Happiness is a topic close to my heart; I’m certain that
happiness levels are intrinsically linked to health levels, and let’s face it,
who doesn’t want to feel happy?! As 2017 draws close with its connotations of new
starts, I thought I’d share with you the three things that have made the
biggest difference to my happiness.
Being thankful every day
Over the last few months, I’ve started a great new habit. Last
thing every night, I take time to reflect on everything I’m grateful for that
day. No matter how challenging my day has been and how tired I am, I thank God
for all my blessings. In fact I’ve found it’s even more beneficial at the end
of a tough day! I list my daughters, Nick, and my family and friends by name
each night, thinking of each of them as I do, and that alone can really transform
how I’m feeling. I’m thankful for my health, house, job, and that we’re lucky enough
to live in a relatively safe country. I recall moments from my day (a lovely
walk in the countryside with Nick and our girls, a fun lunch with friends) and positive
things that have happened to others (that a family member’s operation went well
or that a friend is pregnant). I’m loving this new habit because it means I go
to sleep with a smile on my face (which also means I sleep better) and I’m more
likely to wake up in a positive frame of mind too.
Being thoughtful about media consumption
Like many people, I was in the habit of consuming media in a
fairly mindless way: listening to, reading or watching whatever happened to be
on my newsfeed or TV. Recently I’ve tried to be more thoughtful about the various
screens in front of me, because I found it affected my mood (and productivity).
I was spending too much time unintentionally half-watching TV or aimlessly scrolling through social media. These habits are hard
to break but I helped myself by deleting apps, and changed my settings on
social media so that videos don’t play automatically and I have to actually
think to myself ‘do I want to spend time watching this?’ I now only watch TV
shows that make me smile or laugh. (You may know that I’ve never been able to
handle anything scary, but you wouldn’t believe how much better my TV/film experience
is without all the gratuitous violence and depressing storylines!) I hardly
ever watch the news anymore, because I decided there is no benefit to anyone of
me watching news programmes that are so regularly focused on negativity and
shock-value stories. I read the news because I want to stay informed, but only
via publications that are more centred on the issues than shock tactics and
doom and gloom. When there is a tragic news story I ask myself if I can do
something to help, such as make a donation, but I don’t spend hours dwelling on
the issue because most of the time me doing that won’t help anyone. I hope that
doesn’t sound heartless; I’m not trying to bury my head in the sand or pretend
tragedies are not occurring around the world but I’d rather be informed and do
something about it, then spend hours just consuming the news reports. I
feel the strong focus on the negative gives a warped perception, which is
enough to make you despair about the state of the world and lose focus on all
the good things.
Spending time helping others
I think this is the one that makes the biggest difference to
my happiness. When I spend time helping others, I feel good about myself
knowing that I’ve done something unselfishly to make someone else’s life
better. I’ve read that there is a second reason why helping others improves our
own happiness: helping people less fortunate changes our perspective of how
fortunate we are. Most people’s assessment of their own situation is based on a
comparison to those around them, and for most of us our circles of comparison
are frighteningly small. If I find myself wishing I had a better house/holiday
plans/whatever (which makes me miserable) then the chances are I am comparing
my situation to friends, neighbours and colleagues in a similar situation to my
own. If I look more broadly and consider the whole country, and even the world,
I am reminded that compared to most, we're incredibly fortunate in terms of
standard of living. Spending time helping others helps to broaden my
perspective and reminds me that I am in fact already much more fortunate than
many others. Therefore in doing so, I’m making myself happier, and making
others happier too. So my resolution for 2017 is to increase my time spent
helping others – here’s to spreading some happiness!
Thank you for reading; I’d love to hear what you think and
if you have any happiness tips to share! Happy 2017! x
No comments:
Post a Comment