Money can’t buy you love. It can’t buy you happiness either.

Today’s materialistic world often urges us to buy the coolest gadgets, the trendiest clothes, bigger and better things, but research shows that possessions and purchases don’t buy us happiness.

According to an article on CNN:

By and large, money buys happiness only for those who lack the basic needs. Once you pass an income of $50,000, more money doesn’t buy much more happiness, [according to a happiness studies].

 
So while we are being pushed towards materialism, it’s for monetary gain by corporations, not for our own happiness. Unfortunately, it’s hard to escape the trap of materialism, and find happiness in other ways than buying stuff online or finding joy in the mall. But it’s possible.

Here’s a guide to finding a materialism-free life and discovering true happiness.

Escaping Materialism
All around us, there are messages telling us to buy stuff. On the Internet (blogs included), we see continuous advertising trying to get us to purchase a product or service. It’s the main reason for television, and movies are continually made with products placed throughout, so that we aren’t always sure what is advertising and what was put in there by the director.

Flip on the radio or open up a newspaper or magazine, and you’re bombarded my more advertising. Go to a shopping center/mall, and the urge to buy comes from every direction.

This message to continually buy, buy, buy … and that it will somehow make us happpier … is drilled into our heads from the days of Happy Meals and cartoons until the day we die. It’s inescapable.

Well, almost. You could go and live in a cabin in the woods (and that actually sounds nice), or you could still live in our modern society, but find ways to escape materialism.

Here are some suggestions:

• Limit television. Do you really enjoy watching TV for hours? Think about which shows you really, really love, and only watch during that time. When the commercials come on, go do something else. Or use Tivo to watch TV. You can even give up cable TV entirely, if you’re brave — I have, and it’s one of the best things I’ve ever done.
• Eschew the news. Journalists will never tell you this, but if they’re completely honest, they’ll confess that the most important part of any news company, from TV or radio news to Internet or print new, is the advertising division. It’s the division that pays the paychecks of the rest of the company. The news is important in driving traffic to the advertising. So when you’re watching or reading news, you’re really being sucked in to advertising. Try this instead: boycott the news for a week. I’ve done it for about two years, and it hasn’t hurt me a bit. In fact, it’s helped me a lot.
• Limit Internet reading. I’m not saying you should cancel your cable Internet subscription or anything. I love reading blogs. But find just those that you truly love reading, that give you the most value, and limit your reading to those. And just do it once a day, for 30 minutes or so. If you can do that, you’ve gone a long way towards tearing yourself away from advertising.
• Give up magazines for books. Magazines are also designed with advertising in mind. And they rarely give you much value. Try reading an ad-free book instead. It’s a much better use of your time.
• Don’t go to the mall or Walmart. The only purpose of these places is for you to spend money. If you just want a place to spend your Saturday afternoon, find a place where you don’t need to spend money to have fun — a park or a beach, for example. If you need to buy something, go to a single store (not the mall) and go in and get what you need. Don’t browse and walk around looking at stuff. You’ll get sucked in.
• Monitor your urges. When you’re online, or watching TV, or at a store, keep track of the number of times you want to buy something. Keep a little notebook or index card, and just put tally marks. Once you become more aware of your urges to buy things, you can start to control them. If you could control them, limiting your consumption of media (see above tips) isn’t really necessary — although I would argue that it still gives you a better quality of life.
• Use a 30-day list. If you still really want to buy something, put it on a list, and write down the date you added the item to the list. Now tell yourself you cannot buy that item for 30 days. It might be difficult, but you can do it. When the 30 days have passed, if you still want it, then buy it. But you can’t buy anything (besides essentials like groceries) without putting it on the list for 30 days first. Many times, our urges to buy something will pass during this waiting period.
• Declutter. I find it pretty amazing to see all the crap I buy over a period of years, when I go through my closets and other possessions and start getting rid of stuff I don’t use or want anymore. It’s a gratifying process, and at the same time, it makes me realize how useless all our consumer shopping is. I don’t need any of the stuff! When you do this, you may be less likely to buy more stuff. Especially if you enjoy the decluttered look of your house as much as I do.
• Find other forms of entertainment. There are other things to do besides watch TV or movies or read magazines or newspapers or the Internet. Try playing sports or exercising, or playing board games or creating art or writing or reading a book. Try doing fun things with your kids or visiting relatives and other loved ones. Try volunteering with a charity. I’m sure you could come up with 100 free or cheap things to do.
• Buy used. When you get the urge to buy something, and you’re convinced that it’s needed, try finding it used instead of new. Look in thrift shops or garage sales or flea markets or similar places.

A True Path to Happiness
So, if you’re able to escape materialism, how can you find true happiness? There are many ways, and each of us is different, but here are some things I suggest trying:

• Grateful list. Make a list of things about which you’re grateful in your life. Give thanks for them daily.
• Think positive. Try eliminating negative thinking from your life, and thinking positive instead.
• Small pleasures. Make a list of small things that give you great pleasure. Sprinkle them throughout your day. Notice other small pleasures as you go through your day.
• Kindness. Practice random acts of kindness and compassion. Do it anonymously. Help those in need. Volunteer. Make someone smile.
• Love. Make an intimate connection with your loved ones. Develop your friendships. Spend time with them, converse, understand them, make them happy.
• Health. Exercise and eat healthy — it sounds trite, but it can bring great happiness to your life.
• Meaning. It’s often useful to find meaning, either through a church or spiritual way, or through those we love in life or through the things we’re passionate about. Give yourself a purpose.
• Flow. Eliminate distractions, and really pour yourself into whatever you’re doing. If it’s writing an article, like this one, really put yourself into it, until you forget the outside world.
• Know yourself. Become attuned to what brings you happiness. Study yourself. Learn about what you love, and about your ability to love. Increase your capacity for compassion.

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Even the most motivated of us — you, me, Tony Robbins — can feel unmotivated at times. In fact, sometimes we get into such a slump that even thinking about making positive changes seems too difficult.

But it’s not hopeless: with some small steps, baby ones in fact, you can get started down the road to positive change.

Yes, I know, it seems impossible at times. You don’t feel like doing anything. I’ve been there, and in fact I still feel that way from time to time. You’re not alone. But I’ve learned a few ways to break out of a slump, and we’ll take a look at those today.

1. One Goal. Whenever I’ve been in a slump, I’ve discovered that it’s often because I have too much going on in my life. I’m trying to do too much. And it saps my energy and motivation. It’s probably the most common mistake that people make: they try to take on too much, try to accomplish too many goals at once. You cannot maintain energy and focus (the two most important things in accomplishing a goal) if you are trying to do two or more goals at once. It’s not possible — I’ve tried it many times. You have to choose one goal, for now, and focus on it completely. I know, that’s hard. Still, I speak from experience. You can always do your other goals when you’ve accomplished your One Goal.
2. Find inspiration. Inspiration, for me, comes from others who have achieved what I want to achieve, or who are currently doing it. I read other blogs, books, magazines. I Google my goal, and read success stories. Zen Habits is just one place for inspiration, not only from me but from many readers who have achieved amazing things.
3. Get excited. This sounds obvious, but most people don’t think about it much: if you want to break out of a slump, get yourself excited about a goal. But how can you do that when you don’t feel motivated? Well, it starts with inspiration from others (see above), but you have to take that excitement and build on it. For me, I’ve learned that by talking to my wife about it, and to others, and reading as much about it as possible, and visualizing what it would be like to be successful (seeing the benefits of the goal in my head), I get excited about a goal. Once I’ve done that, it’s just a matter of carrying that energy forward and keeping it going.
4. Build anticipation. This will sound hard, and many people will skip this tip. But it really works. It helped me quit smoking after many failed attempts. If you find inspiration and want to do a goal, don’t start right away. Many of us will get excited and want to start today. That’s a mistake. Set a date in the future — a week or two, or even a month — and make that your Start Date. Mark it on the calendar. Get excited about that date. Make it the most important date in your life. In the meantime, start writing out a plan. And do some of the steps below. Because by delaying your start, you are building anticipation, and increasing your focus and energy for your goal.
5. Post your goal. Print out your goal in big words. Make your goal just a few words long, like a mantra (”Exercise 15 mins. Daily”), and post it up on your wall or refrigerator. Post it at home and work. Put it on your computer desktop. You want to have big reminders about your goal, to keep your focus and keep your excitement going. A picture of your goal (like a model with sexy abs, for example) also helps.
6. Commit publicly. None of us likes to look bad in front of others. We will go the extra mile to do something we’ve said publicly. For example, when I wanted to run my first marathon, I started writing a column about it in my local daily newspaper. The entire island of Guam (pop. 160K) knew about my goal. I couldn’t back down, and even though my motivation came and went, I stuck with it and completed it. Now, you don’t have to commit to your goal in your daily newspaper, but you can do it with friends and family and co-workers, and you can do it on your blog if you have one. And hold yourself accountable — don’t just commit once, but commit to giving progress updates to everyone every week or so.
7. Think about it daily. If you think about your goal every day, it is much more likely to become true. To this end, posting the goal on your wall or computer desktop (as mentioned above) helps a lot. Sending yourself daily reminders also helps. And if you can commit to doing one small thing to further your goal (even just 5 minutes) every single day, your goal will almost certainly come true.
8. Get support. It’s hard to accomplish something alone. When I decided to run my marathon, I had the help of friends and family, and I had a great running community on Guam who encouraged me at 5K races and did long runs with me. When I decided to quit smoking, I joined an online forum and that helped tremendously. And of course, my wife Eva helped every step of the way. I couldn’t have done these goals without her, or without the others who supported me. Find your support network, either in the real world or online, or both.
9. Realize that there’s an ebb and flow. Motivation is not a constant thing that is always there for you. It comes and goes, and comes and goes again, like the tide. But realize that while it may go away, it doesn’t do so permanently. It will come back. Just stick it out and wait for that motivation to come back. In the meantime, read about your goal (see below), ask for help (see below), and do some of the other things listed here until your motivation comes back.
10. Stick with it. Whatever you do, don’t give up. Even if you aren’t feeling any motivation today, or this week, don’t give up. Again, that motivation will come back. Think of your goal as a long journey, and your slump is just a little bump in the road. You can’t give up with every little bump. Stay with it for the long term, ride out the ebbs and surf on the flows, and you’ll get there.
11. Start small. Really small. If you are having a hard time getting started, it may be because you’re thinking too big. If you want to exercise, for example, you may be thinking that you have to do these intense workouts 5 days a week. No — instead, do small, tiny, baby steps. Just do 2 minutes of exercise. I know, that sounds wimpy. But it works. Commit to 2 minutes of exercise for one week. You may want to do more, but just stick to 2 minutes. It’s so easy, you can’t fail. Do it at the same time, every day. Just some crunches, 2 pushups, and some jogging in place. Once you’ve done 2 minutes a day for a week, increase it to 5, and stick with that for a week. In a month, you’ll be doing 15-20. Want to wake up early? Don’t think about waking at 5 a.m. Instead, think about waking 10 minutes earlier for a week. That’s all. Once you’ve done that, wake 10 minutes earlier than that. Baby steps.
12. Build on small successes. Again, if you start small for a week, you’re going to be successful. You can’t fail if you start with something ridiculously easy. Who can’t exercise for 2 minutes? (If that’s you, I apologize.) And you’ll feel successful, and good about yourself. Take that successful feeling and build on it, with another baby step. Add 2-3 minutes to your exercise routine, for example. With each step (and each step should last about a week), you will feel even more successful. Make each step really, really small, and you won’t fail. After a couple of months, your tiny steps will add up to a lot of progress and a lot of success.
13. Read about it daily. When I lose motivation, I just read a book or blog about my goal. It inspires me and reinvigorates me. For some reason, reading helps motivate and focus you on whatever you’re reading about. So read about your goal every day, if you can, especially when you’re not feeling motivated.
14. Call for help when your motivation ebbs. Having trouble? Ask for help. Email me. Join an online forum. Get a partner to join you. Call your mom. It doesn’t matter who, just tell them your problems, and talking about it will help. Ask them for advice. Ask them to help you overcome your slump. It works.
15. Think about the benefits, not the difficulties. One common problem is that we think about how hard something is. Exercise sounds so hard! Just thinking about it makes you tired. But instead of thinking about how hard something is, think about what you will get out of it. For example, instead of thinking about how tiring exercise can be, focus on how good you’ll feel when you’re done, and how you’ll be healthier and slimmer over the long run. The benefits of something will help energize you.
16. Squash negative thoughts; replace them with positive ones. Along those lines, it’s important to start monitoring your thoughts. Recognize negative self-talk, which is really what’s causing your slump. Just spend a few days becoming aware of every negative thought. Then, after a few days, try squashing those negative thoughts like a bug, and then replacing them with a corresponding positive thought. Squash, “This is too hard!” and replace it with, “I can do this! If that wimp Leo can do it, so can I!” It sounds corny, but it works. Really.

by ZenHabits.net

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While researching this article, I ran across one definition that described happiness as the “absence of factors that contribute to unhappiness, like anxiety and pain.” Ah, the medical model! Health is the absence of disease; happiness the absence of unhappiness. I don’t think so. Researchers have found that happiness and unhappiness are distinct emotional states, not polarities of a continuum. Partly nature, partly knack, happiness is emotional fallout from biological and behavioral events that you — and only you — can influence. It’s definitely an “inside story.”

The biology of happiness:
According to Daniel Goleman (Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ, Bantam 1995), you were born with the genetic makeup to be “very happy, or reasonably content, or chronically dissatisfied.” Positive emotions have been shown to coincide with higher levels of activity on the left side of the brain’s prefrontal lobes. A key player seems to be the neurotransmitter dopamine, which carries messages between brain cells. Scientists estimate that half of your mood derives from your happiness “set-point.” Depending on your genes, you may have a natural enthusiasm for life, deriving pleasure from ordinary activities, or you may require unusual adventures, white-knuckle thrills. But regardless of what makes you happy — a quiet walk or a jungle safari — after the initial high, you return to your happiness set-point.

However, your biologically-programmed set-point isn’t really a point, it’s a range. In responding to daily events, nothing prevents you from hanging out at the cheerful end of the range. And if science is correct, your set-point determines only 50 percent of your mood anyway, so understanding how nature programmed you is not nearly so important as understanding that you can choose to act independent of the programming.

Things that do and don’t influence happiness:
Researchers have found that money, age, gender, income, race, education and social status don’t exert much influence on happiness. Surprisingly, neither do major life events, like marriage or childbirth. After the initial high, it’s back to your set-point. However, happy people do tend to share certain personal traits: high self-esteem, optimism, extroversion, and a sense of agency or control over their lives. With high self-esteem you believe yourself worthy of happiness, while a sense of personal agency enables you to handle life’s challenges. When it comes to external factors, the only thing that appears to matter is strong social support — in other words, friends.

If you’d like to be happier — or happy more often — focus on these areas:

Use Your Emotional Intelligence:
A hallmark of high emotional intelligence is the ability to bring “emotional hijackings” under control and recover quickly from upsets and distressing emotions. For more information, read our earlier Seminar “Emotional Intelligence: You Can Help How You Feel!”

Take Care of Your Body:
Exercise. Moderate to intense aerobic exercise lifts the spirits, and is a proven antidote for mild depression and anxiety. Brain chemicals released during exercise, such as serotonin, dopamine, norepinephrine, and the beta-endorphins, are known to have strong effects on mood, and may also help to strengthen your immune system.

Eat complex carbohydrates.
Carbohydrates have a tranquilizing effect on the body by stimulating the brain’s production of serotonin. (By contrast, protein has been shown to sustain alertness and mental energy.) However, with simple sugars (candy and other sweets), you get a brief boost in serotonin followed by a sharp drop; your mood crashes and your craving for sugar returns even stronger. Avoid the roller coaster ride by eating complex carbohydrates — pasta, rice, potatoes, beans, breads, fruits and vegetables. Complex carbs are metabolized by the body more slowly and sustain serotonin levels over a longer period.

Keep it light.
Serotonin levels are also affected by sunlight. If winters are dark where you live, try to get two or three hours of bright, artificial light each day.

Develop Self-efficacy and Resilience:
Life is twenty percent what you make it and eighty percent how you take it. Underlying that statement are the concepts of self-efficacy — the belief that you have both the will and the way to accomplish your goals — and resilience — the ability to bounce back from failures and approach problems as challenges, not tragedies. Focus on your potential, rather than your limitations. Devote yourself to something you do well. Orchestrate your life so that you always have some event or activity to look forward to. Stop defining success in terms of huge breakthroughs and see it in each modicum of progress you make. Above all, break away from other people’s standards and expectations.

Find Pleasure in Everyday Life:
No matter how busy or preoccupied you are, take a few minutes several times a day to be in the present moment. Wake up your senses. Discover what delights you and indulge yourself accordingly. A teacher friend takes a few moments each morning and afternoon to savor a cup of freshly brewed tea, and she refuses to drink from a mug, rotating her collection of elegant teacups from home to classroom. For you, maybe it’s fresh flowers, mystery novels, rummaging through antique stores, motorcycle riding or movies. Want inspiration? Read Simple Abundance: A Daybook of Comfort and Joy by Sarah Ban Breathnach (Warner Books, 1995).

Cultivate Friendships:
Studies have shown that having confidants and companions is a key factor in experiencing a sense of well-being. Social support boosts the immune system and improves the quality (and possibly the length) of life. Friends often see humor in tough situations, help put troubles into perspective and soften life’s blows. Confiding in close friends relieves stress.

Act Happy:
Try exploiting one of social psychology’s key principles: Act yourself into reality. Acting cheerful can help trigger positive emotions. Adopt the stance of being a confident, happy, successful person and you will grow into the role. A number of techniques can help: In her books and workshops, Dr. Jeannette Vos (The Learning Revolution, 1994) teaches people to change their “state” using music. Start by playing music that matches your present mood and then gradually change the music to reflect the mood you desire. Color can also be used to improve mood: warm, bright, active colors help relieve depression and neutral colors tend to alleviate anxiety and tension.

Live a Meaningful Life:
Discover a greater purpose — one strong enough to get you through minor hassles and major traumas. For a powerful exercise, try writing a personal mission statement. If you need assistance, read Creating Your Mission Statement for Work and for Life by Laurie Beth Jones. (You can order it online at www.amazon.com). Get clear about the values and ethics that guide your life. An excellent resource is the Josephson Institute of Ethics, a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the ethical quality of society by teaching “principled reasoning and ethical decision making.” Visit their website (www.charactercounts.org) and see how you measure up to the “Six Pillars of Character.” Don’t let the colorful graphics and kids’ photos fool you. It’s a rich site with information for all ages.

by Dianne Schilling

Dianne Schilling is a San Diego-based writer, editor and instructional designer who specializes in the development of educational publications and customized training programs for business and industry. She is a founding partner in womensmedia.com. Send e-mail to dianneschilling@mac.com.

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I like finding ways to improve my life and bring more positivity into it. Although I´m just at the beginning of that journey I´ve already found some useful ideas for doing just that. Maybe they can help you too to have more fun, improve your relationships, your business, your health and your life. I hope so.

1. Appreciate as much as you can.

This is one of those very simple things you can do to bring more positivity in to your life. I have also found appreciation to be a great way to turn an angry, sad and frustrated mood around to a more positive one.

Simply appreciate anywhere and everywhere in your day: appreciate the great weather, appreciate the kids playing in the park, appreciate your tasty and nutritious meal and appreciate the good looking guy/gal that just walked past you. Appreciate the things you have and the things you experience. Doing this for a minute or two always gives me a positive boost and improves my outlook on the world.

2. Stop comparing yourself to others.

If you don´t then you´ll just create a lot of unnecessary pain in your life. If you pass one person then you´ll just find another person more successful than you. And your brief sense of being a winner will transform once again into anxiety, fear, tummy-aches and possibly heart-attacks. Instead start comparing yourself to yourself. Try to improve yourself and see how you grow and become a more successful and happier person. Focus on yourself, not the other people around you, no matter if they are more or less successful. It may sound corny or clichéd, but I feel it´s both a healthier and more successful way to work and view life.

3. Realize that it is possible to choose how you react.

You don´t have live your life in reaction. You have a choice. There is always a gap between stimuli and reaction. If you focus on that gap it will widen and although it might seem in the beginning like stimuli and your reaction are tied together that is not the case. The more you think about this and try to use it by consciously choosing, over time (for me it was months but it can surely be achieved quicker) the gap will appear larger and larger and that will make the process easier. And it will become easier and easier to choose a useful reaction to challenges, problems and situations in your life.

4. Educate yourself.

Self-education can be a great help to live a more positive life. Read great books on the areas of your life you want to improve. Maybe it’s it your financial situation. Or your health. Or your relationships. Ask people with more success in that area than you what they did to improve. If you have a problem in your life, most likely a lot of people have had that problem the last few thousand years. And, at least one of them - or more likely a few – has written down how they solved that problem in a great way. Feed your mind daily – or weekly – with great solutions and inspirational and useful information.

5. Act as if.

Your emotions work backwards too. So even if you don´t feel positive, confident, calm or decisive you can act like it. And after you have done that for a few minutes, guess what happens? You will actually start to feel positive, confident, calm or decisive.

If you don´t know how to act observe other people around you – it may be friends, co-workers, family or celebrities from any time and age - who have the quality you´d like to have. Then imitate them. If you don´t believe in this, then just smile – even if you have to force yourself – for 30 seconds right now and see how you feel after that.

6. Live in the now.

Don´t let your thoughts drift into the past or future more than necessary. It’s often a sure-fire way to start negative loops of thoughts in your mind. And they can dig you deep down into a negative spiral of thoughts that can last for day, week or even years. Plan your life, reflect on the lessons you can learn from the past. But then work, play and live in the now as much as possible.

7. Do some mental rehearsal.

This is great way to improve your performance and decrease anxiety in any upcoming situation. Maybe you´re heading into a meeting soon. Then visualize now how great the events will unfold - see and hear it - and also how great will you feel at this meeting. See yourself smiling, being positive, open, confident or how you´d like to act and feel. See the excellent outcome in your mind. Then release by visualizing that it has already happened, that the meeting is over with the desired result. This is surprisingly effective and will get you into a great and relaxed mood – or at least decrease your negative feelings and expectations - before even stepping into any meeting or other situation.

8. Redefine failure.

Michael Jordan once said: “I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.”

Society may have brought you up to fear failure. But if you can rethink failure not as something to fear but rather useful feedback it can improve your life immensely. A failure may hurt for a while but then you can learn one or many lessons from it. And then you try again. And again. And failure becomes less and less frightening. All successful people have failed many, many times. But they know that there are still a lot of great new people and opportunities out there. So they try again. And sooner or later they have success once again.

9. Focus on what you want, not on what you don´t want.

One common problem is to focus your thoughts on what you don´t want rather than what you want. If you do that then it will be hard to get what you want in life. If you want to improve your finances then focus on having a great financial situation rather than your lack of money and your debts. If you want a new relationship then focus on meeting a lot of new people and forming great relationships rather than focusing on your loneliness and your lack. If you don´t then you´ll miss many opportunities that you mind just blocks out since it´s focused on your lack. But if you do then opportunities will suddenly start to pop out of all that stimuli that is your world. Your mind can mostly just see what you focus it on. So focus on what you want in life.

by Henrik Edberg:
Henrik is a personal development blogger who writes about people skills, goals, productivity, health, wealth and how to live a happier and better life. You can check out his blog here.

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Are you charting a course to fulfill your dreams? Or are you wandering around without a compass, hoping you’ll somehow find your way? If you’re stuck in a rut, let our happiness experts help you get back on track. Then take our quiz to see if you’re living your life to the fullest…

1. Don’t Try to Buy Happiness
Would you be happy if you had a hundred new pairs of Jimmy Choos or a brand new BMW? Maybe at first you would, but as time went on you’d “just want more, bigger, better and different in a never-ending fashion,” explains Alan Gettis, Ph.D., author of The Happiness Solution: Finding Joy and Meaning In An Upside Down World (Trafford, 2006). The pleasure centers in your brain come alive when you score the perfect skirt or a great pair of jeans, but the feeling fades. After all, if you could really buy happiness, everyone would have bought it already!

If you still believe money is the secret to satisfaction, consider this: According to a University of Illinois study, the Forbes 400 (the wealthiest billionaires in America) and the Maasai tribes of East Africa (simple, pastoral herdsmen) exhibit the same levels of happiness, regardless of their monetary differences. In plain English: Money doesn’t buy happiness.

2. Go for Girl’s Night Out
Could seeing a movie with your pals save your life? Maybe so, when you consider that loneliness is a life-threatening condition that can raise your risk of heart disease and depression.

Connecting with friends counteracts stress and spurs the release of oxytocin, a neurotransmitter that soothes and calms. Maybe that’s part of the reason women have been gathering in groups for centuries, grinding corn, knitting quilts or weaving baskets. “Instinctively, we know it’s good for us,” says Rebecca Radcliffe, motivational speaker and author of Hot Flashes, Chocolate Sauce, & Rippled Thighs (EASE, 2004).

It helps to have a close group of friends, but it’s also important to interact with people outside that circle. Every kind of positive interaction, from smiling at the waitress to chatting with your neighbor, can boost your mood, says Radcliffe.

3. Answer the Call of the Wild
Claude Monet once said, “The richness I achieve comes from nature, the source of my inspiration.” Take his advice and make a date with Mother Nature. It will lower your stress levels, strengthen your immune system and leave you feeling blissfully tranquil.

Can’t spare time away for a weekend camping trip? You’ll reap the same benefits from a quick stroll through the park or an afternoon spent gardening. Even a glance at a tree-lined street or blue sky through your office window will boost your mood and productivity.

4. Make the Little Things Count
So, your alarm woke you up on time for work this morning. If that thought doesn’t make you jump for joy, ask yourself what would have happened if the alarm had failed? You would have woken up late, rushed out the door, forgotten your briefcase and arrived at the office disheveled. Worse, what if you hadn’t woken up at all?

On a typical day, a million things go right, says Gettis. The shower has hot water, your favorite cereal is in the cupboard, your car starts and your computer turns on. “We’re often on auto-pilot and don’t appreciate the good things around us,” he notes.

It’s human nature to rubberneck at the accident on the freeway. But instead of seeking out the bad, focus on the good that’s right in front of you.

5. Pursue Your Passions
“Passions ignite us and keep us going,” says Gettis. But some of us are so entrenched in our daily lives that we’ve lost sight of them. Radcliffe suggests asking yourself this question: “If God came to you and told you to go after your dreams right away, what would you do first?”

Stumped? It’s time for a blast from the past. What did you love to do as a child? Which clubs did you join in high school? When did you last feel truly happy, and what were you doing at the time? The answers can help you rediscover your passions. For more ideas, make a list of things you’ve always wanted to learn, and then learn them. Dance the tango, study German, take up rock-climbing, play the guitar, write a poem…anything goes as long as you’re doing it for you.

“Giving an outlet to our creative selves satisfies a hunger that cannot be filled in any other way,” explains Radcliffe.

6. Forgive Yourself
Airlines have a limit when it comes to carry-on luggage. Pity we can’t set limits on ourselves when it comes to emotional baggage. Dwelling on past mistakes only prevents us from being happy in the present.

“Focusing on the past is a trap,” says Gettis. The key to forgiving yourself is to understand and accept your own history and to learn from your mistakes. How have they made you stronger and wiser? Use the lessons of the past to make better decisions today.

Forgiveness is an ongoing process. It can take months, even years. But in the meantime, “focus on creating a fulfilling life in the present,” suggests Gettis.

7. Live in the Moment
Cocktail hours, social events or a day off work can be great fun. But what about the rest of your life? What about the time you spend at work or running errands? If we only have isolated moments on the calendar to live for, we’re in trouble.

Most of our lives are made up of seemingly mundane moments spent pumping gas or standing in line at the grocery store. Yet we often dismiss these moments. They don’t count, we say. They’re not a part of our real lives. With this attitude, you’ll waste 80% of your life, notes Gettis. “If there’s anything resembling a magic bullet or a key to the universe, it’s the ability to be fully present…here and now,” he explains.

Are You Living Your Life to the Fullest?
James Dean once said, “Dream as if you’ll live forever, live as if you’ll die today.” Do you take time to pursue your passions or are you a slave to the daily grind? Find out if you need a new lease on life with this quality of life quiz.

By Carly Young, Special to LifeScript

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