Originally Published April 14, 2005 -- Your Wellness Guide

Smile, You Might Live Longer -- and Enjoy It!
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For additional ideas on how to be happy:
Honor What You Feel, Be Happy
Manage the "Me" Society For Emotional Balance

How many times have you been in a situation when you got a good laugh and then said “I needed that.”  A solid chuckle offers relief. 

“When you are stressed and have anxiety, there’s an activation of various stress areas in the brain.  This alters the concentration of various hormones in blood.  These stress hormones have a variety of impacts on health – you feel stressed, they impair your ability to think over time, they increase cholesterol in the heart, and they change how the immune system functions,” says Dr. Bruce Rabin, director of the Healthy Lifestyle Program at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. 

High in optimism -- you are hopeful, cheerful, confident in the future, versus “low in optimism” (once called “pessimism”)

Sense of humor -- you find the irony in situations, you can joke around and enjoy the lighter side of life

Spiritual connection -- you enjoy religious and spiritual activities

Rabin says “We encourage people who are having health problems, or an increase likelihood of health problems as you age, to increase these behaviors.”

Dr. Kathleen Hall, author of Alter Your Life, says that researchers believe that 50-70 percent of our happiness and optimism comes from a predisposition or our genes.  However, “there is around 50 percent of happiness that is determined by our attitudes, behaviors, and values,” says Hall.  Recent research revealed “that optimistic individuals reduced their risk of death by 50 percent over the nine years of the study.”

Dr. Hall encourages people to practice intentionally smiling as a technique for living a healthier life.  She says that when you smile, you release more serotonin and endorphins, what she calls “happiness hormones.”   This can improve your energy, your immune system, and reduce your stress and any pain you might be experiencing.  Maybe that’s why your yoga instructor tells you to smile when you are attempting a difficult stretching position?

Our happiness is best affected, says Psychologist Lee Jampolsky, “when we are able to adopt an outlook on life where we stop seeing the outside world as the determiner of our happiness and, instead, see our thoughts as the determiner of happiness.  It’s about changing our thoughts.” 

Dr. Jampolsky, who is also author of Smile for No Good Reason, says that one of the key things you can do to be happy is “add a little now to your later.”  He says “If you’re only worrying about the future, it’s very difficult to be happy.  It’s in the present moment that we find our sense of happiness and peace.”  To stay in the present, you might write yourself reminders, such as writing “My happiness is right now” on a 3x5 card that is stuck to your cubicle wall.  Or a watch alarm that rings every couple of hours to remind you that you have to think of something for which you are grateful.

“Choose what you are a student of,” says Jampolsky.  “If you want to become a student of negativity, listen to all your problems.  Don’t carry around anger from the past.” 

Sometimes all we need is a little tickle.  A little laugh to get us going.  Hey U.G.L.Y. (Unique Gifted Lovable You) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping teens with self-esteem issues while teaching them how to turn negatives into positives.  Wouldn’t it have been great to belong to such an organization when you were a teenager? 

Hey U.G.L.Y. has created a CD called Laugh It Off with the proceeds benefiting the organization’s cause.  It’s 60 minutes of real laughter on the audio track.  And you’re supposed to follow along for a few minutes laughing yourself.

I gave it a whirl and couldn’t wipe the smile off my face!

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