My Business As an IBO

EFFECTS OF HAPPINESS

I thought defining happiness was not as important as knowing the effects of happiness. But my mind has changed. Having a definition begins the understanding and with the understanding of what you want you can work towards achieving it. In fact, our minds are not attracted to what happiness is, but to what happiness does. What does this feeling do for us?

As stated earlier, it makes us feel good. According to Greater Good the Science of a Meaningful Life's article on Happiness, studies have found that happiness actually improves other aspects of our lives. The following are what studies show happens to happy people:

Happiness is good for our health: Happy people are less likely to get sick, and they live longer.
Happiness is good for our relationships: Happy people are more likely to get married and have fulfilling marriages, and they have more friends.
Happy people make more money and are more productive at work.
Happy people are more generous.
Happy people cope better with stress and trauma.
Happy people are more creative and are better able to see the big picture.

Some persons may say that what happiness causes is really the reason for happiness. But that explanation will be saved for a later post.

Look at Abigail Tracy's article that I read,

"Researchers found that those individuals identified as having eudaimonic well-being or happiness rooted in having a deeper purpose, had more favorable gene expression profiles than individuals with hedonic well-being, or more superficial sources of happiness. Specifically, the individuals with eudaimonic well-being had lower levels of inflammatory gene expression and higher levels of anti-viral and anti-body genes than their counterparts, according to ScienceDaily.
During the study the two groups showed the same levels of positivity, so as a result the researchers concluded that the different forms of happiness they were experiencing impacted their health in different ways.
"What this study tells us is that doing good and feeling good have very different effects on the human genome, even though they generate similar levels of positive emotion," Steven Cole, a researcher with UCLA and an author of the study, told ScienceDaily."

So happiness can truly affect the body. I will continue to question why I do what I do. As well as take my answers and live towards the more fulfilling form of happiness.