The Happiness Project

Odd title for a post on fountains of angst, yes. However, I've been reading a blog called The Happiness Project lately and found it enlightening.

Here are a couple posts that I enjoyed.

Hedonic treadmill:

One of the most significant factors in happiness is the hedonic treadmill, or hedonic adaptation.

People are adaptable. We quickly adjust to a new life circumstance—for better or worse—and consider it normal. Although this helps us when our situation worsens, it means that when circumstances improve, we soon become hardened to new comforts or privileges. Scoring air-conditioning, a bigger house, or a fancy title gives us only a brief boost in happiness before we start to take it for granted. As Aldous Huxley wrote, “Habit converts luxurious enjoyments into dull and daily necessities.” That’s the hedonic treadmill.

But we can offset this effect by reminding ourselves how much we enjoy something, or how lucky we are.

Do good, feel good.

When it comes to happiness, it’s very important to remember to ACT AS YOU WANT TO FEEL. People believe they act because of the way they feel, but in fact, we very often feel because of the way we act.

So to change your emotions, change your actions. If you want to feel like a caring person, act in a caring way. If you want to have more loving feelings toward someone, perform loving actions for that person's benefit. Doing good makes you feel good.

It really works.

Regular exercise:

Exercise helps make you happy. People who exercise are healthier, more energetic, think more clearly, sleep better, and have delayed onset of dementia. They also get relief from anxiety and mild depression, comparable to medication and therapy.

But even when you acknowledge the tremendous benefits, if you’re not already exercising regularly, it can be hard to adopt the habit. I managed to change myself from a natural sloth to an enthusiastic exerciser by using all these tricks:

Always exercise on Monday. This sets the psychological pattern for the week.

Never skip exercising for two days in a row. You can skip a day, but the next day, you must exercise no matter how inconvenient.

DON’T link exercise to weight loss as a way to motivate yourself. Although it’s quite true that people who exercise regularly are far more likely to keep weight off, you’ll find yourself justifying missing your run by turning down two Saltines. And if you don’t lose weight easily (who does?), you’re likely to give up exercise as futile.

Check it out. Life can't be all about the angst.

The Happiness Project