Happiness Habits Part 2 | 6 Weeks to a Happier, Healthier You

Foreign. I'd like to welcome everybody to today's presentation of integrative behavioral health. I'm your host, Dr. Donnelly Snipes. This is day two of our limited six week series. Six weeks to a happier, healthier you. Today we are talking about happiness habits. If you remember last week, we actually talked about some other happiness habits on Tuesday. But we're going to add to those today. Remember, when we're happy, there are all kinds of benefits. When we're happy, it reduces our blood pressure, it reduces our risk for cardiovascular disease, it allows our body to more readily balance our blood sugar, it enhances our immunity, it helps us sleep better because it helps us balance our neurotransmitters because that HPA axis is not always hyperactivated affectively when we're happy, it promotes other positive feelings like curiosity and awe and wonder and love and all those wonderful things. When we're happy, we tend to have more energy to be able to focus on things that maybe aren't perceived as quote, essential. Cognitively when we're happy we don't have adrenaline coursing through our veins so we're more easily able to get into our wise mind. We're e more easily able to focus on the positive, to get outside the box, to problem solve, to exercise cognitive flexibility. Lot of benefits to being happy. When we're happy, we tend to feel safe, we tend to feel empowered and we tend to feel energetic which all contribute to positive thoughts and, and a clear headedness environmentally. Just generally when we're happy we attract positivity and even people who aren't in the best of moods when they're around us. A lot of times our positivity can be a little bit contagious. I encourage you. This isn't for your own happiness necessarily, but this is for others. You know, give it away, have that abundance mindset. Try to think of ways that, or things that you can share with others. I know, you know, back when the Internet was very, very young and I was a lot younger, I, I remember every time I would open my email there would be a meme or some video and you know, I kind of miss those days when, and Facebook does it to a certain extent now. But there's a lot of other stuff that you know, I really want to avoid on so finding places like on YouTube, going to the dodo. There are a lot of videos that can make you happy, make you laugh. Share those with your friends, you know, send them a text message so you can brighten their moment. That's going to Help them. And interpersonally, it's kind of dovetails. When we are happy, we tend to be more patient. We tend to have more ability to tolerate other people, to be empathetic. And again, when we're happy, we tend to attract happy people. We tend to spread that abundantly. The first happiness habit we're going to talk about today is gratitude. It can be easy to focus on all of the things you don't have or what's not going right. Well, what is that going to do to your mood? Yeah, it's probably going to put you in a negative or a powerless mindset. Gratitude can help you focus on the things that are going right. Focus on the positive and recognize that. Okay, you know, we talk about living in the and a lot on this show. I may have some things in my life that aren't exactly the way I want it right now. However, let me also notice and give attention to all of the things that are going well, all of the positives. An attitude of gratitude also helps you appreciate the simple things. Sometimes when you're doing that gratitude list, at the end of the day, you're kind of scratching your head going, well, you know, I've listed all the things I'm grateful for. My home, my family, my animals, my this, my that, my health. What else can I be grateful for? And then you really start having to dig. And I've noticed the past week it's really been a blessing because you all know how much I like animals. Every morning there's been some different kind of critter that has passed in front of me when I've been on my way to work. There was a possum, there was a bunny rabbit, There were deer. This morning it was a skunk. And, you know, I just. I love critters, so that always makes me happy. An attitude of gratitude also helps you let go of envy and jealousy when you are not grateful. When you're focusing on all the things you don't have or all the things that other people have that you don't, it is very, um. When you are able to let go of that anger at other people for things that they have that you don't, it frees up a lot of your own energy to focus on nurturing what you do have and working towards getting the things that you may want, working towards improving the next moment. What can you do to enhance gratitude? Well, keep a gratitude list. Every day, add to it. If you are more visual like I am, you can make a gratitude collage. So every day, take a Picture, picture of. And you can do this. You know, you can make a digital collage. It doesn't have to be print of things that you're grateful for. It can be the sunrise, it can be the raindrops. Whatever it is, add it to your gratitude list or your gratitude collage. So when you're having a funky moment, you can look at that collage and go, hey, I've been blessed with a lot of things in my life. So you want to add to that at least one thing that went well each day. The other way you can do it is just have a gratitude box and add a slip of paper to that box every day. Or a gratitude tree. I know I said one more. One, one more. You can make a tree either with construction paper or with gift tags that you hang on a branch like leaves, and add a tag or a leaf to that tree every single day. That shows something that you're grateful for. Another activity that can help you focus on gratitude is looking around and comparing yourself to others who are not doing as well. Or compare yourself to the you in the past that may not have been doing as well. Look in the, you know, six months ago, a year ago, five years ago, what was different? How have you grown? How have. How have you flourished and become more abundant since that time? And it could be your cognitive strength, it could be your mood, your relationships, whatever it is. And maybe it's all of those things along with gratitude. We need compassion. Compassion helps us not be angry and resentful. Compassion means sympathetic awareness of others distress and a desire to alleviate it. When we're compassionate, we want to help every everybody feel happy. Unfortunately, a lot of times people have compassion for others, but not for themselves. And that can be, you know, a problem we want to look and examine. Why is it that I am afraid or resistant to being compassionate for myself? Why am I always hard on myself and compassionate with other people? Many of us were raised to think that if we're compassionate with ourselves, it means we're lazy, weak, or a failure. So it's important to challenge those core beliefs and figure out, you know, number one, if you are compassionate with others, why. Why is it that you're not compassionate with yourself? And is that a helpful rule? And if not, you know, how can you adjust that rule in order to develop compassion? Think of three times you've been compassionate in the past week. To whom were you compassionate? Why were you compassionate with them? How did it impact them? And do you think less of them because they needed that compassion and it is helpful to do this periodically until you start really nurturing that compassion where it just flows out of you instead of having to remind yourself to do it, you know, practice doing this daily for a week and see how it impacts your interactions with others and your compassion for yourself. Which takes us to the next question. How are you compassionate with yourself? And if you're not, how could you be? If you are, how could you be more compassionate with yourself? A lot of times we set the bar here for other people. We say, you know what, you don't have to be Perkins. Perfect progress, not perfection. And then we set the bar up here for ourselves. We say, the only way you can be acceptable is with perfection. Well, does that really make sense? So how can you change your rules about self compassion? The third happiness habit is breathing and laughter. They kind of go hand in hand. When you're laughing, you're breathing. But deep breathing can also be helpful. Deep breaths, the ones that we talk about so often on this show. Breathe in for four, hold for four, exhale for four, and it's a slow four count that helps oxygenate your blood it which also helps reduce fatigue. It's one of the main reasons we yawn is we're not getting enough oxygen. So that will help you feel more energetic, which can help you feel happier. But deep breaths also lower your heart rate and trigger the relaxation response. So instead of having that HPA axis, that threat response system going off, you know, you're actually telling your body no. Now is the time to rest and digest. Now is the time to relax and be happy. In addition to slow deep breathing, which I encourage you to practice throughout the day, and it can be helpful to set push notifications to remind you to do mindfulness check ins and do some deep breathing. I have a little fitness tracker and this one in particular. If my heart rate has too much variability, it thinks that I'm stressed and it reminds me to stop and practice that deep breathing to get re centered. So fitness trackers can be helpful. They're not 100% accurate, but. But it does pick up on some things. Now, laughter not only makes you breathe more deeply, but it also releases endorphins, dopamine and serotonin. So why the heck not? When you laugh, it doesn't mean that everything in your life is perfect. When you laugh, it doesn't mean that part of you is not sad about something. A lot of times people feel guilty for laughing and it's important to check why that is. You know, what, what would happen if you laughed? Obviously there's a time and a place to laugh. But if you are in an appropriate time and place, you know, why not? After my, my mother died, you know, there was. I was going through a grief period, but I also recognized that it was not required of me to be miserable and grieving 247 for however long that was going to take, she would want me to laugh. So it's important to examine your beliefs about laughter as well as really actually work to incorporate it. As adults. We get too freaking serious. Kids laugh all the time. Spend some time with a kid and try to get, you know, into their head, see the world through their eyes and the things that make them curious and the things that make them laugh. They can laugh over some of the most inane things, and that's really cool. And if we can tap into our inner child, that can be helpful. Practice deep breathing after each meal. When you're stressed, take a few deep breaths and schedule in 10 minutes to laugh every day. Now, you're not going to laugh consistently for 10 minutes, but set aside 10 minutes where you do something designed to trigger laughter. Download comedians onto your mobile device so you can listen to them or have it programmed into your car radio so you can listen to them when you are driving. Um, you know, that's actually a double benefit if a lot of people get stressed out when they're in traffic and when they're driving. If you start listening to a comedian or something that makes you happy, it's going to counteract the stress of driving. You're going to focus on the happy, or you can help yourself focus on the happy instead of getting irritated that you're stuck in traffic. Backtalk. Now, we were always taught as kids that backtalk wasn't acceptable. Well, that's when we're back talking our parents. When I'm talking about back talk, I'm talking about back talking your inner critic and your ingrained habits that cause you distress. The voice inside your head that says you're not good enough or you should have done something differently. Back talk that inner critic. Think of that, your inner critic, like a heckler. And you are, you know, performing. You know, back talk that person and say, you know what? Now's not the time, and, and focus on positive thoughts to tell yourself. Focus on what you can tell that critic, what you can tell that heckler. If you have difficulty thinking about that, think, you know, step one, step away from it and say, if somebody was heckling your best friend, what would you say to the heckler? Okay, well, then if somebody's Heckling you say that to them. Choosing happiness habits means quieting the negativity and changing your behaviors. Back talk means telling the critic to be quiet and pushing away the negative thoughts, saying nope, you know, I may not be perfect, but I'm not going to focus on all the things that I am not perfect at. I'm going to focus on the things that I am great at. I'm going to focus on the value that I bring to the world. Recognizing that nobody's perfect and then start telling yourself no. When you start to engage in unhelpful habits like stress eating, smoking or engaging in unnecessary conflict, you know, step back and think about, you know, how is this benefiting me? How is this going to make me happier in the long run? And I have a lot of other videos on ways to break habits, unhelpful habits. But it is important to backtalk yourself and basically re parent yourself. When you're back talking that inner critic, you are taking on the parental role and protecting your psyche if you will. Thought conditioning is the next happiness habit. Most of us are not in the habit of always seeing the bright side or the silver lining or having our rose colored glasses on. Just like conditioner softens your hair, thought conditioning softens your thoughts. When you're in an unpleasant situation or even a pleasant situation, look for the positive. In just about every situation there are positives to be had and it may take some looking but it's important to try to find the strengths that are coming out of this. Maybe it is just, it is showing you how strong you are. Maybe it is enhancing your relationships with your significant others because you're supporting one another. You know there are a lot of different things that you can look at but try to find the, the, the Yang that goes with the yin. The when we talk about yin and Yang, Yin is the cold depressing part, the the slow part. And Yang is the hot, fiery, you know, excitable part. And so you know, trying to find the Yin and the Yang in everything which takes us to walking the middle path, recognizing that the both and I can have a rich and meaningful life. I can enjoy this moment and have this distress thing hanging out there. I can you know, go and go to my kids soccer game and have a great time and, and still be dealing with back pain for example. Walking that middle path, embracing the both and I can have the good and endure the bad at the same time and then address those cognitive distortions. And cognitive distortions are things like all or none thinking. And I have videos on the YouTube channel on negative thinking styles and unhelpful thoughts. And look at those. If you tend to think in all or none terms or you tend to take things really personally, it's important to start conditioning your thoughts to take it. Take things more middle of the road. Instead of saying always or never, saying sometimes or often, instead of saying best or worst, saying adequate, you know, trying to find that middle ground so you're not thinking in extreme terms can be very helpful. Be sensational. Your moods are largely impacted by your environment. So think about what smells make you happy. And it can be essential oils. I know we've talked about that a few times lately and there are a lot of essential oils out there that can help people feel more relaxed, that trigger the release of serotonin and dopamine and even endorphins. So those are things you might want to consider. But you can also find memory related smells and those that can be, you know, caramel, that can be the little wax tarts that you get to put in the things that you plug into the wall. It doesn't have to be an essential oil. When you walk into a building and you smell a certain smell and it reminds you of something, you know, that's a memory related smell, try to figure out what your positive memory related smells are and add those to your environment. What sites make you happy in terms of pictures, screensavers, lock screens, colors, you know, what colors do you feel happiest when you are inundated with them? Um, and you know, does organization matter? If it doesn't matter to you, then that's fine. But for a lot of people, organization at least having stuff in the appropriate bins makes them feel more relaxed. Thinking about when you look around, look around your environment right now. Identify anything that may be triggering stress and make a note of it so you can figure out how to fix it. And then identify places that you can add in positive. Where positive, maybe not, not existing right now, you know, maybe pictures that you hadn't thought to hang. What sounds make you happy? When we talked about nature therapy and forest bathing, we talked about how the research indicates that nature sounds actually tend to increase people's feelings of happiness and release neurochemicals like serotonin and, and gaba. Not every sound works for every person. It's going to be somewhat personal for me. Thunderstorm noises don't really help me relax much anymore. They used to, not anymore. But birds, music, water, the waves at the beach. What kinds of sounds do you want to hear? What makes you happy? And you can also have, you know, just general music. What songs, what bands make you feel happy, what feelings, you know, tactile feelings make you happy. Thinking for me a warm fireplace or a thick angora sweater or cool silk sheets, you know, anything that you can think of that you think, oh, I just love the feel of that. I'm one of those weird people that when I go through the. Through the store and I see a fluffy pillow, I have to reach out and touch it. Same thing with sweaters to see if how soft it is. And I'm the same way when it comes to crocheting with my yarns. I am extremely particular about my yarns because I want something that is going to be soft and nurturing. But those are the feelings that, that I personally like. So thinking about what textures make you feel happy and how can you integrate these into your home, car and workspace. Those are the three places that you probably spend the most time with colors. You don't have to paint the walls. You can add in throw pillows. You can put up pictures. One of the things that I do because you know, really big pictures can get really expensive. I will get the throw blankets that are. That have tap that look like tapestries and I will put a strip of material on the back of them so you. I can string a curtain rod through it and I hang them up on the wall. It works for me. You know, I don't have a super fancy house. I live on a farm. So it fits the decor. But figure out ways that you can affordably and decorate your environment and create an environment that is relaxing and maybe spa like peer pressure. We generally think about this as something that's not good. But peer pressure can actually be good if it's positive. Peer pressure synergize combining your strengths with others, remembering that none of us is perfect at everything. So cre with that abundance mentality, recognizing that you bring certain strengths to the table and other people bring other strengths. Instead of being jealous or feeling threatened or intimidated, look at that as value added. How you're combining to create something that is even better than either one of you could have created alone. Surround yourself with positive people. Happiness begets happiness. And I've told you multiple times about my best friend from college. And she was one of the happiest, most passionate people that I think I ever met. And nothing was ever okay. She was never having a good day. It was always a fun, fabulous day or an amazing class. We were teaching assistants together so we would talk about things and it was always just uber whatever it was, there was no middle ground with her happy feelings. And she usually focused on the positives. Yeah, there may have been some negatives and she would identify those, but she focused most of her energy on nurturing and reveling in the positives. Negative people tend to drain energy and enhance a feelings of helplessness and hopelessness. If you're going to be around them, buffer ahead of time. Figure out how you're going to create those boundaries so you can maintain your happiness even in the presence of negativity. And that can be really hard if you were raised in a family where that was not safe, where you were taught to don't talk, don't talk, don't trust, don't feel. It's important to start developing or enhancing those boundaries in life now. Start figuring out how to be okay being happy. Even if you're around somebody who's in a bad mood. Energy and conversations and relationships are contagious or is contagious. Think of a person you know who's extremely negative. How do you feel when you see that they're calling? How do you feel after you spend time together? And, and generally it's, it's going to be avoidance and exhaustion for a lot of people. Now think of a person you know who's extremely positive. How do you feel when you see they are calling? Now for some people this can be happy, excited, great. Other times, too much positivity can be a little overwhelming if you're already feeling overwhelmed, but that's okay. Recognizing that sometimes their abundance can be a little bit overpowering is all right. But recognizing what they have to bring and how do you feel after spending time together? Generally, extremely positive people, even if they are really abundantly positive, can help us at least soften our mood a little bit. So if you're in started out in a really bad mood, you may, you know, soften that a little bit by spending time together because they can help you turn your perspective. Forgive. Now remember, forgiveness is a power play. Forgiveness is choosing not to let the event or the person continue to drain your energy. You're choosing not to give that energy to that person or event anymore and keep it for yourself. Resentment, regret and guilt are natural responses to a threat. You know, that's okay, acknowledge your feelings, acknowledge your anger, your fear, whatever. But holding on to those feelings drains your energy like crazy. So it's important to recognize that the feeling is telling you something bad happened and you need to fix it and, or protect yourself. You know, sometimes you can't fix it. So what can you do to protect yourself. What lessons can you learn from it? And then taking steps to figure out, okay, now that I'm safe and I recognize what my power is, what is the next step to improving the next moment? You may choose to step back from that person or that situation if it is not safe, or you may choose how you're going to approach that relationship in order to repair what's been done. So think about something you're resentful about. How does holding on to that resentment help protect you? A lot of times people want to hold on to that resentment because they're afraid if they let it go, they're going to be hurt again, they're going to be victimized again. It's important to recognize that forgiveness does not mean forgetting. Forgiveness means learning and choosing how to spend your energy. What would happen if you let go of the resentment and how can you forgive the person or yourself so it stops draining your energy? And I'm going to do another video on forgiveness as a cognitive behavioral tool in a couple of weeks. Project happiness in addiction recovery. We call this fake it till you make it. And that doesn't mean ignore your unpleasant feelings. That means that it's important to recognize that you can have unpleasant feelings and happiness, you know, concurrently. You can be unhappy about certain things and happy about others. When you walk around hunched over, looking at the ground, you feel more depressed. You often miss some of the simple pleasures. If you're looking at the ground, you're going to miss the birds and the sunrise. And you may miss opportunities to positively engage with people. Sit and walk sitting up. You know, look straight up. Look up from your phone. Please look up from your phone when you're walking, but make eye contact with people and smile. Linehan talks about smiling with open hands. Our non verbals communicate a whole lot more than our verbals to do. If you are sitting there like this and looking down, you know people are going to think, well, that person doesn't want to engage. If somebody walks into the room and you look up, even if you're just holding a book, you look up and you smile. You've got open hands and you are encouraging that person or opening the door, you're becoming more approachable. That projects happiness. How else can you project happiness so others can tell that you're happy and. And just think a lot about your non verbals. What is your body saying about your mood? And. And we've talked before. Some of us have a resting, unhappy face. I'm not allowed to say the b word because YouTube would get upset. And, and that's okay if that's the way your face is, face is drawn. But do recognize that other people may see that and think, ooh, she's in a bad mood. So it is important when people enter your realm, enter your sphere, to look up and to smile. You know, turn those, the corners of your mouth up a little bit so they recognize that you are open to interaction. So social support is one of the greatest buffers against stress. And our friends and our supports can actually bring happiness to us, just like I've been talking about sharing happiness with them. They can bring happiness into our life even if we're not expecting it. A lot of times they can make us laugh or at least smile. Happiness doesn't just magically happen. It's not one of those things. If you eliminate depression, you're going to be happy. No, unfortunately, that's not it. If you eliminate depression, you're just going to be. It's important to cultivate happiness just like you cultivate a garden. By choosing habits, habits that promote happiness, you can start feeling happier and set reasonable goals. You know, five, ten minutes a day that you're going to try to do something that makes you laugh. Maybe setting a couple of times a day where you practice mindfulness and open awareness and you look around, you know, choose one or two strategies to start working on in order to start building happiness within your life and building that energy. Your thoughts, emotions, physical sensations, and environment all contribute to your mood. You have the ability to choose happy. A lot of times when people are feeling depressed, they'll sit in a dark room with the blinds drawn and all covered up with a blanket. Well, that doesn't communicate energy. That communicates sleep and fatigue and depression and withdrawal. Choosing happy means opening those blinds, you know, letting the world have the opportunity to shine on you a little bit. It doesn't mean that you can do things just to automatically make pain go away. I'm not saying that, but I am saying that you can help buffer against some of the anguish if you also turn and look at the happy. You know, force yourself to notice everything in your life, not just the negative. Do you guys have any happiness habits that I didn't cover? And remember, I did cover some on last Tuesday. So you can look at that video online if you're interested in more happiness habits. But I know I do not, you know, know all of the possible ways to help people be happy. So, you know, I encourage you to share if you're, what, watching this on replay, then I encourage you to share in the comments section some of your favorite activities or things that you can do to help yourself feel happy, things that add happiness to your life. I really appreciate everybody being here today. I know there's a lot of stuff going on. You're probably, you know, buzzing around trying to get ready for the holidays. If you are working, you may be getting ready for the end of the year closeout of everything. So you've got a lot of stuff to do and I appreciate you taking time out of your day to be with me. I will be here live again tomorrow at 9:30 and we will be talking about cognitive strategies to improve health and happiness.