MORE ABOUT 'HAPPINESS'

This week I will give you the 'skinny' on numbers 1 thru 5 tonight and tomorrow night. Next week I'll try to cover the rest on Thursday and Friday. 
They are thought provoking. What do you think?

(This is another article from Prevention Magazine)


Everything You Know About Happiness Is Wrong
Even in trying times, you have more control over your own happiness than you think.

by Siri Carpenter

What Makes You Happy

1. Know what you want.
2. Savor mystery.
3. Diversify your good deeds.
4. Hope for small changes.
5. Invest in experiences, not stuff.
6 Shift your focus.
7. Let your mind wander.
8. Give money away.
9. Chat up your spouse like a stranger.
10.Settle for good enough.
11.Know when to fold'em.
12.Make something.

The year 2009 was one that few of us will soon forget.
But the tough times we've been through illuminate the human ability to weather challenges that might at first seem overwhelming. As so many millions have painfully learned, we can't fully control our circumstances. Surprisings often though, we can control their effects on our well being.

Experts attribute about 50% of a person's happiness to genetic endowments and another 10% to circumstances - where we live, how much money we make, how healthy we are. That leaves 40% of our happiness in our control. Fortunately, science has much to say about how we can make the most of that 40%. Even small improvements in mood can have cascading effects. The trick is to pay attention to what strategies work best for you.
Try these starters.

1. Know what to want.
Most of us can't predict what will make us happy in the future, and that inability often leads us down the wrong path.

"The average American moves more than 11 times, changes jobs more than 10 times, and marries more than once, suggesting that most of us are making more than a few poor choices," notes Harvard University psychologist Daniel Gilbert, PhD, author of Stumbling on Happiness.  One reason we so often guess wrong, he argues, is that we often imagine the future incorrectly. We forget how easily we adapt, even to painful circumstances. So when we picture what it would be like to be single again or to live in Seattle or to leave one job for another, we don't factor in everything else - the new friends, the newly discovered interest in Cascade Mountains wildflowers - that might also affect our emotional well-being.

Unfortunately, Gilbert says, we can't simply train ourselves to peer into the future with greater clarity. Instead, we should put more trust in other people's experiences. "Start with the assumption that your reactions are a lot like other people's," Gilbert says. If you want to know whether to take a job at a new company, pay attention to the people around you when you're there for an interview. Do they seem engaged and interested? That should count for a lot.

2.  Savor mystery.
In a culture obsessed withe the power of information, the fact that most of us are a little unnerved by uncertainty is hardly surprising.

Yet research suggests that a dash of mystery can make positive experiences last longer. In one study, University of Virginia psychologist Timothy Wilson, PhD, and colleagues found that students who were given a $1 coin with little explanation reported
feeling happier a few minutes later than those who were given either the same amount of money by a known source or no money at all. Wilson argues that those who didn't fully comprehend the reason for the gift spent more time mulling it over, extending their pleasure. "Once we've done the cognitive work to understand something, we kind of wrap it up in a little package and store it away and move on to other things," he explains.

It's not easy to stage surprises for yourself, but Wilson suggests a few tricks. next time you're nearing the end of an engrossing book, save the final pages for a few days later. Or shop from catalogs so you won't know exactly when your purchases will arrive - if you're lucky, when they do you may have forgotten what you've ordered.