How to be happy
Rate your happiness
Check off as many statements below as apply…
1. I enjoy being around other people.
2. I believe you can find some good in everyone.
3.There’s an event coming up that I’m looking forward to.
4. I like the way I look.
5. I have good friends I can confide in.
6. I get along with my parents.
7. I sleep well and wake up feeling rested.
8. I feel as though I can take care of my problems.
9. I can think of five nice things to say about myself.
10. I sing or dance around the house.
11. I have goals.
12. I think I have a pretty good chance of reaching my goals someday.
13. Sometimes just the way the light falls on a building fills me with joy.
14. There are a million things I want to do.
The more items you checked, the happier you probably are.
American people have mixed feelings about happiness. On one hand, we’re supposed to pursue it. It’s in the Declaration of Independence; hey, it’s our job. On the other hand, our Puritan heritage wags its finger and tells us not to confuse mere pleasure— which is fleeting and may involve things we’ll hate ourselves for in the morning— with true happiness, which is basically the icing on the cake of accomplishment.
Score one for the Puritans. The great secret of happiness is, in fact, to do the things that make you feel good about yourself. Self-esteem—along with optimism, extroversion and a sense of control—is generally agreed to be one of the four key traits of happy people (you’ll notice that those are the recurring themes in the checklist at left).
But treats count, too. Recent research shows that regular little booster shots of pleasure can help keep your mood elevated to the most cheerful level your genes (more on those later) allow. And those same pleasant events can boost your immune system’s production of antibodies for the next couple of days.
So are happy people healthier? Maybe. Are they likely to have more friends and better jobs? Studies say yes. But which came first? Are these links between good mood and good events cause or effect? Probably a bit of both. Not that it matters. One way or another, happiness is nature’s way of telling you that you’re doing something right. It’s worth pursuing.
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Feb 20th 2008 at 1:10 pm
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