How To Find Happiness Every Day

CalendarThis is the second post in the How To Find Happiness series. The first is How To Find Happiness In 5 Minutes and the third post is How to Find Happiness That Lasts.

Finding happiness every day is a simple matter of forming habits that become part of our daily routine. We can form a habit in just 30 days, essentially putting happiness on auto-pilot once the happiness habit is formed.

Glance through this post and pick one action that makes you happy. Then do this every day for 30 days until it is entrenched in your daily routine and gets done without any further effort on your part.

photo credit: Andreanna

How to find happiness in the morning

“Be pleasant until ten o’clock in the morning and the rest of the day will take care of itself.”

- Elbert Hubbard

What is ‘good’ about your morning? We offer a cheerful ‘good morning!’ to people we meet, yet often forget to give ourselves a good morning. I often turn on the computer to check my email and blog first thing in the morning, though I am happier sitting still with a cup of coffee just enjoying the coolness of the air on my skin and listening to the birds sing.

Find a happiness routine that makes you feel happy. Then do this first thing in the morning every day for the next 30 days until it becomes a habit. You can choose one action from the list below or use your own.

  1. Look around your bedroom and give thanks that you can see
  2. Listen to the morning sounds and give thanks that you can hear
  3. Touch your soft sheets and give thanks that you can feel
  4. Breathe deeply and give thanks that you can smell
  5. Sip coffee or water and give thanks that you can taste
  6. Move your fingers and toes and give thanks that you can move
  7. Watch a loved one sleeping and celebrate your relationship
  8. Review one page in your gratitude journal
  9. Read your personal creed and be thankful for being you
  10. Give thanks for the gift of one more day of life

How to find happiness during the day

“Think what a better world it would be if we all, the whole world, had cookies and milk about three o’clock every afternoon and then lay down on our blankets for a nap.”

- Barbara Jordan

Christians are taught to say grace before meals, while Muslims pray at least five times a day. The value in these practices is in stopping to focus on what’s important at regular intervals during the day.

If you are not religious, there are other simple practices that can help us find happiness during the day. Again, choose one of the following actions or one of your own and do this once a day for the next 30 days until a habit is formed.

  1. Pay someone a genuine compliment
  2. Perform an anonymous good deed
  3. Exercise at lunch time
  4. Call a friend just to say hello
  5. Call your partner to say you were thinking of him/her
  6. Write a note to your child (see Henie’s beautiful post)
  7. Take a walk around the block
  8. Sit in a quiet park
  9. Watch children at a playground
  10. Complete your most important task for the day

How to find happiness before you sleep

“A good gulp of hot whiskey at bedtime – it’s not very scientific but it helps.”

- Alexander Fleming

Studies suggest that sleep reinforces our emotional memory. What you feel prior to sleeping may therefore play an important role in your long term emotional well-being. Do you spend the hour before bedtime on actions that generate positive, neutral, or negative emotions?

Here are a few actions to consider for your bedtime ritual:

  1. Read an uplifting book
  2. Cuddle with your partner
  3. Admire your children’s fingers or toes
  4. Light a candle and watch it burn
  5. Burn aromatherapy oil and breathe deeply
  6. Listen to soothing music
  7. Meditate
  8. Bless and pray for someone you know
  9. Visualize your ideal day tomorrow
  10. Write in your gratitude journal

How to find the most happiness

“I, not events, have the power to make me happy or unhappy today. I can choose which it shall be. Yesterday is dead. Tomorrow hasn’t arrived yet. I have just one day, today, and I’m going to be happy in it.”

- Groucho Marx

Ideally you would form a happiness habit for the morning, one during the day, and one before you sleep. This way you stay happy throughout the day. If your day is really busy then just do something every morning and every night. If even twice a day is too much, start with just on happiness habit a day – either morning or night.

The long term changes in your psyche from just one repeated daily action is probably under-rated. After gratitude journaling for a few months, I started to experience sudden moments of pure joy that descended on me of the blue.

Start your daily happiness habit today, and the day will soon come when you won’t need to ask how to find happiness. Happiness will find you.



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Posted by Daphne | March 21, 2009 | in Laugh A Lot


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  • Comments by Readers

  • nudgeme: Hi Daphne Lovely to see a post on Joyful days in my Google Reader this morning – and such an uplifting one at that! I concur with...
  • vered - blogger for hire: “Which is partly why I’m blogging less now – I have a happy life to keep me occupied!” This is great. You...
  • Tess The Bold Life: I can attest that they all work. I’ve even been quite happy in the middle even though I’m sliding out of that...
  • J.D. Meier: Excellent rundown. I used to think happiness was doing nothing, then I found out it’s actually doing something. It’s got to...
  • Megan "JoyGirl!" Bord: The “work on your terms” is interesting to me, especially your suggestion that it doesn’t mean we...
  • Annaly: The tongue is a had thing to get control of, but I like your concept of good and bad gossip.
  • Hilary: Hi Daphne – the points you describe so well are so true – Believe in Something – the Dale Carnegie quote .. if we occupy ourselves, we live...
  • Lance: Hi Daphne, This is so good to read! And really, reading this I feel a deep sense of happiness both for you, and within you. Daphne, this is...
  • Baker: Wow. I have to mention that these tips here are very powerful. This is excellent. I can definetly see that you really did an amazing job at...
  • Carla: I can definitely relate to having something to look forward to. When you live your live day by day in a tape loop, it can make things pretty...
  • James Gray: To say that there is no such thing as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ just because they seem to require opposites makes no...
  • MJ: Maybe there are individuals who may have gone through an expereince that would follow.. having been able to choose to be in one Parallel...
  • Hulbert: Hi Daphne, gossiping isn’t really that big of a problem for me because I tend to not hang out with people that just gossip all day....
  • Sara: Daphne — It’s been some time since I visited and I’m glad I came by today. I liked all your suggestions about handling...
  • alessandraelle: Thank you for using my photo and for the exact credits! :-) Ciao from Italy.
  • Daniel: Heya Daphne! Great seeing a new post from you in my reader. :) I too wrote about that story (Socrate’s Teaches The Test of 3)...
  • Daphne: Daphne! Hi, it’s the other Daphne! :) I LOVE the Socrates story – I hadn’t heard it before. I now have a sticky note in...
  • Island Girl: Dear Daphne I have recently moved to a very small island where people do nothing but gossip. I came knowing this would be the case but...
  • Hilda: I used to love a good gossip! Not so much anymore though. I love to hear and pass on good news, but I’m not into the nasty stuff now....
  • Evelyn Lim: I enjoyed reading the story about Socrates that you posted. I don’t like to engage in gossips myself. I have few opportunities to...