Laughter is free, fun, and good for your health. Here are some of the things laughter can do for you, and some ways to bring more joy into your life.

Benefits of Laughter

1. Boost your immune system. Research on the connection between laughter and physical health is still ongoing, but some benefits are clear. Laughing helps to fight stress and may enhance your immune response. This may make you more resistant to colds and other illnesses.

2. Diminish pain. Laughing is an effective way to decrease pain. Many individuals living with chronic pain report that humor helps make their experiences more bearable. Some hospitals even offer laughter therapy to complement conventional treatments for cancer and other conditions.

3. Get a little workout. Every time you chuckle, you boost your heart rate and increase your circulation, which burns more calories than just sitting still. You still need to exercise, but every little bit helps.

4. Improve your mood. Hilarity has a powerful effect on your emotional state. A good laugh instantly relaxes your whole body. Plus, those good feelings last, and may make you feel more positive for hours afterward.

5. Enhance resilience. Learning to see the humor in difficult events is an excellent coping mechanism. Having a flexible outlook will help you bounce back faster from disappointments.

6. Strengthen relationships. Taking pleasure in each other’s company draws people closer together. Laughing together helps us to connect, share happy memories, and appreciate the good things around us.

7. Spread joy to others. Laughing is almost as contagious as yawning. You’re bound to have a good effect on those around you if you use humor appropriately. Smiling and laughing also make you appear more approachable so you’ll get plenty of opportunities to cheer up others.

Ways to Laugh More in Your Daily Life

1. Smile. It’s easier to break out laughing when you’re already smiling. Make a habit of relaxing your face into a subtle smile. You’ll boost your mood and start to notice more things to smile about naturally.

2. Watch funny movies and other media. It’s always good to learn from the experts. Watch great comedy films, read cartoons, or visit a comedy club.

3. Look for the humor in ordinary situations. Cultivate a jovial outlook. Observe your surroundings so that you notice the unexpected and incongruous events of daily life. Practice exaggerating a typical conversation so that it becomes funny.

4. Take yourself less seriously. You can be conscientious and light-hearted. Learn to poke fun at yourself and your idiosyncrasies. Keep minor setbacks in perspective.

5. Practice being silly. If you have children or pets, join in their games or make up silly stories to tell them. Put a whimsical decoration like a funny calendar or wind-up toy in your office or study to amuse you.

6. Share laughter with the people around you. Seek out people whom you find funny. Take a break at work to join in with people who are obviously having a good time. Tell your spouse a funny story from your day when you get home.

7. Apply humor to challenging situations. Humor is even more important on tough days. You can recognize a serious situation and act responsibly while considering how your circumstances might appear funny in the future or if it was happening in a movie.

Improve your quality of life by laughing more. Laughter is good for your health and easy to share with everyone around you.

Tags: Happiness

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Are you still waiting for your circumstances to change before you’ll allow yourself to be happy? Most of us have preconceived ideas of what would make us happy, and we refuse to be satisfied until those things happen.

The problem is that even once specific things happen in our lives, we’re rarely satisfied with them! Instead, we shift our focus to something even bigger and better, believing “it” will make us happy (or happier). We never allow ourselves to reach a point of contentment. Have you done the same thing to yourself?

The good news is that you can decide to be happy NOW – even if not everything in your life is perfect. Below you’ll find 3 easy ways to do so:

1) Be grateful. Gratitude is one of the most powerful states of mind that you can adopt. Not only does it make you feel good, it shifts your focus from what you don’t have to what you DO have, and keeps it there! As you focus more on what you are grateful to have in your life (even the really small blessings!), you worry less about anything that may be lacking. The result? A more pervasive sense of happiness!

2) Take time to smell the roses. If you spend most of your days feeling rushed and scattered, it’s hard to feel happy and content. In order to be truly happy, you need to make time for yourself to relax, dream, and take pleasure in life’s simpler moments. Beginning today, make sure to spend time doing things you love on a regular basis. Read books that stimulate your imagination; listen to great music; take long walks, and generally make an effort to enjoy your life as it is right now.

3) Love the journey. Many of us make the mistake of pinning all of our expectations on some vague, far-off result, like the completion of goals. We believe that once we “get there” everything will be perfect and we’ll finally be happy. However, there is much to be gained from enjoying the journey TO your destination! Make it your mission to revel in every moment that you’re working toward higher goals. Enjoy the sense of self-mastery and accomplishment you gain with every goal you achieve. Make it a worthwhile journey and you’ll savor the end result that much more!

The most important thing to understand about happiness is that it is largely a CHOICE you make from moment to moment. Though certain serious situations make it difficult to feel happy at times, most often we allow the little things to bother us and block any happiness we would otherwise feel. Embrace happiness, and it will grow to monstrous proportions in your life!

Tags: Happiness

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Believe it or not, it is within your power to create positive thoughts allowing you to accomplish anything you set out to do. Can you really think yourself happy? The answer is a qualified yes. Here are the ways in which positive thoughts can help you accomplish many things in life.

Positive thoughts produce positive results. We can either bemoan our situation, or change it. We can be negative about an event or enthusiastic. President Lincoln once said, “Most folks are about as happy as they make up their minds to be.” If you really want to think yourself happy, then make up your mind to do so. It may be difficult to think happy in a world filled with hatred and violence. But it’s not impossible. One person, one idea, one positive thought can change society. How, then, can we make ourselves happy? By being a constant reminder to others that there is goodness in the world.

* Seek out positive people to associate with.
* Expose yourself to all the wonderful books, music and movies available.
* Find the one important thing in your life that’s important, and pursue it.
* Show kindness and respect towards others.
* Live life as if every day is your last.
* Use positive reinforcement wherever and whenever you can.
* Use visualization methods to view the positive aspects of life.
* Speak in a positive tone.
* Rid your mind of negative thinking with yoga and exercise.
* Let your expectations reflect your positive attitude.
* Allow peace of mind to envelop you.
* Become your own best friend.

There is a wonderful poem which clearly explains how unhappiness can thwart our every desire.

If you think you are beaten you are;
If you think you dare not, you don’t;
If you want to win but think you can’t;
It’s almost a cinch you won’t.
If you think you’ll lose you’re lost;
For out of the world we find
Success begins with a fellow’s will;
It’s all in a state of mind.
Life’s battles don’t always go
To the stronger and faster man.

Happiness is not a genetic trait we are born with. It is ingrained in us by our parents and those we love. It is up to us, then, to maintain it, share it, and build our lives around it. Think happy, and you will be happy.

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Money isn’t really everything when it comes to measuring success. You need to be happy with your life and you also have to have achieved your goals. You have to remember there are different forms of being successful. There is being successful in your career and there is also being successful in your personal life, such as your married life or being able to start a family.

When it comes to measuring success, the most important thing that should be measured would be your happiness. You have to ask yourself if you are happy with your life or you still have goals that you want to achieve.

For you to become successful, you will need to know what’s important for you. You have to identify the things that are important to your life. These things are the things that make you happy. If you identified the important things in your life, then you will be much happier living your life, which in turn means becoming more successful.

You also have to remember that you should live a balanced life. What this means is that your life should be a healthy mix of activities. Some people measure success when they are at their peak in their career. However, this is not really it. A healthy mix of activities include establishing and maintaining meaningful relationships with the people around you, taking care of your health and wellness, career, financial stability, and continuing personal growth and development.

Planning is another key to success. Always evaluate your life and identify what is working and what is not working in your life. By having a plan, you will be able to be prepared in case things happen. You will be able to adjust a lot easily and you will also be able to accept things that happen in your life easily.

Another habit that you should develop that identifies a successful person is that you should be able to play and have fun as often as you can. You need to remember that people work hard to play. If you are able to have fun a lot more than work, then you are successful. Try traveling if you can and discover and experience new places and culture.

These are the things that you have to remember about the true meaning of success. You have to keep in mind that success is not just measured by the money you have in your bank account, but it is measured by how much you are satisfied with your life.

Tags: Happiness, Self Help and Motivational, Success, Work Life Balance

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Brian Tracy has put together a short but informative video to show you how you can discover what you were really meant to do with your life.

It sounds like a simple enough thing, until you realize that not one in a thousand people ever do it. Oh sure, you think about doing one thing, and the next thing you know you’re off doing something completely different.

It’s not your fault. We all start out the same that way. Very few of us know what we want to do when we grow up. I can tell you I certainly fell into this category… That is, until I discovered a life-altering secret.

What makes some people more successful than others is their ability to have a clear vision of who they are and what talents they bring to the table.

They discover what I call the “music inside of them” and it’s one of the most important elements in getting what you want in life and business.

Clarity! This is essential to everything you do in life. It will give you the power to cut through the minutia and get to the good stuff.

Plus, you will gain a sense of destiny. You will enjoy a sense of peace and calming as you realize what you were meant to be and do.

Don’t wait another second.

Grab Your Free Video Here and enjoy!

P.S. If this video captures your interest… if you feel compelled to discover your true self… if what I’ve said today resonates with you, then you should read below the video to discover what you can be, do, and have in your life.

Tags: Goals, Happiness, Personal Growth, Self Help and Motivational

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One of the best ways to reducing stress and achieving happiness is by feeling empowered in whatever job that you are doing. Your health also improves as you have more energy to put into whatever you are doing whether at work, home or your social life. Here are keys to achieving happiness through actions that you can take:

1. Love Your Job

If you love the job you do, it is easy to be happy doing it. What if you do not love your job?

There are only two choices. Find another job that you love or find reasons and ways to love your current job. Often, whether you like or dislike your job depends on your mindset.

If you decide to remain at your current job, then find reasons why you are happy about it. The most basic of this will be that it helps you pay your bills. Focus on the few things you find that you like about the job. Meanwhile, look out for other jobs.

Avoid focusing on things that upset you. If you list these out, you may find there are only a few that look like many because you focus on them.

2. Communicate Effectively

If you are unhappy because of how the work gets done in the office, then communicate effectively with your peers and boss on how things can be done better.

Emphasis is on being effective in the communication. Complaining and griping will only irritate your co-workers and boss. Instead, think of ways to improve and discuss these with the others. Besides being better accepted, you will soon find that you enjoy what you do.

3. Mix With The Right People

Choose to mix with people who are positive and focus on results. Stay away from those who are not happy about several things and have a tendency to complain.

Work with people who want to achieve results and find ways of getting the job done better. Contribute your own ideas and take ownership of areas that you are responsible for.

4. Develop Your Skills

Improve on your current skills and start picking up new ones that will help you in your job.

Think about your long-term career and decide on the skills that you need to develop. This will help you decide which are the skills and competencies that you need to work on.

Doing this will give you a target to go after and a purpose in your life. As you keep improving, you will find achieving happiness becomes easier as you get a great sense of fulfillment.

5. Go After Your Dreams

Is your current job a stepping stone to your long-term career?

If it is not, then identify your dreams for the future first. Then decide how your current job can be a stepping stone. You may want to seek for more or a change in your job responsibilities in line with your long-term plans. Speak to your boss about it.

Alternatively, you may want to start looking out for a job that is geared towards your future dreams.

Besides the above tips, it is important that you have fun in your life outside your job. If you are a happy person, it is much easier to be happy at your workplace. Choose something that you like to do and make time to do that.

Achieving happiness needs action besides getting the ideas. Now that you have the ideas, apply them and work on getting a stress-free and happy life.

Tags: Attitude, Goals, Happiness, Motivation, Success

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Can we always be happy? As you know, this isn’t always easy. There are things we have to do apart from just putting a smile and your face so here are a few of them.

First, don’t take life too seriously. If you do, this only causes stress. What you have to understand is there are things beyond your control so you should learn to let these go. The only thing that you can do is do things to the best of your ability and then hope that it is enough.

You should also learn to laugh and appreciate the lighter things in life. Most of us don’t realize it now but some of the mistakes that we commit now, we talk about later on and when we look back, it is something also worth laughing about. But until that day comes, learn from your mistake and try not to do it again. If you can, try to reflect what you did at the end of the day.

Should things go wrong, always look for the silver lining. Sometimes, bad things happen for a reason and this provides us with an opportunity.

Instead of wishing for things that you don’t have, you should also learn to be happy with what you have. Chances are, you don’t live in a mansion or own a fancy car. What you have is your life, your friends and your family so you should be thankful for that.

Are there people around you that criticize you often and as a result, this brings you down. There are people who are like that and here, you can tell who your real friends are. If they respected you, they wouldn’t do that. But if they see something wrong, there is a way to make you realize that you made a mistake and would take steps to help you become a better person.

The same can be said toward your treatment to other people. If you are a true friend, you will always encourage and support them.

One of the most important things you need to be happy is to be yourself. This means expressing yourself even if this will not please everybody. You can do that by engaging in activities that you enjoy and striving for short and long-term goals.

We need people around us so we must always have a healthy relationship. Yes, there will be times that you will fight or have misunderstandings but situations like these makes your bond even stronger than before.

You should also make an effort to preserve a line of communication so you guys are able to hang out with one another even if you follow different things later in life.

Another way to be happy is to learn to diversify. This simply means not sticking to the same daily routine. If you have time, try to engage in fun activities like a hobby, a new adventure or an exercise routine.

There is one other way to always be happy and that is to help people. Helping someone in need always makes you feel good even if you do not get anything in return. Who knows? That kind gesture will be rewarded later when someone sees that you need help.

The hardest thing to do to have a happy life is to learn to forgive. If people have done you wrong, learn to forgive them for what they have done. If you feel you have done wrong to others, learn to forgive yourself.

Life is too short to live in on regrets, mistakes and misfortunes. Yes these are all setbacks but this should not change who you are because despite the circumstances, you can still be happy.

If you need help to find your way, seek professional or religious counseling because both can show you the way. When we talk about professional help, this does not always mean seeking a psychiatrist but rather a life coach. For the religious aspect, there is always the pastor or priest.

We have the power within ourselves to be happy. You can start by following some of the things mentioned one at a time and then making it a part of your daily life.

Tags: Attitude, Happiness, Personal Growth, Self Help and Motivational, Success

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Nobody is shielded from low self-esteem. However, it is important to distinguish between feelings of low esteem from sadness, or from the effects of a string of bad days. There are a couple of symptoms of low self-esteem that you can look out for if you feel that you or a loved one may be suffering from low self-esteem.

First, it is important to realize that unlike sadness or feeling like you woke up from the wrong side of the bed does not make up low self-esteem. This is because psychologists often consider self-esteem as a persisting self-conception. This enduring self-image can permeate into a person’s every activities, as it is at the core of a person’s conception of his or her self-worth.

One of the first symptoms is constant self-deprecation. You may find that a person with low self-esteem will easily say bad words about his or herself, passing comments even about how they are not worth the time or effort that people give them. They may also talk about their incapacity to fulfil their duties.

As well as self-deprecation, people suffering from low self-esteem will constantly express unhappiness about their bodies and how they look. Poor self-image is one of the most telling signs of low self-esteem. They may constantly be paranoid and sensitive about what people think about how they look. What’s worse, some of them may respond to this bad self-image through some form of eating disorder.

People who suffer from low self-esteem may be obsessed with order, forcing themselves to comply by an impossible standard of perfection in whatever task they are involved in. This may make them work slower than others, and may make them more vulnerable to feelings of not doing well because of their own impossible expectations. This feeling of failure (even though they did not fail, except by their own impossible, perfectionist standards) helps further feed their bad opinion of their own self-worth.

They may also be extremely eager to please, depending heavily on the approval of others to feel good about themselves. They find no pleasure in completing and succeeding in tasks unless they are recognized by the people whose opinions they believe matter.

They may even be all too eager to compare themselves to other people they have high regard to. However, it is important to note that these comparisons, for them, fulfil the necessary role of highlighting what they lack and what flaws they have.

While there are those who withdraw from society because of their low self-esteem, there are those who respond by uninhibited anger against themselves or other people. They may express this either by hurting themselves or the people around them, even if these people are not those who triggered feelings of anger. After all, because of low self-esteem, these people begin to hate themselves and the people around them. They are also likelier to explode suddenly in anger over very little issues when they feel that they are being cornered or humiliated.

By identifying the symptoms of low self-esteem, you will be able to decide the best course of action to respond suitably. If you or someone you know scores positively in these symptoms, then it may be good to seek help as soon as possible from a psychologist or therapist.

Tags: Happiness, Personal Growth, Self Esteem, Therapy

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Most folks have no idea that they are able to choose their attitude for each day. They just let their attitude be dictated by the weather, the day of the week, their current financial situation, or their state of relationships with significant others in their life.

This article empowers you to take control of your attitude and your life by discussing the patterns of behavior for many people and how you can make changes today.

- Do you wake up with a positive or negative attitude?

- Do you have to look outside and see if it is sunny or cloudy?

- Do you have to look at the calendar to see if it is a Monday?

- Do you have to first remember if this is a day of work or the weekend?

Attitudes are determined for many by just such information, but it doesn’t have to be that way. No matter the circumstances in which you find yourself, you have the power, the ability, and the option to choose your attitude for the day.

Just as you chose what shirt to put on and what pants and shoes to wear today, you can choose what attitude to have.

Choosing your attitude for the day is largely a matter of habit for many people. They simply fall into a pattern of behavior that they find is comfortable for them. Hopefully, it is your pattern always to get up in a good mood and a positive outlook for the day.

Abraham Lincoln said, “We are about as happy as we make our minds up to be.” As you may remember, Lincoln suffered several bouts with depression and lost many elections before finally becoming president.

Good and bad happens to folks each day. We cannot always control what happens to us, but we can control how we react to what happens to us.

We can choose to accept the event and not let us be overwhelmed by it whether it is positive or negative. Keep things in perspective. Try to look on the positive aspects of the situation.

Remember, we can choose our daily attitudes and thereby serve as a model to our family and our co-workers. In many ways we touch other’s lives each day. You can let your positive attitude be an inspiration for others every day.

Tags: Attitude, Happiness, Motivation, Positive Thinking

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Abraham Lincoln said, “Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be.”

When the economy takes a downward turn many people find their lives turned upside down. Financial worries lead to stress and even health problems.

It takes some extra doing to smile when things all around you are going wrong. However, one of the answers to getting through tough times is smiling. Smiling brings to mind the Bobby McFerrin song, “Don’t Worry, Be Happy”. A smile turns a lot of trouble into a less formidable foe and actually lowers stress.

Happiness is the medicine for bad times and economic turndowns. Don’t think of this as a “Pollyanna, pie in the sky” way of thinking. This is about finding things to smile about, things to laugh about when the rest of the world is falling apart.

Smile enough, you have the power to bring changes and more happiness into your life.

Happiness is all around you and finding some is a job worth pursuing. An excellent start is spending more time with other people. Your social networks can take you away for your troubles and give you some much needed personal time with others. Try an hour talking with friends instead of an hour in front of the TV. Make it a point to interact with more people each day.

Even in the worst of times there are small things to be happy about. The secret is to look for them. Think about what has made you smile in the past. What has made you laugh?

Let’s make a list of things that brings a moment of happiness into your life. Do the daily and Sunday comics in the newspaper make you laugh? Create a scrapbook of your favorite comics. Read it when you need a laugh or just a smile.

Think about everything that has made you happy, made you smile or made you laugh in the last week or month. Start scrapbooking those things and create a happiness book.

Here are some more scrapbook ideas. Do you love kittens or puppies? Do cute human baby picture make you glow inside? Do your juices start flowing when you see beautiful classic cars? Start cutting out pictures and printing them from the Internet. Add them to your scrapbook.

Happiness is often just making a decision to be happy. You can make a decision to pull out your scrapbook and smile for a minute or two.

Will this make the world go away and bring instant happiness? Not likely. It will take some of the gloom and doom and push it aside for a few minutes. Who knows, that smile and positive feeling might even last for hours or all day if you let it. You might even infect someone else with it.

There is a saying, “How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time”. This applies to many things in life including happiness. You might not be able to becoming a bouncing ball of joy all day everyday, but you can create a smile or a laugh and take on your challenges “one bite at a time”, “one smile at a time”.

Looking for things to smile about is important. Just as important is NOT looking for things to stress about. Your personal situation may be stressful, but why take on the world’s stress. How about getting a little less news from TV, the newspaper and online.

Most news is bad news; death, destruction, murder and mayhem. If you start your day reading about bad news, is this a great way to start your day? Try giving up the news for a week, or at least postpone it until later in the day.

Does the news “tie your stomach in knots” at times? If so, why would you want to watch the news just before, during or just after dinner? There are much better times to get news than first thing in the morning and at dinner time.

The two things this short report is meant to do is get you thinking about where you can find some happiness and where you can avoid gloom and doom.

Make an extra effort today to smile a little more. Then be sure to avoid some of the negative people situations and news that do not bring a smile to your face.

Happiness in tough economic times takes more thought than in better times, but it is right there for you if you will only look.

Tags: Attitude, Happiness, Positive Thinking, Self Help and Motivational

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