I think that last line is especially fascinating: "Actual changes in income, on the other hand, buy very little happiness. The Terman study, covered in The Longevity Project , found that relationships and how we help others were important factors in living long, happy lives:. Those who felt very loved and cared for, we predicted, would live the longest.
Beyond social network size, the clearest benefit of social relationships came from helping others. Those who helped their friends and neighbors, advising and caring for others, tended to live to old age.
In The Happiness Advantage , Shawn Achor recommends spending time in the fresh air to improve your happiness:. This is good news for those of us who worry about fitting new habits into already busy schedules. Twenty minutes is a short enough time to spend outside that you could fit it into your commute or even your lunch break.
In fact, participants were found to be substantially happier outdoors in all natural environments than they were in urban environments. The American Meteorological Society published research in that found current temperature has a bigger effect on our happiness than variables like wind speed and humidity, or even the average temperature over the course of a day. It also found that happiness is maximized at 57 degrees The connection between productivity and temperature is another topic we've talked about more here.
It's fascinating what a small change in temperature can do. One of the most counterintuitive pieces of advice I found is that to make yourself feel happier, you should help others. In fact, hours per year or two hours per week is the optimal time we should dedicate to helping others in order to enrich our lives.
Spending money on other people, called 'prosocial spending,' also boosts happiness. The Journal of Happiness Studies published a study that explored this very topic:. Afterward, participants chose whether to spend a monetary windfall on themselves or someone else. Participants assigned to recall a purchase made for someone else reported feeling significantly happier immediately after this recollection; most importantly, the happier participants felt, the more likely they were to choose to spend a windfall on someone else in the near future.
So spending money on other people makes us happier than buying stuff for ourselves. But what about spending our time on other people? A study of volunteering in Germany explored how volunteers were affected when their opportunities to help others were taken away:. Volunteering was still widespread. Due to the shock of the reunion, a large portion of the infrastructure of volunteering e.
Based on a comparison of the change in subjective well-being of these people and of people from the control group who had no change in their volunteer status, the hypothesis is supported that volunteering is rewarding in terms of higher life satisfaction.
As opposed to actually taking a holiday, simply planning a vacation or break from work can improve our happiness. A study published in the journal Applied Research in Quality of Life showed that the highest spike in happiness came during the planning stage of a vacation as people enjoy the sense of anticipation:.
After the vacation, happiness quickly dropped back to baseline levels for most people. If you can't take the time for a vacation right now, or even a night out with friends, put something on the calendar--even if it's a month or a year down the road. Meditation is often touted as an important habit for improving focus, clarity, and attention span, as well as helping to keep you calm.
It turns out it's also useful for improving your happiness :. The study, published in the January issue of Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging , concluded that after completing the course, parts of the participants' brains associated with compassion and self-awareness grew, and parts associated with stress shrank. Meditation literally clears your mind and calms you down. It's often been proved to be the single most effective way to live a happier life.
According to Achor, meditation can actually make you happier long-term:. And research even shows that regular meditation can permanently rewire the brain to raise levels of happiness. The fact that we can actually alter our brain structure through meditation is most surprising to me and somewhat reassuring that however we feel and think today isn't permanent. For more on the subject, here's what happened when I Jeff decided to try meditation. Our commute to work can have a surprisingly powerful impact on our happiness.
Take the same approach with your workspace, she advises. Make it as orderly as you can. Neatening up your workspace and getting rid of stuff you don't need will make you feel calmer and more in control, she says. But don't limit yourself to just decluttering. Take it seriously.
That's very unhealthy and unloving," Schwartz says. Try to work in a place where you have access to natural light, she advises. If that's not possible, invest in full-spectrum light bulbs. Either way, make sure to get outside for a walk as often as you can. Does this sound like you? If you're bringing a bag of coffee to someone else, you pick out a luxury brand in a nice package, but if you're buying it for yourself, you pick the store brand or another inexpensive option.
That's fine if you're one of these people to whom all coffees taste alike. But if you prefer the more expensive brand, you should go for it, Schwartz says.
Top Stories. Top Videos. Some are lucky enough to copy with this task quickly, others face quite a few obstacles on the way to happiness and there are even those who end up living their life all alone.
People write songs about love, they call it the greatest gift or, conversely, the most terrible curse. Some say that this feeling is just a form of mental illness, while others claim that love is the result of a specific chemical reaction. Anyway, no one of us can say what it is. All we know for sure is that our soulmates make us happy. Moreover, they can even move you closer to the understanding of this unexplainable but magnificent phenomenon.
The first one is passion, the second is attraction, and the third is the powerful attachment. And frankly, the only thing that matters is that there is someone who makes us smile.
All people want to be happy.
0コメント