How Can I Be Happy / Happier (w/ Essential Happiness Guide)

Being happy is important in life, not only because it sure beats the hell out of not being happy but because it can affect so many areas of your life.

Being happy keeps some illnesses bay, making you healthier. It also makes you more fun to be around. The benefits are many. So how can we be happy or at least improve our overall level of happiness and well being?

This easy to follow 10 step action plan can immediately start to improve your happiness right from the get-go.

• Deal with problems
• Hobbies
• Outside
• Sleep
• Unplug from social media / the matrix
• Friends and family
• Exercise
• Helping others
• Job you like
• Let it go

Deal with problems

We all have problems in life, in fact life is just a series of problems to be overcome. That sounds pretty gloomy until you change how you look at it.

If you look at problems as a series of challenges you need to overcome or replace with better problems you will have a much easier time of it.

What is the difference between a “bad” problem and a “good” problem? A bad problem is a problem that causes you stress or anxiety. It can take the form of bills, negative people, a bad job, any number of things.

So how can we get rid of these “bad” problems? Easy (-ish), we turn them into “good” problems. That is, problems we can deal with more easily and in a way we control.

For example: You are fat and need to lose weight because your doctor told you to. This is a bad problem. How do we fix it? Turn it into a problem we control. How? By exercising and dieting. (Or fasting – see easy weight loss guide here). You now have turned it into a good problem.

Why is it a good problem? You can control your exercise regime. Now your problem is you need to do exercise. You can control your diet. Now your problem is to eat more healthily.

By breaking up problems into smaller, more easily solvable ones you will make progress, feel less anxious and stressed, and happier as a result.

Hobbies

Men love to make, fix, do, and immerse themselves in many things. Hobbies are an amazing way to beat those blues away.

Firstly many hobbies need a great deal of focus and research, also if you are making something then you need to be paying attention closely to what you are doing. This has the benefit of keeping your mind off any current stressors you may have.

Secondly hobbies can give you purpose. Completing or making something, watching something to the end (like a sport or movie), or finding out something new and interesting all center around out hunter-gatherer instincts in one way or another.

We are results driven by nature and hobbies help us get the fix we need to keep us going in life. (To know more about why hobbies are good for us, click here)

Get outside

Being out and about can get you out of the house. If you are not happy being stuck at home can make it feel like a prison rather than a sanctuary so put on some shoes and stretch your legs. So a change of scenery can lift your spirits.

It’s also good to get some vitamin D. Being in the sun causes your body to produce vitamin D which helps regulate calcium and phosphates in your body to keep your teeth and bones strong.

You may also bump into friends or even share a smile with a passing stranger whilst walking, another good moral boost. Nothing like a few happy words with a friend and even a shared smile with someone you don’t know will always lift you up.

Sleep

Sleeping is a great way to reset your day. Waking up after a good nights sleep is vital as it will have given your body a chance to rest and heal from the rigors of the previous day.

Steps you can take to avoid getting a bad nights sleep can include, putting away gadgets an hour before sleeping if possible or setting them into blue light mode (this filters out blue light which help to keep us awake).

Watching something funny before sleeping like a short comedy clip. This can set you in a calmer, more relaxed mood.

Drinking milk. The amino-acid in milk, tryptophan, will help you sleep as it helps to increase serotonin in your body. This makes you drowsy, less anxious and increases your sense of well being.

Unplug from social media / the matrix

Like Neo in the movie “The Matrix” you may need to unplug. The internet is great because it let’s you access so much but the internet is bad because it let’s you access so much! One of the best examples of a double edged sword. Something that can be good of bad depending on how you use it.

Social Media is slowly evolving to get you hooked and keep you hooked. How? Have you ever been on YouTube, Facebook, Pinterest or Instagram and clicked on something you were interested in only to be shown something else you “may” like as well? Of course, we all have. It’s that rabbit hole we need to avoid.

Going down the rabbit hole, like Alice can lead you to some very strange places. You star off looking at puppy videos and after 20 minutes you are looking at doctors pulling worms out of someones ear.

Switching off is healthy and essential if you want to keep balanced in the real world. A small amount can be beneficial but anything more than 15-20 minutes a couple of times a day is more than you need.

Friends and family – be social face to face

Being social does not mean you have to bury your face in your smartphone checking to see what one of your e-friends ate for breakfast. Being social meets getting out and about and visiting people face to face.

By keeping away from everyone you can run the risk of becoming lonely and this can lead to physical and psychological problems down the track (see here for my loneliness guide)

If you surround yourself with positive family and friends then their optimism will undoubtedly rub off on you and will make you happier as a result.

Exercise

Just a few minutes a day can keep the sadness at bay (about 7-10 minutes). Exercise has many benefits for your health but also for your mind too.

Exercise has been shown to help you focus and improve your memory as well so if you are struggling with some work or task, get up and move around a bit, this can help.

It has also been shown to impact longer term problems like anxiety, depression and stress. It also helps improve your general levels of sleep to boot.

Helping others

As already mentioned men love to get stuff done. Solve problems, fix things. So, if we can do that for others it’s an even bigger win for us from a psychological standpoint.

Another one of our traits, something that has been hard baked into our DNA as well as the hunter-gather instinct and that is that of protector.

These days there’s not much call for us to protect someone from a wolf or other wild creature but we still have that instinct to do so. So what do we protect people from?

We protect people from problems. Helping a neighbor up the stairs with their groceries, fixing a broken light in someone’s house. Pushing a broken down car.

We tell ourselves it’s the decent thing to do, which it is, but it allows us to protect that person from the burden they are suddenly faced with by helping them get rid of it.

Get a job you like

Various polls consistently show that 65-80% of people hate their jobs. When I say hate, it’s a strong word. What I really mean is that people are not engaged in the work, feel apathetic and uncaring or in some cases actually hate their job.

So why do they stick with it? Money and security usually. But surely job satisfaction, happiness, self worth and overall well being should play a major part too? Sadly we often choose money over happiness in life which can create more problems than it solves.

Reducing your outgoings so you can afford to do a job you live should be a focus in life or to make one of your interests or hobbies pay you so you never have to do a job you hate again.

Let sh*t go

Looking at the past as simply that. Past. You cannot change it so thinking about it, stressing over it will just bring something you cannot change into the present (and future) where you can.

John didn’t give you back that screwdriver you lent him 3 years ago and you are still stewing over it. Why? You can fix the problem easily.

• Ask him for it and risk causing some animosity between you
• Don’t ask him for it and keep stressing
• Ditch him as a friend if it really bothers you that much
• Drop it and let it go (hint – do this! )

If John asks to borrow something else tell him he did not return the screwdriver so you’d rather not risk your friendship in case he does not return the next thing he borrows. A good friend will return the tools. It may be he simply forgot.

If not then maybe your friendship is not so important to John so you can cut him loose as a friend.

Whatever you decide to do you need to say to yourself

• Is it really important?
• Can it be resolved now?
• If I drop it what will happen?

If it’s something minor let it go, if its something important can you fix it? If you can’t then what can you do to feel better about it.

Sometimes you just have to stop thinking about stuff, even if it’s was a big issue or event in your life. Keeping things in your present in the form of emotional baggage will hurt you and those around you so try to let things go to protect everyone.

In conclusion:

Being happy is a state of mind, it’s relatively easy to be happier in life but it will need a bit of effort on your part. The good news is that even the smallest amount of effort can immediately yield results. Be happy, stay happy.