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Hedonic benefits1/26/2024 ![]() Practicing bite-sized, actionable, realistic, everyday behaviors and activities can, with a little consistency and commitment, actually rewire your brain to feel more joy, be happier, and move through the world with more positivity. More specifically, Epel’s research for and findings from The BIG JOY Project have uncovered that micro-habits are the true key to boosting happiness (and making it last). “Awareness of how something makes us feel good can help us develop new positive habits.” “When a behavior triggers a positive emotional response, we’re likely to remember this and do it again,” she says. Consciously adopting habits and very mindfully paying attention to their pleasant effects harnesses the power of an existing, positive reward system in our brains. get embedded in our neural wiring, in the basal ganglia,” Epel explains. “Habits are formed when we repeat behaviors. Increasing feelings of joy and happiness in a sustainable way lies in the power of habits. (Try telling someone with clinical depression that happiness is a choice and see how far that gets you.) It's not usually as simple as flipping a switch. But how? “Choosing” happiness is one way of thinking about it, but that makes it sound easier and more immediate than it is for most folks. You can be happier without a magic personality transplant. Having Hobbies Really Can Boost Your Well-Being-Here’s How to Find One You Love The Power of Habits to Feel Happier We can take the reins and discover what we can do now-small things that can boost feelings of joy or content.“ "We don’t have to hope that we’ll feel better someday. “We tend to believe we’ll be happy when certain conditions are met, when we’ve achieved this or that, but that’s a common myth," says Elissa Epel, PhD, professor and vice chair in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of California San Francisco, researcher and co-creator of The Big JOY Project, and author of The Stress Prescription: Seven Days to More Joy and Ease. Really, though, it’s far more layered than that, and the differences between individuals’ unique happiness levels are best explained by a “complex interplay of….genetic predisposition and his or her environment,” the report notes.īut even outside of our DNA and external circumstances, we all have the power within us to be happier. According to the 2022 World Happiness Report, some lucky people really are naturally happier: “ to 40 percent of the differences in happiness between people is accounted for by genetic differences between people…Some people will be born with a set of genetic variants that makes it easier to feel happy, while others are less fortunate.” Some of this can be chalked up to winning the genetic lottery. And still others have the brilliant capacity to feel lousy, but then bounce back and feel happier again in no time at all. ![]() Yes, others are better at “choosing” happiness, even when things are hard. Yes, some people seem to have been born happy. If you think being a happier person isn’t in the cards for you, that joy is simply out of your hands, there’s some serious behavioral neuroscience that will change your mind for good (literally).
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