Building Up Our Happiness Quotient
Tese exercises are recommended by psychologist Rick Hanson:
Slow down, breathe and see the big picture. Tis simple practice brings us into the present moment, reduces the stress activation in the body, disengages us from verbal chatter and negative reactiv- ity, and buys us time to see more clearly. Take three breaths, making the exhalation longer than the inhalation.
Five-Minute Challenge Take in the good. It could be a flower blooming, birds singing or a nice ex- change with another person. Slow down, take a few breaths and let it sink in for a minute or two.
Focus on something to cultivate. Perhaps it’s patience or gratitude. Look for oppor- tunities to have an experience of this qual- ity and internalize it for another minute.
Marinate in pleasant feelings. Cultivate a sense of calm, contentment or warm- heartedness for a couple of minutes.
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thinking, improved decision making
and, perhaps most importantly, an ability to speak authentically. “If we don’t handle the eight feelings, we
don’t feel capable in the world,” she says. Te ability to speak adds to that empowerment. “From asking someone to stop a behavior so that you feel safer to telling someone you love them, asking your boss for a raise or letting people know about yourself and your work to garner opportunities and desired experienc- es—it cuts across every aspect of our lives and is absolutely crucial to our sense of well-being.”
Rewiring the Brain
for Positivity Discoveries in neuroplasticity have re- vealed that the brain changes throughout life well into adulthood. It’s designed to learn not just ideas and information, but skills, attitudes, feelings and moods. Rick Hanson, a clinical psychologist and au- thor of several books, including Hardwir- ing Happiness and Resilient, contends that we can develop greater happiness, just like we can develop greater depression. “Tere’s a lot of research that shows
that through deliberate little practices spread out through the day or sometimes more formal practices like psychotherapy or meditation, we can actually produce
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physical changes in the brain that are now measurable with things like MRIs,” he remarks. Hardwiring happiness is easy, pleasur-
able and doesn’t take a lot of time. “If you take care of the minutes, the years will take care of themselves,” says Hanson. “Little steps gradually move us forward a breath at a time, a minute at a time, a synapse at a time. Bit by bit, we grow the good inside while gradually releasing the bad.” “Our power to positively influence
who we are in small, genuine ways every day is really important to compensate for the brain’s negativity bias, which makes it like Velcro for bad experiences, but Teflon for good ones,” he says. “We evolved a nega- tivity bias over the 600-million-year evolu- tion of the nervous system. Learning from negative experiences and mistakes was a critical survival skill, so we have a brain that is designed to scan for bad news, overreact to it and fast-track it into memory. It’s not our fault, but it is our responsibility to deal with it by first, feeling the negative without reinforcing it and second, focusing on the positive and taking it in. Gradually, you can give yourself a brain that’s like Velcro for the good and Teflon for the bad.”
Sandra Yeyati, J.D., is a professional writer. Reach her at
SandraYeyati@gmail.com.
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