Whether you are part of a traditional family, or have a group of friends who are as close as family, chances are you derive a significant portion of your happiness from spending time and sharing experiences with the ones you love. Science tells us that looking forward to those experiences as well as reflecting on joyful memories generates a boost to your well-being that is almost equal to the experience itself!
Bringing happiness back home
As the editorial director of Live Happy, I’ve spoken at the United Nations and traveled the world as an ambassador for the importance of happiness in our lives. Now I am bringing the message back home with the Family Happiness Board—and I’d like to invite you to make one, too! A happiness board not only reflects past joyful moments, but it works as a reminder of what we love and how we can share happiness with the world around us. Here’s how I—and Live Happy contributing editor Sandra Bienkowski—put ours together. Please share photos of your boards with us using the hashtag #HappyActs on Twitter or Instagram.
It’s also easy and fun to do. First, have each member of your family reflect on three questions: What makes me happy? What makes my family happy? What can we do together to make the world a happier place? Discuss the answers, and then get started making your board.
Gather photos, quotes, mementos and other items that are meaningful and reflect on those times when you’ve been the happiest. I created a board with my family, and it was a blast. My children love to stare at it and talk about what every detail means to them. They point to the pictures and reminisce about vacations we took years ago. When we look at it together, it is an opportunity to go over what we do as a family to make others happy through our church, scouts or Live Happy’s #HappyActs campaign.
Seeing the board hanging on the wall every day is both a reminder of great memories and a signal to do more to bring happiness to each other and to our community. It definitely raised the Gross National Happiness quotient in my house, and I highly recommend you give it a try, too.
For more information on the International Day of Happiness on March 20 and how you can be a part of it, check happyacts.org.
