Habits for Happiness

How is it that some people always seem to be so dang happy? How do they manage to pull it off? Here are a couple tips to getting your days to be sunnier. First of all, it is important to be grateful that you wake up every morning and concentrate on the beauty and wonder of life. Living in the present can do wonders. This means that you are not allowed to sweat the small stuff. Once you get your day going, make sure that you are considerate to all the people that you come across because you never know when your smile might be the only one some of them see that day. Also, never stop being a student. You need to keep up to date on events in your field and maybe learn some new things like web development. It has been shown that learning new skills can boost those happy feelings. While you are learning, take each challenge with stride. Do not wallow in self-pity and learn from mistakes so you can move on to finding a solution.

Finding Your Inner Child

When was the last time you skipped? Like actually leap up into the air and went down the road like a kid? You are probably thinking, that is so childish. But, you cannot image the world of good it can do you. First of all, skipping can burn twice as many calories as walking and it is easier on your joints.  Did you also know that skipping can connect us with our inner child and help with spontaneous and creative energy? While you are still infused with all that energy, you can also be happier because you are letting your heart have a voice. It takes courage to ignore what people will think about you skipping but the rewards are well worth it. It is better than any mobile application when it coming to making you smile. Lastly, you measure success of your skipping endeavors by the uplifting mood it brings not by the time spent doing it or how far you went.

Hacking Happiness

Did you know that anti-depressant use has risen 400% in the past couple years? The first thought is what is going on? The second is that there has to be something that can be done that does not involve chemicals and medications. More than just scientists are asking that question. Everyone is getting in on it. From positive psychology to better eating to tapping into meditation, there are a slew of mobile applications as well as websites that focus of being happier. These apps monitor sleeping and other health parameters. They also help with yoga and correct breathing. Taking it one step further, some of then such as Lumosity, help train the mind to keep it elastic which helps with resilience if something would happen that would get you down. Any thoughts about this technology in its crusade to increase happiness?

Staving Off Mental Decline

In our digital world, it is really no surprise that mobile applications and gaming mobile applications have become a huge business, especially in the field of brain training games. It is a billion dollar industry and there is still to be hard evidence that these games improve mental function and prevent the decline of it. There is a game called Project: Evo that is proving to be above the rest. They are even seeking approval from the FDA. If they would be able to get the seal of approval, it might even be something that the doctor would be able to prescribe like another drug. If you start doing something that taxes your brain in productive ways, forcing it to repeatedly engage declining skills — learning a new language, for instance — those skills get measurably sharper. The problem, of course, is that most of us are pretty lazy. We’re not often going to take up mentally difficult activities in our dotage.Video games seemed like one possible shortcut.

Tech Improving the World

The future is now, it is just not as well spread out as we would like it to be. With all the software development advancements as well as cloud computing, we are that much closer to solving the world's problems. Some of the things that technology can do is bring meditative practices to the mainstream and use inexpensive biometrics along with it. There could also be the offer of web-based psychotherapies as first-line interventions for depression and anxiety (and probably insomnia). Using the internet, doctors would also be able to monitor the negative cognitive and emotional side-effects from a variety of medical interventions, to ensure unintentional effects from the cure are not more harmful than the treated person's original condition. Lastly, big data model could be adopted to collect massive amount of data in order to get a better picture of the patient or disease. Technology could also promote physical activity and motivate people to do get up and do more.

Illutions

Is your life one? There are academics who say you don't have a life. You're just a mobile application. This idea is rather unsettling. As software development and computers became more powerful, programmers started making simulations -- mimicking real-life situations in software. Scientists modeled everything from pandemics to planet formation. Soon complex and compelling societal models emerged. Extrapolating this idea, in the future there could be a possibility that we will have much more sophisticated and complex simulations that will presumably become self-aware, just like humans supposed are now. Going further with this thought, a historian might want to see what life was life centuries back and create a simulation for it. Now, what is to say that you are not just some simulation that is created? How do you know that you are real? Since we are asking these types of questions, lets take a step further and ask about morality? If this is just a Sim, why do we bother with being moral?

Be That Early Bird

Waking up early is a sign of success and ambition in our society. Yet legislature insists on making schools start later to accommodate the sleep cycles of adolescents. You do not need science to figure out that students in middle and high schools like to stay up late and then stay in bed in the mornings. I do not know about you but eight hours is eight hours whether it goes from midnight to 8 am or 10 pm to 6 am. Why don't the parents take back the responsibility and make them go to bed at a decent time. This early-to-bed approach has the benefit of not needing taxpayer dollars. We won't waste lawmakers' time debating the merits of an 8:15 a.m. start time vs. 8:20 a.m. We will also be able to use that time on more pressing matters such as mobile applications and communication services used in schools as well as video conferencing for tutoring. Just imagine the possibilities.