In her wonderful book, The How of Happiness: A Scientific Approach to Getting the Life You Want, Sonja Lyubomirsky tells you how to be happy today.

She shares twelve simple activities to attract happiness. We’ve listed them here for you along with our thoughts on each one.

1) Expressing gratitude

If you haven’t done so already, start today building a habit of gratitude. Be thankful for all your riches. Research has shown that gratitude leads to reaching your goals.

2) Cultivating optimism

We all have a tendency one way or the other. Listen carefully to yourself. If you tend to put a pessimistic spin on things, break the habit. Optimism brings many benefits.

3) Avoiding overthinking and social comparison

Comparing yourself to others will cost you now and in the future. If you stack up favorably, you may get overconfident. You may not push as hard. If others are doing better than you, you may feel disheartened.

Stop looking at others. Look only at your personal and professional progress and take action accordingly.

4) Practicing acts of kindness

When you help people, you help yourself. It’s like a drug. In fact, the term “helper’s high” has been coined to describe the endorphin rush experienced by acts of kindness.

5) Nurturing social relationships

Life comes down to two things: relationships and experiences. Sure, you can experience things alone. Some of the time, you should!

But wouldn’t you rather share your invigorating experiences with people you love? Building relationships is one of the most important activities if you want to reach BIGG success.

6) Developing strategies for coping

The single, biggest difference between people who reach BIGG success and those who don’t is perseverance. Everybody runs full-speed ahead into a wall from time to time. Everyone has bad days.

All of us feel discouraged at times. The most successful find ways to deal with it.

7) Learning to forgive

It’s not easy to forgive someone who has seriously wronged you. It is necessary, however. As long as you don’t forgive them, you hold on to them. You’re stuck in the past.

Move on. Get rid of this mental clutter.

8) Increasing flow experiences

Flow is when you get so caught up in an activity that the world goes into suspension. Time passes without a care. You are completely immersed in the task at hand.

If you can’t find this flow in your work, get a hobby. In fact, get a hobby anyway. It’s what the most successful people do.

9) Savoring life’s joys

While this one is closely related to the first one, there is a reason to include it separately. It emphasizes the importance of moving out of the complex world to see things more simply. It will help you rediscover your creativity!

10) Committing to your goals

Losers make promises; winners make commitments. We discussed this a little bit under the sixth point. But the key here is to understand the link between your goals and your vision.

11) Practicing Religion and Spirituality

You are a three-in-one: body, mind, and spirit. You need to feed all three if you want to achieve the most happiness. Believe in a power greater than yourself. And realize that peace on earth begins with you.

12) Taking Care of Your Body

We get busy. We often fail to take care of our bodies the way we should. The two of us struggle with this one as we press for our own BIGG success.

But then we remind ourselves, that it only takes five minutes. It may not be ideal, but it’s better than nothing!

We like the fact that these twelve activities were all framed in the active tense. The song tells us, “Don’t worry, be happy.”

The better way of thinking is: Take action. Be happy today. Now that’s BIGG success!

What makes you happy?

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Dan Buettner’s fascinating book Thrive discusses the keys to happiness. One of the most important key to your happiness is your relationships.

In an interview on NPR’s Weekend Edition Sunday, he cites what we think is a staggering statistic:

The happiest people in America socialize seven hours a day.

Seven hours! Now that’s a lot of interaction!

But it’s necessary if you want to be happy. We’ll discuss four relationships that yield many happy returns.

Listen to this post! Click a player to hear George & Mary-Lynn on The BIGG Success Show Podcast


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Do you want to be happier at work? You can be, starting today.

It’s really simple. You’ll be happier at work if you have a best friend there.
It’s the #1 factor in determining whether or not you’ll like your job.

New friends

Here’s another one, G. Each new friend increases your happiness by about 10%.

At times, you may think you have enough friends. But you can never have too many friends.

Of course, you’ll invest time to build and maintain those relationships. But we often over-estimate what that takes.

Go out for dinner together – you have to eat anyway.

Invite them over to watch the game – you’ll have more people to celebrate with if you win. Or, if you lose, remember that misery loves company!

Your spouse

Here’s another interesting tidbit that Dan Buettner found in his research – married people are three times happier than single people.

It’s kind of funny, in an ironic sort of way.
What do comedians joke about? Marriage.
What do guys poke fun at? Married life.

Well, at it turns out, marriage has a huge upside when it comes to happiness.

Your parents

There’s one more relationship we haven’t talked about yet. And it’s the relationship that will yield the greatest returns when you look back in time.

It’s your relationship with your parents. Fortunately, we’re in the time of year when we have the opportunity to spend more time with our Moms and Dads.

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Now, I have to tell you – I’ve lost both of my parents. Dad’s been gone over fifteen years and we lost Mom five years ago.

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And I lost my Mom thirteen years ago. I’m blessed, though – Dad’s still going strong.

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Occasionally we’ll run into someone who doesn’t get along with their parents. These are people in their 30s, 40s, and even older who are still holding a grudge.

Of course, sometimes parents behaved poorly. There are legitimate reasons to be upset. But that’s not what we’re talking about.

We’re talking about parents who tried their best. But who weren’t perfect.

You know what? Parents aren’t supposed to be perfect. They’re just supposed to provide a benchmark.

You can follow their lead. Or you can do the opposite.

Their job is to set an example. Your job is to learn.

They may get it right. They may not. It’s up to you to decide and act accordingly. But let bygones by bygones.

It’s a busy time of year. While most other people are worrying about getting the right gift, you can give the gift that keeps on giving by focusing on your relationships.

They will yield many happy returns. And that’s BIGG success!

We’re so happy to see you here today. Thanks for checking in.

Until next time, here’s to your BIGG success!

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Direct link to The Bigg Success Show audio file | podcast:
http://traffic.libsyn.com/biggsuccess/00763-122111.mp3

As I was walking down the street today,
I looked up in the sky,
And a bird pooped in my eye.
I’m so glad that cows can’t fly.
~ Author unknown

If you can’t be grateful for what did happen to you, be thankful for what didn’t.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Image from rudecactus.com

But what if the order is reversed? Can happiness buy money?

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The latest research supports the notion that happiness can buy money[PDF]. It comes from a team effort with researchers from the University of Virginia, Michigan State University, and last but certainly the most, the University of Illinois. Okay, we’re biased but at least we admit it.

Happiness buys an extra $8,263 a year!

The researchers surveyed incoming freshmen at 25 elite colleges. We’re not sure how they defined “elite”, but we’re pretty sure it’s the schools we attended!

The participants reported their cheerfulness. 19 years later, when the participants were about 37 years old, the researchers asked them to report their annual income.

On average, the participants in the highest 10% on the cheerfulness scale earned over 15% more than those in the lowest 10%. In 1995 dollars, this was a difference of $8,263 a year, on average ($62,681 vs. $54,318).

Attitude to altitude

That’s a bigg difference. So not only can happiness buy you money, it can buy quite a bit of it! Apparently attitude does determine altitude!

That’s one of the bigg takeaways here. If we approach the days of our lives with the right attitude, we’ll be more productive. We’ll show more initiative. We’ll get more opportunities.

More money, less risk

We also found it interesting that the most cheerful participants were one-third less likely to ever be unemployed than the least cheerful. It appears that being of good cheer not only helps you be more prosperous, it reduces your risk as well. That’s a slam dunk!

And it flies in the face of conventional wisdom. We learn in business school that you have to take more risk to make more money. But as this study shows, you can make more money and actually have less risk with the right attitude!

That’s the bigg idea behind bigg success – to get all areas of our lives working harmoniously by finding synergy like what we see here.

Being too happy is costly

Here’s a surprising twist from this study: People who were moderately cheerful (above average on the researchers scale but not in the top 10%) earned the most on average.

They made almost 6% more than those in the top 10% and about 22% more than the bottom 10%. In 1995 dollars, that means they earned $3,563 and $11,826 more than the highest and lowest deciles respectively.

So being really happy leads to much better income than being really unhappy. But being happy instead of really happy is even better yet!

It turns out that Droopy had it right. He never said, “I’m really happy.” Just “I’m happy.”

Bigg Success is the community of bigg goal-getters. People who are usually happy, but never content. This research supports the notion that this “happy, not content” attitude leads to bigg success.

Thanks so much for checking in on us today. You can get more tips and tools to be a bigg success by subscribing to our free weekly newsletter.

Please join us next time when we’ll discuss what entrepreneurs have that MBAs don’t. Until then, here’s to your bigg success!

Subscribe to The Bigg Success Show in iTunes. 

Subscribe to the Bigg Success feed.

Direct link to The Bigg Success Show audio file:
http://media.libsyn.com/media/biggsuccess/00446-072709.mp3

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(Image in today's post by Mattox)

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Does that mean you’re going to sing, George?

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I hope not. We want our audience to keep listening. I only put you through that torture, Mary-Lynn.

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We do like music here at Bigg Success as you may have noticed by all the songs and bands we talk about.

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I’m more of a melody person and George is the lyrics guy.

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With it being St. Patrick’s Day, we started thinking about the song, I’m Looking Over a Four-Leaf Clover. What a happy little jingle, written all the way back in 1927 but, ironically, overlooked until Art Mooney popularized it in 1948.

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The song opens, “I’m looking over a four-leaf clover that I overlooked before.” And in the lyrics … see I am a lyrics guy … are three great lessons.

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Sunshine + Rain = Roses

The second part of the song goes, “One leaf is sunshine, the second is rain, Third is the roses that grow in the lane.”

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This is the first lesson we see in this wonderful song and it seems particularly appropriate right now as we face tough times. Sometimes the sun shines. I just love sunny days. The sun represents the good times.

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Up until about a year or so ago, we were living in pretty good times, economically. We often aren’t thankful enough when we’re in the middle of them.

Then it rains. And we’re in the middle of a storm right now. But the thing is – if the sun was always shining, if it never rained – would we really appreciate the sunshine?

It’s the change of weather that makes weather more interesting. It’s the change in circumstances that makes life more interesting. And boy, are they interesting right now or what!

This part of the song wraps up talking about the roses that grow in the lane. And here’s where the lesson comes in. Without the sunshine and the rain, those roses wouldn’t grow. Without the rain, those roses wouldn’t bloom into their full beauty.

So it is with us. It takes sunshine and rain, good times and bad, for us to reach our full potential. Because in the down times, when the challenges may be the greatest, we gain wisdom, strength, and skills that we would never have otherwise. And those things carry us to greater heights than we could have ever imagined when the good times come. 

The fourth leaf

The song continues, “No need explaining, the one remaining is somebody I adore.” St. Patrick’s Day is all about luck. The fourth leaf of a four-leaf clover is often associated with luck. And how lucky we are if we have someone to adore! That’s the second lesson from this song.

Isn’t it interesting that the song doesn’t talk about having somebody who adores us? It’s showing us that to give our love, our adoration, is so very important. Because we can’t really love someone else fully unless we love ourselves enough to have some love to give, some extra capacity. Then we can experience the joy of giving love.

Let’s not overlook the third lesson

Believe it or not, that’s the whole song … it’s like the whole song is a chorus.

So you may be saying, “Wait a minute. They said there were three lessons in this song and so far they’ve only talked about two of them.”

Good catch. The third lesson is in the first part of the song. “I’m looking over a four-leaf clover that I overlooked before.”

Since we view four-leaf clovers as a sign of good luck to come, we wonder …

We have wonderful people in our lives. We have the basic necessities we need. We have so much and we often fail to stop and be thankful for it. Yes, today is a day to realize how lucky we are. Our stocks and the value of our houses may be down. But we shouldn’t overlook how fortunate we are.

We feel fortunate that you spent time with us today. Thank you so much. 

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If we don’t have enough of this one thing, we’ll fail. If we have too much of it, we’ll fail. Join us next time to find out what this one thing is … and exactly how much you need of it to succeed bigg. Until then, here’s to your bigg success!

Subscribe to The Bigg Success Show in iTunes. 

Subscribe to the Bigg Success feed.

Direct link to The Bigg Success Show audio file:
http://media.libsyn.com/media/biggsuccess/00352-031709.mp3

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(Image in today's post by woodsy)