Happiness Habit Hints For The Holidays
Do Habitually Happy People ever get lonesome, frustrated, disappointed or down like the rest of us over the holidays? The answer is yes, absolutely! But they bounce back quickly. Here are some of their Happiness Habit hints for the holidays:
Be Adventuresome And Creative – Habitually Happy People know there are usually lots of great ways to do anything, including the holidays, well. Different is often very delightful. Holding on to rigid expectations and thinking there is just one right way to do things is a major source of holiday pain. Instead, resolve to be creative and invite others along on an exciting new holiday adventure.
Flexibility Is An Important Key To Happiness – Be willing to reposition your perspectives, change your plans and even your preferences to cast off difficulties so you can honestly embrace good will. Resolve that no matter what happens, you are going to have a great time and help others do so too.
Self Pity Is A Sure Route To Sadness – Feeling sorry for yourself is always self defeating. Don’t do it! The Poor Me’s manufacture self made misery. Focus on anything and everything else but yourself. Spend time helping someone who genuinely needs your assistance. Take care of yourself and remember that excessive self concern is a major source of unhappiness.
Sometimes Strangers Offer Safety – Families and even fond friendships can turn toxic over the holidays. Involving new people changes group dynamics. So does changing the place, the time, the theme, the menu. Altering anything can help break bad ruts. Misery means we’re meant to change.
Drive Your Holidays With Delight – Resolve to have a good time all the time. Don’t let any one or any thing shake you your determination to savor and enjoy each moment as much as you can. Don’t hand control of your holiday happiness over to anything that threatens to drag down your spirits.
Negative Judgments Cause Pain – In fact, most of our emotional pain is caused by our negative judgments. To enjoy happy holidays, stop judging. Measuring life by should’s and ought’s brings sadness. Envision the holiday you want to create and let judgment keep you on track to achieve that goal.
Give Without Strings Attached – Decide what you want to do because YOU want to do it out of genuine goodness. Let goodness be your guiding goal and your sole reward. Don’t give with strings attached in order to get. If the returns don’t come back, you will be disappointed.
Assess Reality Accurately And Don’t Get Carried Away – It’s easy to swept up with exuberant holiday joy. Over extending yourself, incurring big bills, losing sleep, forgoing wise diet and drink choices is not the path to peace or happiness. Excess in anything invariably brings pain, not joy.
Guard Your Personal Time Carefully – Holidays are times of giving, but preserve some precious personal time for yourself. Normal schedules are often discarded, it’s easy to be on the run all the time. Stop to enjoy time with yourself. Habitually Happy People seem gregarious, but they often say they need plenty of time for themselves. Preserving personal time is often the best investment you can make for holiday happiness.
Share The Spirit – Smile, greet and speak to strangers. Extend a warm, holiday welcome to everyone you meet. When we summon up a sense of joy and honestly project it, we can’t help but raise our own spirits, and we might just brighten someone else’s holiday as well.
Share your favorite holiday Happiness Hints – email them to Share@HappinessHabit.com
Happy Holidays To You All!
Michele Moore & The Happiness Habit Team
Happiness Habit: Skills & Strategies of Habitually Happy People
Copyright 2005, Michele Moore. All Rights Reserved. Reprints.
