Not knowing what makes you happy is incredibly annoying. Being happy is one of the most important goals in life for many people. Generally, health comes first, but if that doesn't work out, being happy is the most important thing. Just when you think: I don't know what makes me happy, that is a sign on the wall that you need to rediscover yourself.
To make sure that you find out what does make you happy, in this blog I will go over where to find happiness.
Happiness through activities
Many people will "do something" to become happy. For many people, exercise is a means of finding happiness. This in itself is not surprising, because exercise causes your body to produce adrenaline and dopamine. In addition, exercise reduces cortisol, a stress hormone.
Too much stress can make you unhappy; exercise can stop it again.
Now I can imagine that you have already tried a fitness subscription but didn't like it. In that case, it is important to look for other forms of exercise that do make you happy.
Dancing and yoga are fun forms of movement that generally do not feel like sports.
Especially with dancing, there is also a social aspect at play, which can make dancing even more fun. Yoga is a form of moving meditation. Meditation helps to achieve inner peace as well. This peaceful feeling is something that makes yogis, people who practice yoga, happy.
Besides sports, there are other activities that can make you happy. Activities that make you think only about that activity, such as watching a good movie, reading a compelling story or doing something that requires focus, such as knitting, painting and other forms of manual labor.
These types of manual labor activities promote mindfulness naturally and without any real focus.
This mindfulness can make you less likely to have a thought about whether or not you are happy.
Happiness through control of your thoughts and beliefs
Whether you are happy is more a matter of controlling thoughts and unconscious processes for some people. Many people associate thoughts with who they are, but ultimately thoughts are just thoughts. You don't have to do anything with them.
To people, what you do often says much more about who you are and what makes you happy.
Control over your thoughts and unconscious beliefs is possible with self-hypnosis and hypnotherapy. For example, if you don't know what makes you happy because you are unconsciously stopping yourself from becoming happy, hypnotherapy can provide a solution for this.
With a hypnotherapist, you can figure out unconscious beliefs that block you from getting happiness from the little things in life. This can be done with various techniques, such as cognitive behavioral therapy or regression therapy.
Perhaps you have once experienced trauma that makes it difficult for you to enjoy something that makes most other people happy.
Self-hypnosis for happiness
For example, if you have a belief that you don't deserve happiness , hypnotic suggestions can help to weaken that belief and, on the contrary, to place the belief that you do deserve and may claim happiness.
These may include:
Earning happiness.
I can count myself lucky.
I also get to enjoy small things.
I only live once, so I enjoy.
My time is now.
These are just examples, they may already be working for you, but if not, you can also go to a hypnotherapist and they can come up with other hypnotic suggestions for you based on your beliefs and experiences.
Visualizing happiness
Another way to have more happiness by controlling your thoughts is by visualizing happiness. Sometimes you must first be able to imagine something in order to actually grasp it. A visualization can provide more happiness in 2 ways.
A calming visualization can make you feel less stressed, which often makes you experience more happiness.
A sample visualization can allow you to seize happiness in situations that usually make you happy.
In a visualization, you visualize your surroundings, how you feel, how you also feel the wind or the sun, your facial expression and how people around you react to you, if they are a part of your visualization.
If you find it difficult to do this yourself, a hypnotherapist can help you with this through guided visualization.
Focus on happiness and fun
Another reason why you may not know what makes you happy is because every time you try something new you focus mostly on what you don't like about that activity. Perhaps you have become a bit pessimistic because of all kinds of experiences, which of course doesn't really help when you want to find your happiness again.
It is therefore important to train yourself to focus precisely on happiness and fun things to do during the day.
There are several ways to do this, such as having an intention or keeping a "positive" journal.
When having an intention, you can have a small ritual every morning where you look at yourself in the mirror, take a few deep breaths and speak an intention for the day out loud, such as:
- Today I'm going to enjoy the little things.
- Today I am helpful.
- Today I am kind.
By having such an intention, you go through each decision for the rest of the day wondering if the next step will help you live with the intention of the day.
With the positive journal, you write down precisely between 3 and 5 things each day that you liked about the day or made you happy.
These may include:
- Today, the sunrise made me happy.
- Today I was made happy by the little bird in the park.
- Today I became happy talking with colleague X.
It may be big and small things that make you happy or joyful. By keeping a journal in which you only have to write down moments of happiness, you will pay more attention during the day to the things that make you happy. If you are a negative thinker you can change that in this way.
Happiness by living in the moment
Not being happy is in many cases due to thoughts you have. In fact, many thoughts that make you unhappy or stressed are about things that happened in the past or worries you have just for the future.
By living precisely in the moment, you are less bothered by such thoughts and often experience more feelings of happiness.
This is possible, for example, by using mindfulness. Mindfulness is a technique for being in the here and now with your attention and thoughts. Your focus is on the activity you are currently engaged in. If you are at work, you are not thinking about what you are going to do in your free time or about mistakes you have made at work in the past. You think only about the work you are currently engaged in.
Just when you're at home enjoying a movie, don't let thoughts about work distract you.
When such a thought does present itself to you name the subject of the thought, such as work or leisure, the emotion you feel with it and then focus back on your breathing and what you were doing.
Over time, you may even discover patterns that you can then break.
Not finding happiness as a sign of depression
Despite all these techniques, are you finding it difficult to find your happiness and figure out what makes you happy? If so, that may be a sign that there is more to it.
Overworked, bore-out and even depression can have as a symptom that you no longer become happy about things you were usually happy about.
At some point, of course, you can get bored of something, but that can't actually be true of all the things that actually make you happy. When 1 option drops out, sometimes that's normal, usually something else takes its place.
However, if all your happy moments are falling off and nothing is taking their place then it is important to seek help.
There are also mental techniques available against overwork, bore-out and they can also help support treatment for depression.
Want to learn more about mental techniques that help you find your happiness again? Then come to the free online master class or check out Hypnosis Institute Netherlands' training courses.
Also pin this handy infographic as a reminder:
M. Heerkens
on May 22, 2017