One Major Step to a Happier Life

Yesterday, I was reading an article in Newsweek (February 8, 2010) by Irwin Kirsch, Ph. D., which indicated that placebos (sugar pills) are about as effective as anti-depressants. What, you mean you’ve been taking this pill for ever and now you find out it didn’t work!

Yep, that’s right.

My daughter was positive that her medications were effective for her. Now, she will be wondering.

The real issue, though, is that our expectations about life affect our moods and even depressions and anxieties.

This is a powerful idea. It’s not that what we think becomes reality. Rather, if we think about something too much we become depressed and anxious. If we ruminate (love that word), then our emotions are put into turmoil and we find ourselves emotional wrecks.

If medications don’t work (and the research points to this), the next question is what can you do to improve your mood, or reduce your depression or break the anxiety cycle?

To attain this type of change in your life, then you will have to become more active in ensuring that your emotions are better controlled. How, then, can you do that.

A hint of this solution comes from Barbara Fredrickson’s book, Positivity. Dr. Fredrickson has done extensive research on how positivity affects our moods and our ability to live life happily. She has documented that, if your positive emotions outweigh your negative ones by a ratio of 3 to 1, then you tend to have a happier life.

The one major step to a happier life then is to increase your experiences of positivity.

But, you say, how can I avoid the negative experiences in my life? It’s not that you can avoid bad or difficult times. Everyone has them, even individuals who are famous or have great net worth.

Instead, you and I have to work to resist negative urges and ruminations about negative experiences. Rather than revisiting the negatives in your life, go forward and become aware of the present, and the good things around you. Become mindful and also resist thoughts that make you feel less than happy. Avoid gossip, learn to cope well with negative people, and you might even skip the evening news which is often filled with stories about the unfortunate people in life.

Concurrently, we need to build ourselves up by

• focusing on achieving goals that are meaningful to ourselves,
• appreciating life with its ups and downs,
• involving ourselves in spiritual or meditative practices,
• making sure that your appreciate every moment possible,
• doing exercise,
• being involved with our families,
• being kind to others, and
• being passionate about life.