HAPPY AND HEALTHY

You have chosen to live in a state of optimal health. This is unique to you and not just because of biometrics, your medical history or how long you can hold a plank. Your highest level of living is tied to how you view the world. So, does your perspective give you happiness?

How Happy Makes You Healthy

Happiness is defined in the Random House Dictionary as the state of being delighted, pleased or glad over a particular thing. Of course, the thing that makes you happy may be different from what makes someone else happy and may change over time. One of the things which makes most people happy is being healthy, but don’t just take my word for it.

Professor Ed Diener, who was quoted on this chapter’s title page, co-authored the research review, “Happy People Live Longer: Subjective Well-Being Contributes to Health and Longevity,” with University of Texas at Dallas professor, Micaela Chan. The review examined more than 160 studies and found a preponderance of evidence linking happiness and wellness.

All of the different kinds of studies pointed to the same conclusion: health and longevity are influenced by your mood state. Remember Dr. Wayne Dyer’s quote from the Change? chapter?

When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.

This is not just a clever play on words. In the world of quantum theory (stay with me please), scientists acknowledge that the act of observing a subatomic particle changes its behavior. These tiny pieces of matter (which are part of you and me) are not just changeable, but many things all at the same time. Furthermore, these subatomic particles have no meaning in isolation, but only in relationship to everything around them. 

Can you conclude that if the very building blocks of this physical world are affected by simply looking at them, you can choose to change the way you look at your health, no matter what it appears to be? I hope I’m not “jumping the shark,” but Professors Diener and Chan’s study linking an optimistic, happy outlook with longevity, lower levels of stress hormones increased immunity and faster recovery after exercise, suggests this is so.

More Happy Science

Don’t misinterpret what I am offering to you. I am not suggesting that “positive thinking” alone will make you healthy. By no means do I contend that you can preclude the care of a physician when you are faced with sickness, disease or trauma. If you break your arm, go see a doctor. At the same time, there is clear evidence that choosing a positive outlook is related to more optimal health.

A study by Dr. Laura Kubzansky, Harvard School of Public Health Associate professor, found vital emotions such as enthusiasm, hopefulness and engagement with life appeared to reduce the risk of coronary heart disease. The study followed more than 6000 people, aged 25 to 74, for 20 years using an adaptation of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey measure for General Well-Being. The results from Kubzansky’s measure of well-being agreed with other research in the area of outlook and its influence on health:

Personal attributes such as emotional vitality, optimism, a supportive network of friends and family and self-regulation correlate with better health.

Be Happy Now

Professor Sonja Lyubomirsky, PhD, of the University of California, Riverside is the author of The How of Happiness: A Scientific Approach to Getting the Life You Want. She has been researching happiness for over 30 years and her work has focused on how kindness, connection to others, gratitude, making someone else happy and a positive outlook increase lasting happiness. Here are five key strategies she suggests for more happiness (and good health) in your life:

1.   Count your blessings through contemplation, journaling or sharing them with others. More on this in Gratitude and Your Health.

2.   Cultivate optimism by envisioning and writing about the best possible outcomes.

3.   Practice random acts of kindness.

4.   Develop nurturing relationships by investing time and energy in them.

5.   Do what you love and love what you do.

I’d like to add, care for your body through exercise, a healthy diet, laughing and smiling.