Being happy is not that easy! We always have to do things that we don't feel like doing. The fairy who fulfills our wishes never appears. And then there are always nasty strokes of fate that completely throw us off track. Well, life is really not easy. It is all the more important that we learn to help ourselves and to be as happy and positive as possible. And the good news is that satisfaction and optimism are neither innate nor coincidence, but primarily a matter of practice.
Why we often focus on the negative
How happy we feel depends to a large extent on our perception. Of course, external factors such as wealth, social status, success, appearance or the weather play a role, after all, these are the things we perceive. However, we have a choice how we look at, weight and classify them: do we focus on what bothers us and what is missing? Or what we are satisfied with or what we have?
Many people tend to focus on what is bothering them and just believe happy will to be able to change something. That is not reprehensible! It is simply within us that we pay more attention to dangers and weaknesses than anything that goes well (you can find out more about this in our article on "Bing Theory"). And there is nothing wrong with setting goals and wanting to "progress" in life (wherever the journey should go …). But if we are not careful and only focus on our goals and desires, sooner or later we lose motivation because we unlearn happy too be. But to prevent this, a simple question can help very well.
You should ask yourself this question every day
Since our natural impulse tends to focus our attention on the threatening or deficient, we can only create a balance in our perception by deliberately focusing on the positive – and we should do this every day if possible. This works best with the simple question:
Regardless of whether our answers are small things like "the delicious potato gratin from today’s lunch" or "that I cleaned my bathroom and it is now so clean" or big things like "that I am healthy" or "that I have my mom, that is always there for me "- by asking ourselves this question, we inevitably put the beautiful and what we have in the foreground. On the other hand, we simply hide what we want to achieve and wish for a relaxing moment of happiness.
The best thing about it: If we really ask (and answer) this question consistently every day, we not only notice at the moment that there is something positive in our life and feel happy, but also train our brain, more often by itself See positives of a situation, and become even happier and more optimistic in the long run. And at some point life suddenly doesn't seem so difficult to us anymore … ?