What makes you happy? Pleasant events, love, money, good time? Your happiness is determined by the brain. Therefore, in order to feel at least a little happier in a difficult moment, you need to focus on how to make your brain happy. And neuroscience knows how to excel at this. Alex Corb – A UCLA neuroscientist suggests trying simple things to make your brain feel happier, and explains why.
Music will help make the brain happy
Music affects the brain in an interesting way: it reminds it of the places and circumstances in which you have listened to it before. Thus, to make the brain happy, sometimes it is enough just to listen to music that reminds you of pleasant events: a fun party with friends, a good day with a loved one, a diploma received, the birth of a child, etc.
This effect of music is due to the actions of the hippocampus, which is responsible for context-sensitive memory.
By the way, we recommend listening to – so you can enhance the pleasant sensations, remembering them in the future.
Smiling and sunglasses will make your brain happy
Despite a range of amazing possibilities, the brain does not always act intelligently. Sometimes, given a whole bunch of different information, the brain is not sure how it should feel. Therefore, he is in search of peculiar clues. This process is called biofeedback. It is the process during which the brain decides how it needs to feel in a particular situation.
For example, when you are happy, you smile. But the reverse process is also effective: if you smile, the brain detects it (tracks muscle movements) and decides that, therefore, it is happy. Thus, happiness makes you smile, and a smile – be happy. So to make your brain happy, pretend you are happy.
When we look at bright sunlight, we squint. The brain often misinterprets such a signal coming from the muscle that wrinkles the eyebrow (corrugator supercilii). In order not to mislead the brain, put on sunglasses and smile!
Thinking about goals can make your brain happy
It has been experimentally proven that having the goal of – means to look at the world differently. So when you're overwhelmed by discouragement, stress, or problems, think about the long-term goals you've set for yourself. How will it make the brain happy? Through the production of dopamine, which is responsible for motivation, of course.
Purposes and intentions that are "kept" in the prefrontal cortex, change the perception of the world. The fact is that a person evaluates events subjectively, i.e. we decide for ourselves whether good or bad happened to us.
And if you think about achieving your goal, the brain will receive its dopamine reward in the pleasure center, and you will be able to resist negative emotions.
Nothing makes the brain happier than sleep
Depression leads to sleep disturbances, and sleep disturbances – to depression. To sleep well, you need to do the following:
- walk outside during the day, enjoy the sun (on a gloomy day, turn on the lights brighter);
- restrict yourself from all light sources at night;
- take care of a comfortable bed;
- come up with a ritual that you will perform every day before going to bed (aroma oil bath, reading a book, listening to an audiobook, foot massage, etc.);
- ventilate the room regularly, optimize the room temperature.
An excellent exercise for the mind and body will be a morning walk, and better – morning walk with a friend. Such morning rituals, along with the above evening rituals, will help regulate your sleep schedule by influencing the serotonin production system. Thanks to this, you will be able to develop a habit that is useful for the whole organism. Thus, making the brain happy is quite simple – estet-portal.com wishes you success in this matter!
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