Articles Archives ~ Page 46 of 51 ~ Clare Josa

What Are Your Happiness Secrets?

It’s all very well having someone else witter on about how to feel happier, but nobody has all the answers.

And although I’ve discovered plenty of useful happiness techniques and tips over the last few years, I’m always up for learning more.

The thing is that all of us know, deep down, how to feel happier. It’s just that we’re good at forgetting it.

One of the reasons I run How To Feel Happier is to provide inspiration for when people are stuck.

Here are some of my personal favourite ways to feel happier:

Go for a walk outside and stamp my feet, to get rid of the frustration!

Imagine it’s a really sunny day.

Listen to a piece of music (loudly!) that always cheers me up – and dance, too 😉

Get back “in the moment”, rather than dwelling on the past or worrying about the future. Playing with my boys and giving them 100% of my attention is a great way to do this.

Eat chocolate – I’m only human…!

And I was wondering if you’d like to get sharing?

What are your favourite happiness quick fixes?

What do you do, think or say when you want to feel happier?

And how do you inspire others to feel happier?

Please feel free to share via the comments box, below. Thank you!
Clare x

Chief Happiness Experimenter for How To Feel Happier.

Are You Spreading Smiles Or Frowns?

Inspirational Messages

Have you ever noticed how walking into a room of grumpy people is like standing under a rain cloud?

But walking into a room of people who are genuinely happy and laughing is like an instant mood lift?

In fact, it’s pretty easy to feel happy when you’re surrounded by other people who are happy.

But it’s pretty tough to feel happy if you’re surrounded by others who are miserable.
So what can you do about it?

How about choosing to be the one who lifts the mood?

Whatever the atmosphere in a room, you can easily do your bit to improve it.

All you need to do is focus on something that makes you feel happy. Give it your full attention for a minute or more. Then notice how another, even happier thought easily flows into your mind. Then another. And before you know it, you’re feeling happier. You’ll be smiling. And those around you will notice the shift.

The key is not to become attached to making others feel happier. That rarely works.

It’s about creating an environment that inspires them to feel happier, then letting them get on with making their own choice.

Smiles are contagious. How about giving a few away today?

Your Favourite Happiness Quotes

Inspirational Messages

We were chatting on the How To Feel Happier sofa about happiness quotes the other day.

And it got us wondering: what are your favourite happiness quotes?

Are there particular quotes that lift your spirits or just generally make you feel happy, when you think of them?

Or perhaps there are funny things that friends and family have said, that make you feel happier?

Here are some of ours favourites, to get you started:

Happiness comes when your work and words are of benefit to yourself and others.

Buddha

The basic thing that everyone wants is happiness; no one wants suffering. Happiness mainly comes from our own attitude, rather than from external factors. If your own mental attitude is correct, even if you remain in a hostile environment, you feel happy.

HH Dalai Lama

The truest greatness lies in being kind; the truest wisdom in a happy mind.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Ragesh Aggarwal — Thoughts, poems & quotes on happiness

And here is one of our favourite books of happiness quotes: “Thoughts, quotes & poems on happiness” by Rakesh Aggarwal.

How about sharing? What are your favourite happiness quotes via the comments box?

7 Great Reasons To Smile

Inspirational Messages

Sometimes with the Credit Crunch and everything else going on around us, it can be easy to feel we have nothing to smile about.

So here are 7 great reasons to smile now. Want to know the secrets of why something so simple can be so transformational?

Smiling is contagious
It doesn’t matter whether you’re in the office or at a bus stop, smiling is contagious. I’m not talking the kind of creepy, self-conscious, embarrassed smiles that make you cringe. I’m talking natural, friendly, happy smiles. Have you ever noticed how often people smile back when you smile at them?

Thinking a happier thought can turn your ship around
Simply thinking a thought that is marginally happier than the last one you had can turn things around. You might be feeling glum and depressed, but a little smile and choosing a thought that feels better can transform your day.

Give someone the gift of a smile
I smiled at a man in a shop today. He had been friendly and helpful and I said thank you, with a genuine, eye-contact smile. He positively beamed back at me, wished me a happy new year and we both went on our day feeling so much happier. Such a simple gift to share.

You can shift the mood in the room
Frowns are contagious, too. If everyone in the room is grumpy and fed up, it’s easy to get dragged into that mood. But smiling can influence everyone in the room and can rescue many a nightmare meeting.

You get what you think about
Have you ever noticed how stubbing your toe on the bed as you get up can lead to a nightmare day? Yet opening the curtains to blue sky and sunshine can have the opposite effect? It’s a proven fact that our mindset acts as a filter on our experience of the day. If we’re thinking about stuff that stresses you out, we’re likely to be spotting more and more stuff that stresses us. Smiling, and consciously looking for the sunshine in each activity, can profoundly improve your day!

Feeling grateful
If you’re finding it hard to raise a smile, how about thinking of something you feel grateful for? See if you can think of 3 things? Or even more? If you can switch your focus to things you feel grateful for even for just a minute, you’ll have shifted your mood and that smile will be beaming.

Smiling makes you feel better
It’s a biological fact that the body produces its “happy chemicals” whether or not your smile is genuine! So smiling for 60 seconds will get it well on its way to giving you a natural high. Smiling literally makes you feel happier. Now isn’t that worth knowing?

Bottom line? Even if at first you’re faking it, the simple act of smiling makes you feel happier. Are you ready to discover 5 more secrets to feeling happier now?

Then I invite you to join our Soul-Sized Living community and I’ll send you my new book absolutely free – it’s called How To Be Happy – 5 Insider Secrets You’ll Love To Use – Today.

You can sign up in the box below this article.

I’d LOVE to see you there!

With love, Namaste,

Why New Year Resolutions Don't Work – Part 3 of 3

Inspirational Messages

In parts 1 and 2 we covered two of the most important reasons why New Year Resolutions don’t work.

In this final video, you’ll discover the most important reason why most resolutions fail – and what you can do to make sure you don’t fall into this trap.

What do you think?
How are your New Year Resolutions going?

We’d love to hear from you via the comments box.

From Clare Josa, HowToFeelHappier.com

Do You Know What You Want?

How To Change Your Life

I have a theory that one of the hardest parts of creating the life we dream of is figuring out what we really want.

There’s something that happens when we have complete clarity that gives us a sense of motivation and focus, meaning we can create a life that most would call “charmed”.

Yet years come and go and we often feel we’re making little progress towards our dreams.

The arrival of a New Year is a great time to focus our attention on what we really want and get clear about our priorities. Then all we need to do is sit back and believe.

It’s taken me years to figure that one out. I used to be the Queen of “doing”. If I wanted something, the first thing I would think about was the “how”. And if I couldn’t figure out the “how”, I would feel discouraged and would give it all up as a bad idea.

Nowadays, I realise that all that “mind work” of working out the “how” meant I was missing all the signs and opportunities along the way. They would have made things soooo much easier!

So here’s a rule of thumb that was on my Abraham-Hicks perpetual calendar this week:

Make a decision about what you want,

focus your attention there,

find out what it feels like to be there.

And then let go and wait for inspired action.

By far the most important part of this is deciding what you want.

So if you could wave a magic wand and have any life you wanted, what would you wish for?

My invitation to you this New Year is to:

Make a decision about what you really want and write it down
Imagine you’ve already got it / been there / done it and really feel the emotion of that
Spend a couple of minutes in that “place”
Repeat every morning before you get up
Turn your radar on every day for actions that will move you closer to your dream. Don’t force it, just let it happen.

Here’s wishing you the 2009 of your dreams!

Let me know how you get on via the comments box.

Thanks,
Clare x