Top Five Ways to Finding Happiness.
“If you want happiness for an hour, take a nap. If you want happiness for a day, go fishing. If you want happiness for a year, inherit a fortune. If you want happiness for a lifetime, help somebody.”- Chinese Proverb.
For millennia, great thinkers have contemplated the meaning of life, and many came to the conclusion that happiness is to be found in the act of helping others. Through scientific research, we have learned that giving is a very powerful tool for personal growth and for obtaining lasting happiness. Giving is the gift that keeps on giving. It turns out that the act of giving and helping others may be the secret to a happier, healthier and wealthier life.
However, life is all about balance, and if you give too much, it can leave you feeling empty and like you have been taken advantage of.
If you want to feel good, do good.
- Find your purpose.
People who pursue their purpose or passion enjoy a sense of accomplishment, and their life has increased meaning. People generally want to belong and to feel like they are a part of something bigger. Those who help others and contribute to the betterment of humanity commonly enjoy a greater sense of well-being.
- Give your time.
We all innately cherish and value our time, and therefore we guard and control it with every waking moment. However, research shows that giving our time to help others makes us just as happy as donating money. But again we have to consider balance and whether its time or money we shouldn’t give more than we can afford or we will wind up exhausted and broke.
- Give to organisations whose values are aligned with your own.
Professor Michael Norton, the co-author of Happy Money, believes that “giving to a cause that specifies what they’re going to do with your money leads to more happiness than giving to an umbrella cause where you’re not so sure where your money is going.” Basically speaking, give to a cause that resonates with you, and you’ll reap the rewards.
- Give the guilt trip a miss.
Being made to feel guilty and pressured into giving will not leave you with a warm fuzzy feeling. In fact, quite the opposite. It will leave you feeling resentful. If our giving has guilty undertones, it goes to figure that we will be reluctant to give to the cause in the future. Give because you want to, not because you must.
- Develop self-appreciation and feel good about yourself.
- Clean your space and make it beautiful (buy flowers and light a candle).
- Eat healthy food.
- Help others.
- Play great music-LOUDLY!
- Have fun and belly laugh every day.
- Meditate.
- Sleep well.
Happiness is always just a moment and a thought away. However, COVID-19 has left so many of us with an incredible sense of despair. If you are feeling overwhelmed, like your life is out of your control, just remember that there’s so much you can control. You can choose whether to run yourself a bath, light a candle and meditate. You can control what you eat, whether to watch movies that you know will make you laugh and whether to help someone in need. You just have to understand what works for you and develop your own personal recipe for happiness, and the smiles will follow.