If you pin your happiness on success, you might want to know that studies have shown than it actually works the other way around…
Happier people are more likely to achieve success in business.
Business benefits to being cheerful include…
- Spotting more opportunities
- Getting better responses from people
- Greater creativity
- Enhanced problem solving ability
- Faster progress towards goals
- Higher income
Hack Your Happiness
There are lots of ways to become happier more of the time. Research in the field of Positive Psychology points to the balance of positive to negative emotion as a key factor.
The magic number is 3: if we have at east three times the amount of positive emotion to negative emotion, then happiness is more likely to flourish (the actual number is 2.9 up to a maximum of around 11 times). This balance leaves room for some negative emotions, which are an intrinsic part of the human experience.
Since positive emotions are linked to positive experiences, this gives us a simple-to-do happiness hack:
Build up your positive experiences!
Try out the Boost Your Happiness exercise below, after reading…
2 Types of Happiness
Broadly speaking we can experience 2 types of happiness…
1. Happiness in the moment (think eating chocolate ice cream under a parasol on a tropical beach with a cocktail on hand). This is sometimes called hedonistic happiness.
2. Feeling fulfilled (a long lasting, deeper sense of well-being and contentment). This is sometimes called eudemonic happiness.
Boost Your Happiness – TRY THIS!
Here is a little exercise you can do right now to increase your happiness by building positive experiences and positive emotions.
1. List all the things you like to do that make you happy (covering both types: happiness in the moment and long lasting fulfilment)
2. Review the list. Are you doing these things in your life and business? Often enough?
3. Take action! Plan to build in the things that make you happy into your day. Make a decision right now to do at least one thing on your list today or tomorrow.
Here’s to your happiness and success!