How to Feel Happy Again and Build Your Happiness Muscle

Have you ever thought to yourself, how did I get here? How am I living a life that makes me unhappy? How to feel happy again?

Today we will explore what makes you unhappy and how to feel happy again. We’ll go behind the scenes of that moment when you sit down with yourself and realize you’re unhappy, unfulfilled, or dissatisfied. Just not happy with your life.

I’ll offer insights about the part that often gets overlooked and how to make some changes in that area.

We will take a simple and effective approach to creating a happier life and building your happiness muscle. The approach that you can start applying today.

Prefer audio? Listen to this blog post on my podcast, The La Ivana Podcast (available on all podcasting platforms & my YouTube channel).

1) small actions can decrease your happiness

“Don’t waste your time in anger, regrets, worries, and grudges. Life is too short to be unhappy.”
― Roy T. Bennett

The reason as to why you feel unhappy can be found in the big things in life. It could be that your job, relationship, or living situation makes you feel unhappy. And if it is, I’d encourage you to change it, of course.

However, there is also another part that we often overlook because it doesn’t seem as significant as the big things I mentioned. And it’s the small things.

It’s all the small daily actions that have led to this point where you feel unhappy.

How many of these sound familiar?

– breaking promises to yourself. You say you’re going to do something and then you don’t.
– skipping daily movement. Whether it’s yoga, working out, riding a bike, or simply walking. You know you always feel better after, but you just can’t be bothered to get up and do your daily movement.
– eating food that makes you feel sluggish. But it’s convenient and it’s an easier option in the moment.
– snoozing the alarm
– procrastinating with every single task
– not drinking enough water (how basic is that! And yet it impacts how you feel throughout the day.)
– not getting enough sleep
– wearing clothes you don’t feel confident in. Just throwing on whatever is closest.
– your room is a mess
– you talk negatively to yourself or about yourself

How many did you get out of these 10?

The point is that all these small things pile up. Your outfit makes a difference in how you feel. When you eat healthier you automatically feel on top of things. Even just for a moment, while you’re drinking that smoothie.

On the other hand, when you eat things that don’t make you feel good, you feel comforted for a moment, sure. But then you might judge yourself and feel even worse.

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2) equally, small actions can increase happiness

“Happiness is not something ready made. It comes from your own actions.”
― Dalai Lama XIV

If you want to change your job, it might take time. Let’s say it will take 2 months to quit your job and find another one.
Okay, what are you going to do in the meantime?

Or you break up with someone and want to find someone else. All valid. But how are you going to spend your time between these bigger changes?

Again, it’s those minuscule things that add up. And they are there no matter what else is going on in your life.

Whenever you’re in a transition period, or you’ve gone through a big change, or a breakup, or you’re navigating something in your life, it’s those small daily habits and actions you can ground in.

You can use them as your anchor so that no matter what happens on the outside, you know you have your own feel-good kit that you can come back to.

Want to know how to feel happy again? Try to collect the small positive moments throughout the day because they will impact how you ultimately feel.

3) simplifying happiness

“For every minute you are angry you lose sixty seconds of happiness.”
― Ralph Waldo Emerson

Let’s see how this theory about the compound effect of small actions works and then you can decide if that’s something you want to try out.

The day has 24 hours.

Now imagine this:
You get 1-hour walk which makes you feel better.
Then you add 30 minutes of tidying up your environment which helps you clear your mind. Clean space = clear mind, as they say.
Then you add a 40-minute workout that makes you feel stronger and more confident.
Then you add 5 minutes of legs up the wall before bed to relieve stress.

At the end of the day, it’s just math. Feeling good is math.

How many hours do you spend doing things that make you feel good?

And on the flip side, how many hours do you spend doing things that don’t make you feel good?

It gets to be that simple. We often overthink and overcomplicate it, but what if it gets to be simple?

An action step to take from this post:
Make a list of things you can do daily that you know will benefit you.

It’s like a dopamine menu. Have a list of things that always make you feel better and then just pick and choose from the menu.

And start feeding the good feeling.

Share this blog post with someone who needs to read it and if this is an area of your life you want to work on and improve, I invite you to book a 1:1 coaching session with me.

Until the next time,
Ivana

happiness how to feel happy again

La Ivana Cert. Life Coach · The La Ivana Podcast