What is Happiness?

Happiness - what is it really? 

Happiness can be described as a feeling of overall contentment, pleasure and satisfaction. 

A general state of well-being and knowing it. 

It is a feeling people have when things just seem to line up in work, health, family, relationships, goals, fun and values. 

It is something people strive for and want, but is it realistic to feel happiness all the time and would it make you happy to have it?? :) 

Life is full of ups and downs, highs and lows and everything in between. As humans we experience a wide variety of emotions and feelings, some are fleeting and some linger. 

Wanting and striving for life long, forever happiness would be unrealistic, but increasing the moments of happiness and joy in your life has got to make life better. 

Research has shown that a sense of happiness can have a positive impact on both your mental and physical health.

I see this when working with clients. I ask them about the last time they were at their goal weight or felt good in their body and it always matched up with life going well overall. 

We know feelings and emotions are triggered by what is going on outside of us but we also know they are created inside of us.

By closing our eyes and remembering past events or imagining future ones, we can trigger feelings of happiness, anger, fear, anxiety, love, hate and all the rest. 

We do have a choice over how we feel even though there are times we feel out of control. 

Starting to notice, bring attention to, and feel times when we are happy, content or ok, will attract more of that feeling. Has someone ever pointed something out to you, a car, or a song and suddenly it’s everywhere? 

It is the same with emotions, the more you become aware of the good feelings, the more you will notice them.

Even better, we can use hypnosis to guide you back to a time you felt good and ask the mind to map that feeling so when needed, you can intentionally bring it back. 

 

Ask yourself:

What is one habit or behaviour that is stopping you from having the life you want, a life full of happy moments?

It could be lifestyle habits - choosing foods you know are not good for you.

Procrastination - putting off doing things that in the end will make your life easier. 

Relationship issues - staying friends with people that are not good for you.

Boundaries - not being able to say no.

Hypnotherapy is an excellent way to help release things from your life that you struggle with, but there are also different techniques you can do yourself at home to help. 

Here is a list of 5 ways to help change a habit or behaviour that is really standing in the way of your happiness. 

1. Focus on changing one thing at a time. The road may be longer taking small steps, but the chance of reaching where you want to be drastically improves. I see this often with frustrated weight loss clients who try very restrictive diets and then after a short amount of time, crash and burn only to eat more than when they started.
2. Out of sight, out of mind. For example, if you are struggling with overeating junk food, keep it out of the house. You may still want it but it will take more effort to get it. When the thought comes to mind, click your fingers or slap your legs three times to bring you out of the junk food trance and then ask yourself “Do I really need it?”. This can be used for anything, even texting someone you are trying to release.
3. Get an accountability partner. It could be a friend, family member, coach even posting it on social media. When you have voiced what you are doing to others, it definitely helps with motivation, knowing you are going to be questioned on how you are doing.
4. We use a technique in hypnotherapy where we take clients on a journey into the future to see how your life would be if you didn’t change the habits that are causing problems.  The aim is to release some of the pleasure that is associated with what you are doing. Sit down with a piece of paper and picture yourself in 1 year, 5 and then 10 years of continuing the behaviour. Be very true to yourself and ask is it actually worth carrying it on?
5. Reward yourself. Add some pleasure to having completely released the habit or behaviour. Maybe shout yourself a nice day out or buy something when you are a few months free.  Set a date for the reward so you have something nice to look forward to. Success is much easier when there is something you are working towards. 

Print off and download My Happiness Checklist and complete daily to see how you are tracking.

Also available to listen to is our short Choose Happiness meditation. Take 5 minutes, sit down and relax! It will show you how to anchor the good feeling to slowly rubbing your hands together so you can use that movement when needed to change the way you feel. Practice makes perfect, so listen to the recording more than once and do it. Make your life better, control how you feel. 

I hope these five steps help you to take the step in making positive changes in your life. 

If there is something you are really struggling with, whether it be weight loss, relationships, motivation, even past trauma, reach out. Hypnotherapy can make it so much easier, we not only focus on what is happening now, we also have techniques to clear past experiences that may be holding you back.

Book your free 15 minute consultation to discuss more

 

If you are new to hypnosis then please listen to the following video about What is Hypnosis to hopefully answer any questions you may have.