On ensuring your happiness

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Everyone wants to be happy, I believe this is only a natural feeling for every human being. Happiness is not just a feeling, it also has an effect on our general well being, as research has shown that happy people have stronger Immune systems, are more energetic and live longer than their counterparts who aren't.

When I talk about happiness, I'm not referring to the strong bursts of joy you experience when you get a promotion, when you buy a new house or a new car, or when you win the lottery. Though, it is normal to feel happier at certain times than others, that isn't true happiness.

True happiness involves contentment and peace of mind, the kind of feeling you want in between these strong bursts of joy. In other words, true happiness is sustainable.

I have learnt (via self help books and personal life experiences) that a great deal of our happiness is in our control and determined by our choices and habits. Being happy like all other things in life, follow the simple rule of nature about "reaping what you sow". So this means that if you want to ensure your happiness (reap), you have to practice positivity and introduce habits that can help you maintain a good and confident mood (sow).

I am not a professional counselor, but I am willing to share a few tips that might be of help to anyone who wants to ensure his/her happiness. These tips are in no particular order, here goes:

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• Take care of your health: Good health is the number one contributor to happiness. Ensuring that your body is healthy would contribute largely to living a happy life. Having a Good health requires a healthy lifestyle, so dangerous habits such as Excessive drinking and smoking, unsafe sex should be avoided.
  Also getting enough sleep (about 7-9 hrs) and exercising enough would help a lot.

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• love yourself: loving yourself involves accepting yourself for who you truly are i.e accepting your flaws and appreciating your strengths. The satisfaction gotten from this can help increase your confidence.

• Be around positive people: Your social circle has influence on your happiness. If you are surrounded with people who continually belittle you, who don't have your best interests at heart or who are constantly cynical, you won't be happy. Also, getting out of relationships that are toxic would be a good idea, as it does you more harm than good.

• Avoid comparing yourself to others: Humans are unique individuals with unique characteristics who live life differently, hence, comparing yourself to other people is of no good. Instead of making comparisons, focus on your success and how you can become a better person with the opportunities available to you.
  Also, with that advent of social media where everyone flaunts his/her success, there is usually a silent but very powerful "pressure" that makes you crave to be like the other person who seems more successful and when this dosen't happen fast enough, we become frustrated. If you are in this situation, you might want to consider deleting your social media accounts or reducing the amount of time you spend on them.

• Ensure that you live a Balanced life: Balance in every aspect of our lives is essential. There should be balance in our work and relaxation time as "All work and no play makes Jack an unhappy boy". Also, in our area of finances, our spendings on our needs and wants should be handled according to their order of importance else we would go "broke", which really isn't a happy situation.

In conclusion...

Practicing the tips listed above isn't easy, sometimes we might find ourselves going outta line and falling into a depression. However when we do, we shouldn't let go of our goal of aim of attaining happiness.

Thanks for reading!