Here’s a typical abstract of recent Happiness Research…

We tend to adapt, quickly returning to our usual level of happiness. The classic example of such “hedonic adaptation” comes from a 1970s study of lottery winners, who a year after their windfall ended up no happier than nonwinners. Hedonic adaptation helps to explain why even changes in major life circumstances–such as income, marriage, physical health and where we live–do so little to boost our overall happiness. Not only that, but studies of twins and adoptees have shown that about 50 percent of each person’s happiness is determined from birth. This “genetic set point” alone makes the happiness glass look half empty, because any upward swing in happiness seems doomed to fall back to near your baseline.

Explore our happiness quotes explaining how to create happiness and a happy life. Use the Search Box on the right to look for happy quotes and topics in this blog that are important to you.  Enjoy HappinessHabit.com and  Creating-Happiness.com!

Links to some of our most popular quotes for creating a happy life:

Dealing Distress & Despair:  Don’t Beat Yourself Up! · Bouncing Back Quickly, Powerfully ·  Feeling Overwhelmed? ·  Dealing With Dangerous, Deranged Thoughts  ·   Detach From Distress and Despair ·  Avoid The Fault Finding Feel Goods · Defeating the Dismal Downers  ·   NEW – Happiness Habits For Veterans

Creating Happiness: Have A Good Time All The Time ·  YOUR Best ·   Savor, Enjoy, Appreciate ·  Forgiveness And Happiness ·  Fight With Finesse · What Are Habitually Happy People? ·  Can You Really Be Happy All of the Time? ·  Happiness Lessons From The Godfather · Love Powers Happiness ·  Happiness And Greatness ·  Happiness Without Hardness ·  Happiness And Pride ·  Happiness & Mastering The Art Of Living · Happiness And “Work”

Sadly, the Happiness Blog is being hacked – it’s been seeded with typos, links are being broken, sentences rearranged or garbled so they don’t make sense.  We’re fixing these problems as fast as we find them. If you come across anything weird, please Tweet us or Comment to alert us so we can fix it. MANY THANKS!

What causes the Dismal Downers and what can we do to defeat or deter them?

Photographs showing differences in brain activity when people are depressed – like this from  the Mayo Clinic – may be familiar.

Reduced Brian Activity Is Associated With Depression. One of the keys to raising our spirits and defeating depression is to find ways to stimulate our brain activity.

Exercise –  Many research studies show that regular rigorous exercise improves brain function and brightens people’s moods. This may be tied to improvements in the supply of blood flow to the brain.

Our brains represent about 2% of our body mass, but they consume about 25% of our body’s supply of oxygen. Brain function declines when brain blood flow declines.  (Source: Massachusetts General Hospital “Mind, Mood & Memory” August, 2011)

Neural activity also stimulates blood flow to specific parts of the brain, but one’s heart and circulatory system must be strong enough to support the necessary increased flows.

Music – Many people also find music helps brighten their moods – the music stimulates their brains and their bodies into greater activity.

Stimulants – Other types of stimulants like alcohol, drugs or caffeine may produce the same effects but with negative consequences. They briefly raise blood pressure, alertness and mental activity but they also set us up for a reactive downer when the effects of the stimulants pass.

We can achieve many of the same things naturally without these negative consequences. This is why a brisk walk can do so much to brighten our mood and increase our mental  alertness.

We can avoid overeating and dairy products and starches that make many people sleepy and slow.

We can choose to stimulate our own minds with lots of challenging, interesting thoughts. People who continually love to learn or acquire new skills or languages are found to retain their mental acuity into old age.

Habitually Happy people continually stimulate their minds with a constant stream of interesting, exciting, creative thoughts and mental activity. They think boredom is an inability to entertain ourselves when our environmental stimulation is low.

The Best Stimulation of All Is Happiness, Fun and a Good Time. Habitually Happy People Try To Have A Good Time All of The Time. 

Why Not Try It, It’s A Great, Fun Way To Brighten Your Mood, Defeat The Dismal Downers and Sharpen Your Mind!

Copyright 1999- , Michele Moore. All Rights Reserved. Explore HappinessHabit.com and Creating-Happiness.com for more happiness quotes. Our materials may NOT be published, broadcast, redistributed or rewritten without written permission from the authors.

Wrap the Pain In Love – Remember what a big, warm, loving hug feels like?  Whenever you need it, give yourself a big hug and wrap your pain, fear and bad memories in love.

When bad thoughts or feelings come to mind, picture yourself getting a great big warm hug and remember how great it makes you feel.  Mentally give yourself that big, wonderful hug. Wrap the pain, the fear and the bad memories in love.

Enjoy that warm, loving hug for a few moments, and then immediately shift your attention to positive, constructive objectives. You don’t have to physically hug yourself to have this work well and nobody needs to know what you’re thinking or doing.

Our Happiness Habit research shows the happiest people are the most loving people – they love what they do, they love the people around them, they love their work and they love themselves.  Wherever love is limited or lacking, there is no happiness. To be happy, try to love expansively and extensively.

Our Focus Determines Our Feelings – Thinking about bad things makes feel sad, angry or anxious. Shifting our attention to good things makes us feel happy, energized and enthusiastic.

That’s why it’s so important to move from problems to possible positive solutions quickly.  Focusing on what’s wrong keeps us stuck in misery.

Painful visions and memories give us powerful jolts of Negative Energy, they are our own personal horror shows.  Defuse those bad thoughts by wrapping them in love and then shifting attention to pleasant objectives. They are painful distraction from the happy life you want to enjoy.

Revolt & Rebel against letting painful past memories take control of your thoughts and feelings.  Fight back and refuse to give them control.  Wrap them in love and refocus your attention on being happy and whatever you are trying to achieve.

Happiness Is Healing – Happiness is the best way to put painful experiences behind us.  Expect everything you do to be enjoyable and then try to make everything you do fun, interesting and rewarding.

Try To Have A Good Time All Of The Time.  Fuel Your Life And Your Work With Love And Fun.  

This posting will be expanded soon.  Hope it helps!

Copyright 1999- , Michele Moore. All Rights Reserved. Explore HappinessHabit.com and Creating-Happiness.com for more happiness quotes and insights. Our materials may NOT be published, broadcast, redistributed or rewritten without written permission from the authors.

Stuart Smalley - Saturday Night Live (Al Franken)

Saturday Night Live’s Stuart Smalley comes to mind whenever I hear the word Affirmations.  Silly, nonsensical, comic.

Focus On What You Want To Achieve And The Steps You Must Take To Attain It is a key Happiness Habit.

We think it is critical to focus on your goals AND what you need to do to achieve them.

Repeating Positive affirmations over and over again, saying and pretending that you have already achieved your goals is delusional and counterproductive. This does not emphasize what you actually need to do to attain your goals.

Positive affirmations are very much part of our “The Secret” driven culture. They do everyone a serious disservice.

If you wander around pretending you already have achieved something you have not worked for, it’s easy to get lost in lies.

Here’s a paraphrased example of affirmations from a self help book I recently saw:

• There are two things you must know to reach a goal. First it must be clearly identified and quantified.  Second, goals should be written and affirmed as if they already existed.
• To affirm something, you write and / or state it repeatedly, sincerely believing it has already been accomplished.
• Your affirmation might sound something like this:  “I have sold five units as of January 30, 2011. Gross income from these sales is $500,000 and net profit is $80,000. I am respected and lead my field in sales production.”
• By expressing your desired outcome in the present tense, you condition your subconscious mind to accept it as fact. This method is taught by most success motivators.
• Write your affirmations several times each morning and evening. Post them on your bathroom mirror, refrigerator, your computer or car dashboard. Refer to them often and repeat them out loud. Believe them!
• By planting this seed of positive expectancy you condition yourself to move toward your goal swiftly and unswervingly.

Does this sound familiar? No where does it describe what you actually must do, or do differently to achieve these goals!

Wishing doesn’t make things real. Repeating affirmations over and over again detaches you from reality. If you truly believe it when you have not achieved it, it is delusional.

So focus on what you what to achieve and the steps you must take to attain it.

Positive affirmations do help you to step into the right mind set to perform and present yourself at your best. A successful salesman I know always says: “Cool, confident, successful and savvy” to himself before he walks into any room to remind himself of how he wants to think of himself and what we wants to project.

This helps him connect with a clear image of the person he wants to be – but it is very different from pretending and telling himself he has already done something he hasn’t worked to attain.

Use affirmations to help you to connect with your best self and then:

Focus On What You Want To Achieve And The Steps You Must Take To Attain It to achieve your dreams.

Copyright 1999- , Michele Moore. All Rights Reserved. Explore HappinessHabit.com and Creating-Happiness.com for more happiness quotes. Our materials may NOT be published, broadcast, redistributed or rewritten without written permission from the authors.

Our Aim Determines Our Achievements

If you want to be happy or happier, make happiness and enjoying life your goals.

Whatever you have to do, try to enjoy it!  Find ways to make ALL your activities enjoyable, rewarding and meaningful.

Make Doing Well AND Feeling Well Your Top Personal Priorities

Expect to enjoy everything you do and then find ways to make everything you do enjoyable, meaningful and rewarding – for everyone involved.

Propel Your Life and Your Work With Fun! Continually create your own happiness.

Try To Have A Good Time ALL of The Time!

Sound simple?  It is!

Learn how happiness works and start building happiness in your life.

Many people want to be happy but they expect happiness to magically descend on them, like a dove from heaven.  They don’t know how to create happiness in their lives or for the people around them.

They don’t realize happiness is right there at their finger tips, waiting for them to reach out and enjoy it.

If you don’t make happiness a personal priority, happiness often only appears by accident or as an afterthought.  Life is too short for that.

To Be Happy or Happier, Aim For Happiness.  Make Happiness Your Goal and Work To Achieve It.

Copyright 1999-     , Michele Moore. All Rights Reserved. Explore HappinessHabit.com and Creating-Happiness.com. Our materials may NOT be published, broadcast, redistributed or rewritten without written permission from the authors.

Here are ways to make your holidays joyous during difficult times.

(For more ideas see Holiday Happiness In Hard Times and Happiness Hints for the Holidays 2 and Happiness Hints for the Holidays 1 )

Love Expansively – Love propels happiness in all circumstances, it is especially important during difficult times.

In hard times we may forget to Love because we are so concerned about other things.  This is the time when we need Love the most – both to give Love and receive it!

The happiest people are always the most loving people: they love the people around them, they love what they do, they love their work and they love themselves.

If you have ever been to a third world country where people have little materially but great joy you know the truth of this statement.  Learn from them and do what they do.

Love is something we can grow, loving is something we can decide to do.  Wherever love is limited or lacking there is no happiness.

One of the greatest holiday gifts we can give good times or bad is simply setting a loving, positive, joyous tone that embraces all the good things and the people around us.

To be happy in good times or bad, love expansively and extensively.

Resolve to have a fun and festive Happiness Habit Holiday despite what may be happening.

Here are more Happiness Habits that can brighten your holiday:

Be Guided By Goodness –  Doing Good Helps You To Feel Good

Savor, Enjoy and Appreciate all the good things that do come into your life.

Don’t Beat Yourself Up!

Avoid the Fault Finding Feel Goods and Eliminate All UnNecessary Negativity.

Rebel Against Bad Feelings – Refuse to let bad events drag you down or interfere with your holiday joy.

Expect To Enjoy Everything You Do and then Find Ways To Make What You Do Meaningful and Enjoyable.

Want even more ideas for a happy holiday? See Creating-Happiness.com

Wishing you very happy holidays,

Michele Moore and the
Happiness Habit Team

Eager excitement and anticipation blaze in our New Year’s celebrations.

We are determined to make this year much better than the last which just gratefully passed.

Now, barely several weeks into the New Year, many of us feel the Gnawing Nags of Negativity signaling New Years Resolution Remorse.

We have not done and are not doing all of the things we were so enthusiastically determined to do.

The power of habits, inertia and the demands of life seem to be dragging us back into the same ruts we wanted to escape.  So what do we do?

Here are a few key Happiness Habits to help you redouble your determination and desire to achieve your New Year’s goals and aspirations:

Don’t Beat Yourself Up – Criticizing and castigating yourself is damaging, demoralizing and very counterproductive. We do it because as children, adults punished us in efforts to improve our behavior, so we do it to ourselves thinking it will make us better.  It doesn’t, it defeats us.

Expect Lapses and Plan for Them – Many successful personal development programs grow in fits and starts with great leaps forward alternating with relapses backwards.  The key is to learn how to handle your relapses well.

Failure Is NOT Falling Down, It’s Staying Down – Giving up because you made a goof or series of goofs is a grievous condemnation and limitation on your future performance.  Successful people make mistakes, they are also determined not be defeated by them.

Misery Is Meant To Make Us Move – Those Gnawing Nags of Remorse and Negativity are a powerful, helpful signs you are slipping back into patterns and behaviors you resolved to avoid.   Say “Thank you Resolution Remorse, you are reminding me and reinforcing my resolve to achieve my goals.”

Redouble Your Determination, Drive and Desire – Your dreams haven’t changed, you are just disappointed in your recent actions to attain them.  This doesn’t mean you can’t do it.  Reinforce your resolve to work hard to achieve your goals.

Drive Discipline With Desire –  Don’t view discipline as deprivation, see discipline as steps to dream realization.  The secret to successful discipline is to always desire something positive more than whatever tempts you. Fire up and redouble your desire to achieve your goals.

See Small, Very Specific Steps To Success – Start small, construct your process as a series of small, very specific steps that lead to dream fulfillment. Continually celebrating successful completion of each step sets you up for a series of successes.

Lapses Mean You Have To Work Even Harder – Make up for your mistakes and work hard to catch up and stay on track.

Continually Recall And Reinforce Your Resolve – Remember and relive the feelings that lead to your resolution.  Continually reinforce your desire and determination, rekindle your resolve to achieve your dream.

Happy New Year from Michele Moore and the  Happiness Habit Team!

Copyright 1999-     , Michele Moore. All Rights Reserved. Explore HappinessHabit.com and HappinessBlog.com. Our materials may NOT be published, broadcast, redistributed or rewritten without written permission from the authors. Photograph from Dreamstime.com

Be Honest About Where You Are, Decide To Be Deliberately Different – Consciously deciding to change and do things differently helps cut painful connections with the past.  Different can be very delightful, deliberately deciding to do things differently can be very liberating.

Joy Has NO Price Tag – Our greatest joys don’t come from gifts of material things.  The people, memories, experiences and magic moments that bring us the most joy are not tangible items. Recall sources of joy in the past and recreate them in new and different ways.

Create a Colonial Christmas – imagine what Christmas was like 250 years ago for the first settlers of our country. Create a 1760’s Christmas – simple, joyous, special.  Decorate using free, natural items:  pine cones, evergreen limbs, pop corn strings.

Cut simple decorative shapes from colored paper or old magazines.  Enjoy candles with mirrors.  Look for bonfires if you don’t have a fireplace.

Consider Exchanging Care Coupons – Create and decorate coupons for the intangible gifts your loved ones will value the most:

• This coupon is good for one hour of help with anything you ask – I promise to work hard happily, enthusiastically and energetically.

• This coupon is good for one hour of undivided, uninterrupted time together doing exactly what you want to do.  I promise to give my full, undivided, sincere, enthusiastic attention and appreciation to you and whatever you decide to do.

Create a Another Country’s Non Commercial,  Cultural Christmas – What Christmas would be like if you were living in a Hindu, Muslim or Buddhist country?  Or in a simple village in Latin America?  Mongolia?  Ethiopia?  Learn about other cultures, recreate one for a memorable, enjoyable holiday.

Emphasize Enjoyable Experiences – Look for experiences that bring happiness and joy in the holiday season.

End Extravagant Expectations – Money does not buy a joyful holiday.

See Stabs Of Self Pity As An SOS – Immediately redirect your time, energy and attention toward thoughts, actions, objectives and activities that will help you to build happiness and spiritual success.

Enjoy Natural Beauty – Take walks.  Savor, enjoy and appreciate the beauty around you:  the special smells, the fresh air on your face, the spectacular sunsets you were always too busy to watch.

Assess Reality Accurately, Don’t Get Carried Away – Don’t diminish holiday joy by over spending, over eating or over compensating for any difficulties, it’s not necessary.

Strangers Can Offer Security And Safety – Family relationships and even long standing friendships can suddenly turn toxic over the holidays.  New or different people change holiday dynamics and interactions.  Changing the place, time and theme of holiday celebrations can help break bad ruts.

Begin Your New Year’s Resolutions Early –  Whatever they are, begin now.  Eat and drink healthily.  Avoid excesses, too much rich food, alcohol.  Too many sweets and starches can drive you nuts.   Jump start your diet, exercise or personal development programs.  Exercise aggressively. Eat wisely.

Continually Sparkle, Radiate and Set A Positive, Enthusiastic  Holiday Tone – Consciously deciding to continually sparkle and radiate joy raises your spirits and the spirits of the people around you.  Use holidays as an excuse to smile, speak and greet strangers warmly. Extend a genuine holiday welcome to everyone you meet.

Be Adventuresome And Creative – Decide to do things you haven’t done before, or decide to do them in very different ways.

There are lots of wonderful new ways to enjoy the holidays, find them, explore  and enjoy them.

Look For Free Festive Activities With New People In New Places – Volunteering to help others often comes with free food and fun holiday festivities. Find free concerts, free special holiday events and religious activities. Learn about different cultures or religious groups. Visit a friend, relative or shut in who will relish your company.

Spend time really exploring, enjoying and savoring the holiday season and holiday decorations.  Do things you were always too busy to do in the past.  Make this holiday wonderfully different and it won’t be deficient.

Creativity Is A Key To Happiness In Ordinary Times, It Is Especially Important In Hard Times.  Find Creative New Ways To Enjoy Your Holiday And Bring Joy To Others!