How to Be Happy: Simple Solution Works, Says Harvard
Want to succeed? Increase your confidence? Know how to be happy?
If you answered a resounding, “YES!,” then I have the world’s simplest solution for you — a solution that’s backed by a Scientific Study, conducted by Harvard.
Step 1:
Buy a notebook.
Step 2:
Each night, before you go to bed, record each of your daily accomplishments — no matter how small they might seem. Voila! Now you know how to be happy!
Can Something so Simple Really Work?
Absolutely — if you take the requisite 5 minutes to write in your journal each day.
But most of us are programmed to self-criticize. We brood about the things that didn’t go our way. Texting, posting, and tweeting, we blab about our unhappiness. We call sympathetic friends and ruin THEIR day by whining about the guy who cut us off on the freeway, the lover who never called, or the co-worker who missed her deadline, forcing us to work an hour late.
According to the Universal Law of Attraction, whatever you focus on — Fear or Appreciation — is going to make you magnetic to the very thing that you Fear or Appreciate.
How to be Happy: The Progress Principle
Here’s food for thought: The Harvard Business School conducted a study about “The Progress Principle.” This study concluded that focusing on “small wins” activates positive chemistry in your brain that allows for a more rewarding life. In other words, if you want to know how to be happy, you must retrain your brain. You must focus on what makes you happy.
For approximately 15 years, Harvard’s Teresa Amabile and study co-author, Steven Kramer, looked at psychological experiences on the job. They surveyed people about their emotions, moods, and motivation levels. Participants were asked to keep diaries and record the events that stood out in their minds.
Amabile and Kramer learned that the daily practice of recording “small wins” helps people appreciate their daily progress. This appreciation can boost a person’s confidence, which can lead to bigger achievements and future successes.
Remember the saying, “Life’s not about the Destination: it’s about the journey?”
Yep. Harvard proved that.
Progress vs Accomplishment
The study reports that Progress shouldn’t be defined solely as the accomplishment of long-term goals and major breakthroughs. While big wins can be exciting, they tend to happen far less often than “small wins” – like taking the vacuum to the repair shop (finally!)
Thus, learning how to be happy means breaking old mental habits. We must begin to define “Progress” in such a way, that it includes positive, small events in our lives. For example, you followed through on your pledge to walk vigorously for 15 minutes, or you started the first draft of you resume.
Amabile and Kramer wrote, “Any accomplishment, no matter how small, activates the reward circuitry of our brains. When this pathway is opened, some key chemicals are released that give us a feeling of achievement and pride. In particular, the neurotransmitter, dopamine, is released, which energizes us and gives us a feel-good aura. This chemical enables us not only to get that sweet feeling of reward, but (it) also motivates us to take action and repeat what we did to trigger its release in the first place.”
So if you want to know how to be happy, stop looking for some external miracle! Your brain is your secret superpower. All you have to do is focus it in a deliberate way. Record 1 small win in your journal each night. One win! How hard can that be?
Best of all, the payoff is HUGE: Positive feelings, confidence, and success.
Adrienne, The Austin Party Psychic
Fun & Good Fortunes to Uplift Your SpiritsAdrienne brings light and joy to Texans as a psychic reader, an energy healer, and a bestselling author. The State Comptroller invited her to speak at Texas's inaugural Idea Fair; a State Senator hired her to make Tarot predictions at his holiday party; and local hospitals asked her to demonstrate the benefits of her "healing harp" in their neuro ICUs. Adrienne's greatest joy is to help her clients discover their intuitive gifts. She channels spiritual guidance from the Angelic Realm and Master Spirit Guides. Thanks to her work on a national psychic hotline, she has attracted clientele from coast to coast. Closer to home, Adrienne styles herself as "The Austin Party Psychic," introducing thousands of (skeptical) Texans to metaphysical principles in a playful, upbeat manner. She is now accepting new clients for private psychic readings. To learn more, click the link in the navigation bar.
