The Basics: Are You Doing These 5 Easy Things to Boost Your Happiness?

So many of us go looking for complicated solutions to problems, when often a simple solution will do.  These 5 easy things can help almost any problem, whether you’re looking for better health, better emotional state, more energy, or to reach a big goal.

And remember, happiness is a long-game.  While each of these is small and simple, and may not seem to have much effect if we do it for just one day, over time they can have incredible effects on our health and happiness.

1) Eating

Many of us (especially women!) have fallen into the trap of eating too little.  Or we eat too much.  (Or sometimes we eat too little and then eat way too much…)

We can also be tempted to reach for processed foods over organic ones, and fast food over home-cooked meals, whether for convenience, or time, or taste.

But food is one of only two ways we get energy into our body after we are born (the other is air).  What we put into our bodies, is literally the fuel that keeps every other process going, including the production of our happy hormones like serotonin and dopamine.  And it’s not just us, we are eating for not 1 but a trillion or so — our gut bacteria have been shown again and again to play a major role on our thoughts, emotions, and mental clarity.  What we eat feeds them and can actually affect which types of bacteria are most prominent, which also plays a role in our mental health.

Here are a few tips that I have picked up over the years:

• Everyone’s dietary needs are different, so play around to discover what works well for you.  I also trust the help of my naturopath to aid me in figuring what foods work for me and what don’t.  (And don’t take this article as medical advice, every body is different!)
• Whole foods are easier for our body to break down and digest than heavily processed foods.  So aim for a whole food, organic diet when you can.  (For me, I avoided gluten for a long time because I thought I was gluten intolerant, but it turns out I have no difficulty eating home-made bread, even with whole wheat flour)
• Eat at regular intervals so your body knows what to expect.  Fasting is also important as it gives our digestive enzymes a chance to relax and reset, but it doesn’t have to be those crazy 10 day fasts that seem so popular now… Serica Cernohaus, an oriental medicine doctor and food therapist, recommends we eat 3 meals a day, 5 hours apart, as this compliments the normal digestive enzyme cycle really well.
• Eat more veggies than carbs or protein.  Why? They are easier to digest and contain lots of fibre and essential nutrients.  (Check out Canada’s new Food Guide, which I love!)

2) Drinking

I remember an old vet once telling me there are only two species of animal who don’t drink enough water: cats and humans.  Do you want to be dehydrated like a house cat?

There are many different recommendations out there, but I like to aim for 6 litres of water a day.

Yes, you read that right, SIX.

Did you know that the hydrogen atoms that come from water are part of the primary energy currency in the body.  The chemical reaction that powers every cell in our body (the conversion of ATP to ADP) relies on water!  No wonder it’s so gosh darned important!!!

Water helps us flush waste products and toxins out of body, so the more you drink, the less junk you are carrying around with you, and the clearer your mind can be.

And being well hydrated improves circulation to all of our vital organs, muscles, joints, and tissues, meaning everything just works better.

If that’s not enough of a reason to drink more, I don’t know what is!

3) Exercise/Movement

So many of us live ‘stagnant’ lives, we sit in our cars, at our desks, on the sofa in front of the TV…. The problem is that when we are stagnant, our energy is stagnant, and this leads to all kinds of pain and dis-ease and improper functioning of the body.

And being physically active helps our brain function better, faster, and more clearly too.  I have saved many a frustrating or non-productive day by going for a good walk.

The best part about exercise is that it doesn’t need to be hard, a short walk or some simple stretching can often be enough to reset our brain.

4) Breathing

Remember when we talked about food being one of the two main ways we get energy into our body, the other way is by breathing.  Oxygen is an essential nutrient.  And many of us are not getting enough.

Taking a few minutes for deep breathing a couple times a day can boost our blood oxygen levels, which improves our strength, energy, and mental clarity.

When we breathe deeply and do a full exhale, we are also changing out all the carbon dioxide in our lungs.  This is vitally important as too much carbon dioxide can result in more acidic blood, which makes us feel yucky and sluggish.

5) Sleeping

As many of you know, we have a little baby at home, and I have been low on sleep for almost a year.  Trust me when I say, sleep is super important!!!

We need 7-8 hours of uninterrupted sleep every night in order to experience a full REM cycle.  For a long time, we’ve known this was important for mental processing and memory, but we are also realizing that it is during the later phases of sleep that our body produces a number of reparative hormones (like human growth hormone) which keep our body strong and energetic.

Plus sleep is the balance point to running around all day.  It’s the Yin to our waking-day’s Yang, and as such it’s the source of unlimited energy and creativity!  All good things in my opinion.

And 6) Smiling

I don’t know what it is, but I don’t see people smile as much as I used to.  Smiling is our bonus #6 easy trick for improving your overall happiness, and it’s probably the easiest to start doing right away.

Science has shown that the mere act of smiling can lift your mood, lower stress, and boost your immune system.  It does this by releasing a complex chemical reaction that results in more happy hormones like dopamine and serotonin.

The other thing that smiling does is it encourages the people around you to smile, though a reflex called mirroring, where our brain rapidly reads and copies facial expressions on people around us to help us better fit in socially.  Pretty cool, right?!

When we smile, it encourages other people to smile, and then they feel happier, and then everyone around us is happy, and life starts to feel pretty good!

So there we have it, 6 simple and easy things we can do every day to boost our happiness.  How many of these are you doing already?  How could you work on implementing the others?

As always, 2-3 Love you all!

Until next time 🙂