Social interest in well-being is growing. Well-being is translated as happiness or a sense of well-being, and is understood to mean life satisfaction, fulfillment, and positive emotions. Recent advancements in diagnostic technology have established self-assessment methods that can measure an individual’s level of happiness with considerable accuracy. Companies using these methods are increasingly seeing increased employee happiness and improved performance. Each time employees experience a moment of happiness, positive emotions arise, leading to increased creativity and innovation, creating a virtuous cycle that translates into improved performance. It has also been found that when companies and managers create happy and cheerful workplaces, sick leave decreases and medical expenses decline. If we can create homes, schools, workplaces, and communities overflowing with happiness and joy, we can become happier.
People with high levels of happiness maintain appropriate levels of secretion of happiness hormones such as oxytocin, serotonin, and dopamine. If you want to increase your happiness, you should focus on devising ways to stimulate the secretion of these hormones. For example, oxytocin is a hormone that is secreted in large quantities when you feel love. To promote the secretion of oxytocin, passive or active stimulation is necessary. Positive mother-child interactions, good relationships, and interaction with pets all provide active stimulation. Serotonin forms the foundation of mental stability and health, while dopamine enhances the joy and motivation of achieving goals. Understanding the mechanisms that stimulate the secretion of these hormones and being able to devise ways to do so increases the possibility of achieving happiness. For example, increasing serotonin secretion can improve stress tolerance and help overcome anxiety.
If you want to live a happy life, you should cultivate skills from a young age to stimulate the secretion of happiness hormones and skills to suppress activity in the precuneus of the brain. This training begins with understanding the characteristics of the brain. The brain loves fun. Try things you find interesting. To feel something is interesting, you need more dopamine secretion. An efficient way to increase dopamine is to experience many small achievements. You can experience this sense of accomplishment as you gradually improve. Of course, it’s even better if you can experience this sense of accomplishment at work. It’s also wise to incorporate things that make your brain happy into your work and leisure time. Specifically, you can promote the secretion of oxytocin by maintaining smooth social relationships. Next, you can promote the secretion of serotonin by getting enough sleep and exercise. And finally, you can promote the secretion of dopamine by experiencing many small achievements.
