The secrets to living a happier life

Living a happier, more meaningful and fulfilled life comes down to increasing our understanding and making some basic changes.

by: E.B. Johnson

Happiness seems like an elusive concept to many of us, as complex as it is fleeting and as difficult to attain as enlightenment or a luxury sports car. It’s something we’re all chasing, but it seems to be something so few of us find. Why? Is it because happiness is a hard thing to achieve? No. It’s because it’s a hard state to maintain when we stay focused on all the wrong things.

True happiness serves an important purpose in our lives, and it can empower us to make some really incredible changes. When we’re happy, we’re healthier, better connected, and better able to solve the problems and challenges that modern life throws our way. It’s important. But learning how to be happy starts with learning how to define that happiness for ourselves, while making incremental changes to simple aspects of our lives.

What is happiness?

Happiness is a state of mind, and one that can dramatically impact our day-to-day lives. Rather than being a long-lasting or permanent personality trait, it’s an emotional place of being that is both fleeting and changeable. Happiness isn’t just something that we inherently have. It’s something we have to cultivate intentionally in our lives, but that cultivation looks different for everyone.

Also referred to as wellbeing, true happiness is stable and emanates from our core. It is not pleasure, and it is not meaning. Rather, it is a personally defined place of existence that allows us to see ourselves and our environments in a more positive light. Happiness gives us confidence and self-esteem, but it doesn’t harry us like our fear or our anxieties. While it can occur on several different planes, the results are always the same: it makes us feel good.

Learning how to define our own happiness starts by understanding it and understanding how it applies to and improves our lives. True happiness is a transformative tool that allows us to unlock some truly incredible opportunities in our lives. It can also help us build our resilience and strengthen our resolve when seeking the things we want in this life. Happiness isn’t some fairy dream. It’s a real and accessible means to a better tomorrow.

Why happiness matters.

Being happy is good. It makes us feel good, and it empowers us to make others feel good. When we seek happiness, we’re usually also seeking the things that brings us to a higher state of being. Who we are is inherently tied into happiness, and learning how to tap into its powers improves our lives in a number of ways.

It makes us better problem solvers.

Some studies have shown that happiness actually makes us better problem solvers. Those who are more positive or in a happier state find it easier to solve problems, and are able to do so more efficiently. Not only are they more inventive, but they also concentrate better — something which might occur thanks to lower levels of stress. Happiness improves our ability to learn and remember things, an invaluable gift in today’s fast-paced world.

It improves our health.

There have been a number of studies that have shown the link between stress and health, and that’s why happiness can play a critical role in boosting our feel-good vibes. Happy, positive thoughts actually impact even the cellular level of our bodies, helping to produce chemicals that boost immunity, cell repair and even muscle strength. It’s good for our health, and it makes us feel better about getting in shape or reinvigorating our fitness routines in new and surprising ways.

It helps us live longer.

Whether we like it or not, the fact remains: happy people live longer. One study — conducted among nuns who were asked to write short, biographical sketches before taking their vows — showed that, at the age of 85, those with more cheerful dispositions were still alive; versus just 54% of those who were identified as being more negative or unhappy. At 95 years of age, 54% of the happiest nuns were still living, compared to just 11% of those who were ranked among the most unhappy.

It makes us more resilient.

When we’re happy, we’re more optimistic and that makes it easier for us to deal with stress and bounce back after traumatic life events and hardship. Expecting positive things to happen goes a long way in allowing you to identify positive pathways to positive outcomes, even in the midst of stress and chaos. Feeling happy can empower you to see and act on options that you might have missed otherwise, mired in the much of negative thinking. Looking for a good outcome has a funny way of presenting them to you.

The 10 secrets to living a happier life.

Living a happier life isn’t about expensive retreats or a stack of self-help books, it’s about getting back to the root of who you are and identifying the things that make your soul tick. If you want to be happier, it comes down to shifting your thinking and learning how to address — honestly — who you are and what you want from life and the people around you.

1. Focus on the positive side

A lot can be said for positive thinking and the benefits it can bring to our lives. If we’re looking to truly transform our longterm happiness, we have to retrain our brains to look on the brighter side, and learn how to move away from focusing only on the negative. When we move from a negative mindset to a more positive one, it unlocks some really surprising opportunities.

Spend some time each day considering three things that are constructive or positive in your life. They can be big things, or small, and should exclude obligations like work or school (unless those things are exceptionally great for your sense of self). Do this 3x a day for 28 days to turn it into a habit that your brain can start doing automatically. Over time, you’ll get better at recognizing the silver linings in life.

Another way to retrain your brain is to use a positive mantra throughout the day. These mantras can be simple or complex, but it’s best to start with something like, “Today is wonderful,” or “I’m grateful for all the good things in my life.” When you find yourself in a stressful moment, quickly find a quiet space, close your eyes, and take a deep breath. Repeat your mantra to yourself a couple of times and try to see the situation from a positive light. Is there a lesson to be learned here? There’s always an upside when we give ourselves a chance to look honestly.

2. Learn how to live intentionally

You might have heard the term “intentional living” before, but chances are you’re still not quite sure what that means. An intentional life looks different depending who you are, and what you want; and it can look vastly different over time as your needs and desires change.

To live intentionally means learning how to make better decisions for you. It means choosing to live in a manner that aligns with your sense of self and your sense of purpose — and above all it means finding meaning in the chaos that is modern living.

If you want to live intentionally, accept that your life is composed of choices and understand your role in making those choices. Evaluate your environment. Does it give you the things you need? How can you improve it? Perform a self-exam and get to the root of who you are and what you want from life. Make a conscious decision to live life on your own terms and set boundaries that allow you to pursue your purpose without hindrance and without fear. Life is ours to mold. Decide what makes yours worth living and go after it with every ounce of who you are.

3. Celebrate the small stuff

We live in a society that tells us to achieve, to achieve, achieve, and this often warps our perception of what true achievement looks like. While the TV and our parents might preach material success as the only way to guage how well we’re doing, there’s much more to being a successful person than just doing well at your job or having a huge family. Taking the time to celebrate the small wins goes a long way in making us feel better about ourselves and who we are.

Take a few minutes every day to zero-in on the small wins in your life, and then take some time to celebrate them. Record them in a journal, or share them with a friend. Don’t shy away from the tiniest of victories, and acknowledge what it took from you to achieve even the smallest of wins.

It’s important too to take this time to acknowledge that habits that helped you achieve these victories. Appreciate the added value they have brought to your life, and appreciate too the effort that you had to put in to change those habits or shift them in such a way that they allowed you to achieve. Part of being more mindful is being able to be truly present in the positive parts of our lives. Be present in the moment and revel in your success. Sometimes, just getting out of bed is an achievement when you’re learning how to be happier.

4. Practice mindfulness

When we think of being mindful, we often assume it means simply being nice (to ourselves and others) — but it’s much, much more than that. Mindfulness is a powerful tool and a powerful state of being which can help us to unlock our true potential and create more loving, compassionate and fulfilling environments and experiences for ourselves. It’s being present in the moment, and it’s being aware of both where we’re at and how we’re feeling.

Learning how to be more mindful actually unlocks powerful avenues of emotional intelligence, which in turn allows us to better deal with the toxic stress that permeates our lives. Cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure and major clinical depression are just a few of the side-effects of living in a life that’s stressed to the max and focused on everything but the here and now. Learning how to be more mindful can transform our our perceptions and our health — but it has a number of other surprising benefits too.

Take at least 10–15 minutes to think about the things in your life that your thankful for. Set a timer and — at the end of the process — take another 5 minutes or so to journal about the experience and how these things in your life make you feel. Whenever you’re struggling to be present in the moment, or deal with some new obstacle, refer back to the journal. Are you still thankful for those things? Are they worth overcoming these challenges for? Let them be the inspiration that navigates you through the tough times.

5. Channel gratitude

It doesn’t matter who you are, if you’re a living human being — you have something to be grateful for. Big or small, there are beautiful things all around us that have the ability to give our lives meaning, or remind us of the good things that are just within our reach.

Take 5 minutes to sit down each day and make a list of all the things in your life that you’re grateful for. List the great things in your life and the things that make you smile. Read through the list a few times and make sure not to forget the simple things.

You’ll start to feel better in no time when you remember that it’s not all doom and gloom. There’s something out there for everyone to love in life and if you haven’t found that yet it’s time to get started. The greatest thing about happiness is that it is not a luxury commodity — it’s a state of being that exists, naturally, within each and every one of us.

6. Build better relationships

Our relationships can comprise a core element of our life experience, and through them, we reaffirm our ideas about self and our place in the world around us. Relationships are important, and part of that importance comes from the support they offer us in times of hardships. For many, unlocking true happiness in life comes through building better relationships that allow us to thrive.

Building better relationships takes not only a bit of internal work, it takes reassessing our external world as well. Spend some time assessing what you need from your relationships, and clearly communicate those things to the people in your life. Make peace with who you are, and make peace with who they are too. Do they show a genuine interest in your life, and do you share that interest in theirs? True partnerships (both romantic and platonic) are a two-way street.

Make sure that you surround yourself with people who not only want the best for you, but people who respect your boundaries as well. Our boundaries and limitations are an important part of who we are, and they form a critical piece of the protections that allow us to feel safe and secure in this chaotic world. Focus on connecting with people on a deeper, more meaningful level. Having a support system that works can make all the difference when face the various hardships that life throws our way.

7. Get into nature

Spending time outside is a great way to improve your health and the manner in which you get things done. When we’re out in nature, it relieves our stress and helps us to clear our thoughts and get back in touch with the things that really matter.

Stepping away from the desk and getting outdoors has been proven to improve short term memory, spark inspiration and even decrease stress levels. Taking just 20 minutes out of your day to get some fresh air lowers levels of cortisol in the body and makes us not only more resilient to stress, but more resilient to pesky aches and pains as well.

Getting out in the great wide open for a walk or a run boosts positivity and enhances our creative functions. When we’re feeling happy and connected to our inner creator, it’s easy for us to find our flow and conquer the things that we once thought we couldn’t. If you’re dealing with foggy thoughts, or a loss of focus, take some time to get outdoors. Your mind and your body will thank you.

8. Nail your work-life balance

Modern society puts a tremendous amount of pressure on us to perform, and it puts a tremendous amount of pressure on us to work. There’s hardly anyone these days that works just 1 job, and that means a lot of stress. Turning up, day after day, and doing the tasks that need to get done can chip away at our happiess. That’s why it’s so important to nail down our work-life balance in order to unlock the true joy that’s so necessary for fulfillment.

Studies have shown that more than 40% of us neglect important aspects of our lives due to work. This often means critical self-care that allows us to maintain an even-keel and the natural sense of peace that’s so critical to a happy life. The more hours you spend at work, the more hours you spend stressing out about work at home. Finding the middle ground is critical, but it takes drawing the line and sticking to the boundaries that are important to you.

Sit down and make a list of all the things your work prevents. Then, make a separate list of all the things you need to accomplish in order to feel as though you are happy in life. Is the first list preventing you from accomplishing things on the second list? If so, it’s time to draw the line and establish the boundaries between what your work requires and what your life requires. You can’t have one without the other, so get realistic and brutal. It’s your happiness on the line.

9. Re-engage your creative side

Learning how to re-engage our creativity is a great way to empower ourselves to strive confidently foward, and it’s a great way to boost our self-esteem. By remembering how to let our creative brain thrive, we can also shift our perspective and come to see things in a new (and better) light. Creativity is another invaluable tool on the pathway to happiness. Engage yours to transform your joy journey.

Start small. At first, take just a few minutes each day to engage in something creative. This can take the form of a new mindful journaling practice, or even just some time spent doodling away in an adult coloring book. The choice is totally yours. What matters is giving your brain the freedom each day to get back into the routine of getting creative.

We are most creative when we’re shifting ideas across planes. When we take an idea and move it from one context to another, we often wind up with surprising innovations and out-of-the-box thinking. Once you’ve got the hang of feeling that creative freedom again, expand your hand and try a new activity or skill that enhances your ability to see things in a new light. If you want the world to look different, learn how to see it differently by re-engaging your creative brain.

10. Practice radical self-acceptance

Only when we learn how to accept ourselves and the way we feel and react to the environment around us can we truly unlock the power of our authentic joy. We all have our baggage and the experiences that define who we are in the moment, but that person is always changing. In order to truly learn how to live in the moment, we have to learn how to accept ourselves as we are.

Let go of all the judgements and preconceived notions you have about yourself and others. Remind yourself that the only behavior within the realm of your control is your own, and own up to that behavior and the things that drove you to those points. Embrace who you are, and embrace what you really want. No one in this universe is the combination of things that you are. Love those things, and see the beauty in them and the purpose for their creation.

If there’s something you don’t like about yourself — make a plan to change it — but only after looking it boldly in the face and accepting it for what it is. Acceptance is the key to all change and understanding, but it is often the hardest hurdle to overcome. Only when we accept something that is within our nature can we dig into the meat of it and come up with a plan to change or transform it. Spend a few minutes each day practicing this radical self-acceptance, and look to build it into your regular routine.

Putting it all together…

Happiness isn’t some complext concept or luxury good that’s beyond the reach of average people like you and me. It’s a natural, and lasting, state of being that can be unlocked by the power of our own personal will and sense of self. Getting happy comes down to understanding not only ourselves, but what we want from life, while empowering ourselves to pursue the things that give our lives meaning and purpose.

Living a happier life comes down to changing and working on the simple things and routines that make us who we are. Revisit happy memories and focus on the positive side. Learn how to live intentionally and celebrate the small stuff. By establishing a mindful practice in your life, you can get in touch with your emotions and ease the mental and emotional pain that makes your life more challenging than it needs to be. Channel gratitude and focus on build better relationships and support networks that can help you thrive. Really nail down your work-life balance and try to spend a little time in nature each day to give yourself a natural boost. We become happier one day at a time. Re-engage your creative side to get back in touch with the things that make you feel confident and fulfilled. Only when we learn how to accept who we are and what we want can we truly unlock the happiness that’s waiting for us at our core.