Want to be happy? Build it.

I remember being asked a question a long time ago that really puzzled me. I had to describe “a happy day”. Recalling all the happy, interesting, downright glorious days I’ve experienced, it wasn’t clear to me what criteria I should use to choose one.

Happiness is a complicated thing, at least when you’re born with receptors sensitive to all the vibrations of pain around you. So, I simultaneously felt the guilt of not being happy enough and the guilt of being happy while many other people’s lives seemed so difficult.

Professor of psychology, Sonja Lyubomirsky, states happiness is closely linked to our health and success. There is ample evidence that happy people are healthier, more creative, earn more money, are more productive, cope better with adversity and are more likely to get married.

what’s the secret? 

To achieve greater happiness, we should first know what makes us happy. More time? More money? A life partner? Losing 10 kilos? As desirable as attaining these things might be, they don’t increase our long-term happiness, at least not significantly, says Lyubomirsky.

Lyubomirsky’s research shows that 50 per cent of the factors that affect happiness are genetically determined, while circumstances account for 10 per cent of our happiness. So let’s say there were 100 people in a theatre at different points on a happiness continuum, even if we could turn them all into identical siblings, they would still have different levels of happiness, just with the differences reduced to 50 per cent. 

On the other hand, if we put all 100 of them in the same circumstances (equally beautiful or healthy, live in the same house, have the same partner, experience the same suffering, etc), the differences in their levels of happiness would be reduced by only 10 per cent. The remaining 40 per cent is related to people’s behaviour. The key to increasing happiness, Lyubomirsky concludes, lies not in changing genetic factors (which is impossible) or circumstances (also sometimes impossible), but in the daily actions we take.  

out of breath, but feeling good

Physical activity goes hand in hand with happiness, researchers found in a 17-month study. Participants downloaded an app that asked them to rate their mood at different times of the day and then answer questions about how active they had been in the previous 15 minutes.

The volunteers reported feeling happier after moving around in the previous 15 minutes compared to sitting or lying down, even though their physical activity was generally light.

The study also found that people who moved regularly were more likely to consider themselves happier than those who spent most of their time in a chair. Although researchers have not established whether physical activity makes us happier or whether happiness makes us more physically active, it is clear there is a positive association, direct or indirect, between happiness and physical activity, which has been found in several studies.

For those struggling with depression or anxiety, clinical studies show that 20 to 40 minutes of physical activity done daily or a few times a week, can have significant benefits

Researchers from the University of Michigan analysed 23 of the most relevant studies on the link between physical activity and happiness. Most of the studies analysed were observational and a few were experimental. People started exercising and the researchers measured the intensity of their happiness before and after they became more physically active.

These studies involved more than 500,000 people from teenagers to the elderly, from many ethnic groups and with different socioeconomic statuses. Each study found a link between physical activity and increased happiness. The type of exercise or the amount of time spent exercising didn’t make much of a difference. And even 10 minutes a day was associated with a better mood.

“Exercise is like an intravenous dose of hope. And it’s any form of movement that you’re willing to do with any part of your body that you can still move,” says Kelly McGonigal, lecturer at Stanford University. For those struggling with depression or anxiety, clinical studies show that 20 to 40 minutes of physical activity done daily or a few times a week, can have significant benefits. This includes light activities like gardening or walking. There are also studies showing just two to three minutes of exercise can boost a person’s energy and mood for several hours.

McGonigal says when our muscles contract, they release specific substances called myokines that make us more resilient to stress and help us recover from trauma. The myokines released by regular exercise could even suppress tumour growth, helping to actively fight cancer cells.

gratitude, often

After analysing several dozen experimental studies, researchers Dunigan Folk and Elizabeth Dunn concluded there is strong evidence for the benefits of expressing gratitude. Gratitude makes us feel better, the studies show, but the effects don’t seem to last more than a day . . . all the more reason not to deny ourselves the experience of gratitude too often.

Psychologists Robert Emmons and Michael McCullough asked participants in a study on gratitude to write a few sentences each week.

Those in the first group were asked to write about the things they were grateful for that week, while those in the second group were asked to write about all the irritating or unpleasant things that happened each day.

Those in the third group were asked to write about events that had affected them, without emphasising whether they were positive or negative. After 10 weeks, those who expressed gratitude for what they had experienced were more optimistic and satisfied with their lives, more physically active and even visited the doctor less than those who focused on unpleasant events.

Psychologist Martin Seligman tested the effects of various positive psychology interventions on 411 people who were asked to write about their early memories. The biggest impact—a huge spike in happiness levels that lasted for a month—came from the task of writing and personally delivering a letter of gratitude to someone who had never been thanked for their kindness.

the power of connection

The mere presence of other people in our lives enhances our happiness, according to a study by US researchers on a sample of 222 college students. Comparing the happiest with the unhappiest participants, the authors of the study found one major difference between the two groups: the happiest students spent less time alone than the least happy. However, it’s not so much the number of people you have close to you, but the quality of your relationships with them.

Interestingly, the happiness of our friends also contributes to our happiness, according to researchers Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler. The pair found that in social networks, happiness can be contagious up to three degrees of separation from its source (a person is one degree away from their friend, two degrees away from their friend’s friend, three degrees away from their friend’s friend’s friend, and so on). If a person is one degree away from someone happy, they are 15 per cent more likely to be happy themselves. At two and three degrees of separation, the chances of happiness contagion are nearly 10 per cent and 5.6 per cent, respectively.

As happiness expert Daniel Gilbert points out, “We are happy when we have family, we are happy when we have friends and almost all the other things we think make us happy are actually just ways of getting more family and friends.”

doing good makes us feel good

Researcher Elizabeth Dunn points out that studies have shown that people who donate are happier than those who don’t, regardless of their financial situation. In fact, the act of giving has the same effect on happiness as doubling your salary

While depression, anxiety or stress are associated with a degree of self-centredness, focusing on the needs of others removes negative emotions. When we help another person, we enter a positive feedback loop: doing good makes us feel good, and that good feeling makes us more likely to do good.

Professor Seligman says out of all the activities scientists have tested so far, altruistic acts have produced the most significant increase in wellbeing.

This is good news for happiness seekers, who are both fascinated and confused by the contemporary model of happiness. If happiness has only 10 per cent to do with our circumstances and four times as much to do with our behaviour, then at its core it remains a verb. We just have to choose our verb wisely. We can’t wait for it to appear out of nowhere, we can’t hunt it down in all the places we think it might be—we must build it. Day by day, we allow those around us to bask in its light, while we drip kindness and care over the troubled moments of someone less fortunate than ourselves.