7 ways to boost your happiness

I get it. We all want, and deserve, that sense of well-being. But save your money. Achieving happiness is easier than you may think.

We all experience emotional highs throughout our lives — with a job promotion, on our wedding day, with the birth of a child. But these moments only yield temporary feelings of elation, and experts say that they alone are not enough to achieve true happiness.

Happiness isn’t just an emotional state. Decades of research proves it goes much deeper. In fact, science shows people who are happy live longer and healthier lives. The good news is that generating better bliss is something we can all do regardless of our environment or genetics.

Here are seven ways to boost your life satisfaction:

Start by changing your attitude.

Just start laughing.

Research shows that laughing doesn’t just signal happiness, it produces it. When we laugh, our stress hormones decrease and our endorphins rise. Endorphins are the same brain chemicals associated with the “runner’s high” you get from exercise.

Live to 100: Laugh more

Laughing is also good for your heart. A study found that only 8% of heart patients who were made to laugh daily had a second heart attack within a year, compared with 42% of the non-laughers.

Studies show our bodies can’t differentiate between fake and real laughter; you’ll get the health boost either way. So you can even fake it until you make it. Laugh in your car, in the shower — force yourself to start laughing a few minutes every day.

CNN