Wanna Be Happy? Here's How!
by Bobbe Sommer - From Cosmopolitan Magazine

"Try to skip instead of shuffle, sub a smile for that sullen stare. When you practice "feeling" up, you can beat the blues"...Bobbe Sommer

How do you acquire the habit of happiness?

The key is, not to play the "when-is-life-going-to-get-better game."

Some people fall prey to magical thinking. 
They tell themselves that life will get better just as soon as they pass the next milestone -- get that promotion -- turn twenty-five -- find true love. If this is your approach to happiness, it's almost certain that you'll be disappointed. 
Happiness doesn't operate on a schedule. If you're waiting for the right time to be happy, chances are you'll  wait forever.

Instead, simply recognize that you can consciously choose to be happy. Don't put happiness on hold. There is only one right time to make your move toward happiness: Now! 
You can make happiness a habit just the way you make other behavior a habit - through repeated practice, until it becomes a subconscious act. You can expect optimism to be your usual state of mind (allowing for occasional setbacks) if you diligently follow these guidelines:

1. When negative thoughts and feelings creep up on you, cancel them. Accept that there are some situations that you can't control right now. Try to react to whatever happens as rationally and calmly as possible.

2. Give happiness your best shot. Always be open for the smallest opportunity for it. Focus on the feeling you get from watching a sunset, completing a long-term project, having a favorite old movie pop up on late-night cable, getting a special present when it isn't your birthday. You know the moments that work for you. Try to keep the feeling they give you in your consciousness as much as you can.

3. Practice being happy. This is an act-as-if exercise. Tell yourself and others that you are generally a happy person. Rehearse your smile often. Practice giving thanks daily, hourly, for the dozens of small happiness' that come our way...waking up this morning, for instance.

4. Go out of your way to make someone else happy. If you see a child struggling with packages, offer to help. If you see a man staring at a map and looking confused, ask him if he needs directions. Openly acknowledge it when someone makes a contribution to your happiness. Remember the old saying "Happiness is Contagious"? It's true!

5. Think of a person who has enriched your life, added to your self-worth. Take some time to focus on this person, and acknowledge his or her contribution to your happiness.

6. Practice being less critical of other people's faults. Put the best possible interpretation on their actions and avoid the negative thinking that gets in the way of happiness.

7. Strive for a 1-percent: 100-percent ratio. Instead of trying to be 100-percent happier, make yourself 1-percent happier in a hundred different ways.

8. Fake it till you make it! Act as though your self-image is exactly the way you want it to be, as though you've already achieved the success you deserve.

Many people are chronically unhappy because their expectations are unrealistic.

An optimist recognizes that happiness is relative. Don't delude yourself that you can ward off unhappiness in all situations all the time. There's no such thing as permanent, uninterrupted happiness.

"Who ever said life was fair?" your old tapes may tell you. 

The point to recognize is that life isn't unfair either. Life is fragile. The important thing is to learn how to accept setbacks without thinking of them as permanent conditions, without convincing yourself you'll be destroyed, without blaming yourself or resenting others for what's happened to you. When you learn to do that, you'll have caught the happiness habit!  

xx A FREE VIDEO DEMO is available upon request.

To engage Bobbe for a keynote address, contact her via;

  BobbeSOMMER@COX.NET        Voice Mail: 949-235-9585       Fax: 949-361-3606