeat of the first two back & forth between these two-awe inspiring songwriter cafés. We would also head down to the Holiday Inn Nashville Vanderbilt Commodore lounge on West End and listen to songwriters sing for free if money got tight. 

For lunch or dinner, I would take my best friend to Darfon’s, Stoney River Steakhouse and Grill, Merchants, Khan’s Mongolian BBQ & Sushi, and drive out to the outskirts of town in Hermitage and go to the southern delight of What-a-Burger or the best Japanese restaurant in town, Chikuyo Tei. 

During the day in the southland if you ain’t out on a lake you ain’t country enough for Music City. I would have my best friend join me & my wife on our boat where we hit the lake listening to music, sharing age old memories, lies & laughter, catching rays while we are “diggin’ the scene with a gangsta lean.” 

I sing the praise of the gangster 1974 lyrical poetry of R&B singer/songwriter William DeVaughn, to this day. I use his seven-word musical line to prove a point about the power of the poetry given to humankind by those who write & sing their own songs. William figured out a poetic & musical way, so that every time I am cruising & singing that I am, “diggin’ the scene with a gangsta lean,” it is a soul reminder to me & those around me to always “Be thankful for what you got.”

Great song lyrics stick with you through thick & thin until the end. Just like a long-lost friend.

As I said before, and I will say it again. It is not only the incredible music, food, & talented musicians that makes Nashville so great. It is getting to see the real wizards behind the curtain, the songwriters who share their intimate emotions & give true meaning to the one emotion that connects humankind together: Empathy

You will leave Nashville knowing honest-to-God country music was conceived & born in songwriters’ homes, offices and back alleys of Nashville, Tennessee. You will be listening to some of the best songwriters in the world. It is something you will not find anywhere else on the planet.

If we heed the lyrics given to us by country songwriters Luke Laird, Shane McAnally & Walker Hayes there is a good chance that you will discover the meaning of life boils down to all of us “Just tryna stay out of AA.” 

Website: https://abcsofhappiness.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/skip.work.5/

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