excerpts from the post by eric barker
1) Thank someone
First thing in the morning, send an email thanking or praising someone.
Research shows this can brighten your day.
2) Spend money — on someone else
Harvard professor Michael Norton, author of Happy Money: The Science of
Smarter Spending, talks about this in this video
3) Give 5 hugs
In a one-of-a-kind study, students at Pennsylvania State University were
assigned to two groups. The first group was instructed to give or recevie a
minimum of five hugs per day over the course of four weeks and to record the
details. The hugs had to be front-to-front (nonsexual) hugs, using both arms of
both participants; however, the length and strength of hug, as well as the
placement of hands, were left to their discretion. Furthermore, these students
couldn’t simply huge their boyfriends or girlfriends half a dozen times; they
had to aim to hug as many different individuals as possible. The second, the
controls, was instructed simply to record the number of hours they read each
day over the same four weeks.
People assigned to give or receive hugs 5 times a day ended up happier than the
control group. From Sonja Lyubomirsky’s book
4) Do stuff you’re good at
People who deliberately exercised their signature strengths on a daily basis —
those qualities they were uniquely best at, the talents that set them apart
from others – became significantly happier for months.
5) Do 5 little nice things for others
…individuals told to complete five acts of kindness over the course of a day
report feeling much happier than control groups and that the feeling lasts for
many subsequent days, far after the exercise is over. To try this yourself,
pick one day a week and make a point of committing five acts of kindness. But
if you want to reap the psychological benefit, make sure you do these things
deliberately and consciously—you can’t just look back over the last 24 hours
and declare your acts post hoc.
6) Create something to look forward
to
One study found that people who just thought about watching their favorite
movie actually raised their endorphin levels by 27 percent. Often, the most
enjoyable part of an activity is the anticipation. 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. Then whenever you
need a boost of happiness, remind yourself about it.
7) Spend time with friends
Having a better social life is the happiness equivalent of making an extra
$131,232 a year:
There is substantial evidence in the psychology and sociology literature that
social relationships promote happiness for the individual. Yet the size of
their impacts remains largely unknown. This paper explores the use of shadow
pricing method to estimate the monetary values of the satisfaction with life
gained by an increase in the frequency of interaction with friends, relatives,
and neighbours. Using the British Household Panel Survey, I find that an
increase in the level of social involvements is worth up to an extra £85,000 a
year in terms of life satisfaction. Actual changes in income, on the other
hand, buy very little happiness.
8) Before bed, write down three good things that happened today
Every night for the next week, set aside ten minutes before you go to sleep.
Write down three things that went well today and why they went well. You may
use a journal or your computer to write about the events, but it is important
that you have a physical record of what you wrote. The three things need not be
earthshaking in importance (“ My husband picked up my favorite ice cream for
dessert on the way home from work today”), but they can be important (“ My
sister just gave birth to a healthy baby boy”).
