FIVE STEPS TO BECOMING AN OPTIMIST

THE ‘Happiness Habits’ I’ve outlined here may seem very simple but they are the building blocks of how human beings can change. They are the five behaviours for change which have been most comprehensively researched and evaluated across the field of positive psychology.

Optimism is a choice, but it does require applying some effort. By doing these exercises daily for 21 days you are laying the groundwork for new patterns of behaviour which will allow you to start to change the way you see the world. Obviously, you’ll have to continue with them if you want to carry on reaping future benefits but if you stick to them every day for the first three weeks, they could become as much a part of your routine as making a cup of tea in the morning.

1 LEARN TO BE GRATEFUL

WHAT IS IT: The Gratitude Habit – the easiest one to start with and takes just one minute a day.

HOW TO DO IT: Think of three things that you are grateful for and why. For instance: ‘I’m grateful that my son gave me a hug today after school, it means I’m loved regardless.’

The crucial thing is that you think of a completely new set of gratitudes every day. Eventually your brain will have been trained to automatically scan for positive things over the course of the day, even when you’re not doing the exercise. WHY IT WORKS:

Gratitude changes your outlook. We construct our view of the world based on the facts we have and if you’re fixated on the negative, you have a negative world. Gratitude helps us construct a world made of positive facts.

Focusing on the simple things in life, like the sunshine in the morning, is something that anyone can do. We can all find these things anywhere. Research has also shown relationship benefits for couples who do gratitude exercises together at home regularly. Hearing three things that you’re both grateful for in one another simply gives us more reasons to like one another. It’s been reported that these couples are more likely to still be together six months to a year in the future.

2 TRY A SIMPLE THANK YOU

WHAT IS IT: The Thank You Habit – the most powerful of all five exercises.

HOW TO DO IT: Pick a different person every morning and write a two-minute text or email thanking them for something they’ve done and praising them. You don’t have to be best friends or relatives, it could be a note to an old English teacher, a coach, a client, a colleague.

WHY IT WORKS: We found it makes you feel happy immediately, and often that person writes back and tells you how kind you are, reinforcing the benefit.

Over the course of time The Thank You Habit deepens and strengthens your network of relationships. We ran this as an experiment at Facebook and when workers practised it every day for three weeks, their ‘social connection’ scores rose to among the top ten percent worldwide.

Social connection has not only been found to be the biggest predictor of our happiness but it also influences how long we might live. Loneliness is now widely accepted by experts as being as damaging to our health as obesity, high blood pressure and smoking.

All the research shows that gratitude exercises such as these first two habits are like ‘gateway drugs’. Once people try them and begin to reap the benefits, they start to create lots of other positive habits in their lives. Positivity fuels more positivity.

3 SEE MEANING IN SOMETHING

WHAT IS IT: The Visualisation habit – think of one meaningful thing that happened to you in the past 24 hours.

HOW TO DO IT: Maybe someone holding a door open for you, a great conversation or helping someone. In two minutes, write down every detail you can remember as a series of bullet points. From what was said, for example, to the weather or the colour of the jumper you were wearing.

WHY IT WORKS: You’re trying to mentally relive the experience, stamping it as a meaningful event in your brain. Our brains can’t tell much difference between visualisation and actual experience, so this doubles the impact of the most positive moment of the day: a reminder that the day was worthwhile. In research we found that this was the fastest means of raising engagement scores at work.

4 GET UP AND GET ACTIVE

WHAT IS IT: The Exercise Habit – do something physical, for 15 minutes a day or for half an hour three times a week.

HOW TO DO IT: There’s no evidence that one particular form of exercise is more effective than any other – we’re in the process of learning that lots of types of movement work. However, to reap the benefits your activity should be cardio-based, which means your heart rate rises when you do it. We’ve also found that while it might be more convenient to work out on your own, you’re more likely to stick at it and enjoy it more when you do it regularly with others. WHY IT WORKS: Our research has shown that a quarter of an hour of mindful, cardio activity is the equivalent of taking an antidepressant. That’s not by any means diminishing the importance of medication but rather an illustration of the value of exercise. However, the feelgood endorphins released by physical activity into our system are just the pleasure aspect of its benefits. More significantly in the long term, making a habit of exercising has been shown to expand the brain’s network of blood vessels, resulting in improved cognitive functioning and possibly delaying the onset of dementia.

5 TAKE TIME TO BREATHE

WHAT IS IT: The Meditation Habit – take two minutes every day to take a quiet moment, stop what you’re doing and simply focus on your breath going in and out. HOW TO DO IT: Rest your hands on your knees and close the eyes to minimise distractions. WHY IT WORKS: Meditation gives the brain a new pattern, as concentrating solely on the breath makes it switch from multi-to-single-tasking. As your brain is usually bombarded with information – both good and bad – it feels under threat, which forces it into defensive mode. From there on it only processes threats. So, by meditating for just two minutes a day, which is the minimum time proven to have shown benefits, you can stop the flood of information to the brain and bring the threat levels down. It gives the brain a chance to take a pause – a bit like noise cancelling – before being able to start recording the positive aspects in life again.

Harvard academic Shawn Achor, founder of The Institute for Applied Positive Research, is Oprah Winfrey’s go-to expert for living a more positive life and has worked with the White House, the Pentagon and the world’s biggest companies on maximising happiness and success. More than 17million people have watched his ‘Happiness’ Ted Talk. Achor’s new book is Big Potential, Five Secrets Of Reaching Higher By Powering Those Around You (Virgin Books, £14.99).

The goal is to do these things daily, just like brushing your teeth. Remember, the research is clear that making these actions habits makes life-long changes to our happiness. You will start to feel the benefits in days, if not in minutes.