Health is the foundation to all happiness.
Where there is no health, there’s no happiness.
When you’re healthy, you do more.
You begin to feel and experience more.
The healthier you are, the happier you’ll feel.
The happier you feel, the healthier you’ll be.
Create more health & happiness in your life.
“When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, I wrote down ‘happy’. They told me I didn’t understand the assignment, and I told them they didn’t understand life.”
~ John Lennon ~
Happiness
Happiness isn’t a job, a place, or something you buy.
It doesn’t depend on what you have or who you are.
Happiness is a choice.
It solely relies on what you think and the decisions you make along the way.
The Groundwork For All Happiness Is Health
I don’t know about you, but I don’t know many people who are sick, injured, or both that are happy.
Whenever I’m sick with a cold or the flu or battling an injury and unable to the things I want, I’m not happy. I’m still grateful for all I have, I’m just not happy being limited to what I can and can’t do because of my current health state.
Your body is amazing.
It has the ability to provide you with complete joy and happiness.
It also has the ability to provide you with pain and misery.
The good news is, you’re ultimately responsible for which of these it provides you with based on how well you take care of yourself and your health.
“Take care of your body, it’s the only place you have to live.”
~ Jim Rohn ~
Health = Happiness
I’ve never been very good at math, it’s always been my nemesis.
Although this one equation has always made perfectly good sense to me:
health = happiness
My health allows me to do all of the things I want to do and therefore, contributes to my happiness.
I’m often asked if I’m really as happy as I look or come across and if so, what’s my secret? I can’t help but smile whenever I’m asked, even now as I write about it.
I’m happy because I’m healthy and able to do all of the things that make me happy.
Traveling, snorkeling, skydiving, playing beach volleyball, running marathons.
It’s my health that allows me to do all all of this.
“Most people have no idea how good their body is designed to feel.”
~ Kevin Trudea ~
Unhealthy Does Not Equal Happiness
Illness, injury, being overweight – if you’re unhealthy, chances are you’re unhappy.
Statistics show that as obesity increases, happiness decreases. It isn’t just obesity either that decreases your level of happiness, illness or injury of any type has the same effect.
As your health diminishes, so does your happiness.
What Determines Happiness
According to studies, 50% of your happiness is derived from genetics. If you wish you had blue eyes but have brown eyes, that’s genetics. Nothing you can do about it. If you want to be tall but your short, again, that’s genetics, you can’t change that.
10% of your happiness is determined by external factors. These are things such as financial resources, your career, climate, where you live, who you’re with. I was surprised when I saw this. I would have thought these factors made up more than just 10% of your happiness – not the case.
The most fascinating statistic of all is that the remaining 40% of your happiness is determined by your actions and thoughts.
That is such a powerful statistic that I believe it’s worth repeating…
40% of your happiness is determined by your actions and thoughts.
What you do and how you think is largely responsible for your overall happiness.
The Challengers
Whenever it comes to creating more health and happiness in your life, there’s three factors that’ll position themselves as challenges.
Time
I often hear from my clients, “I need to make time to exercise” or “I need to make time for myself and do more for me”. Unfortunately you cannot make more time, I wish we could. I could use a few more hours per day.
It’s not about making time, it’s about allocating time to your health and happiness. It’s about making both of these a priority in your life and dedicating time to both.
If you need help identifying your priorities, here’s something I wrote that’ll help you.
Money
Here’s some great news for you – health and happiness are completely free!
Doing push-ups, sit-up, squats, lunges, jumping jacks all in your living room is free. Going for a run around the neighborhood or a walk around the lake is also free. Exercising for your health is completely free to do.
Spending time with family and friends, reading your favorite book, writing, having a picnic, all of these things are free. Happiness doesn’t cost you a thing.
Fear
What if you don’t lose weight? What if your business fails? What if the relationship doesn’t work out? What if you don’t finish the race? What if you do? What if it all works out?
If you’re going to afraid, be afraid of what it’ll be like to not be healthy and happy.
The only thing you have to fear is fear itself.
“Thinking is easy, acting is difficult, and to put ones thoughts into action is the most difficult thing in the world.”
~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe ~
We All Have The Desire To Be Healthy & Happy
Thinking about it is easy, it’s the actual doing, taking action, that’s challenging and can feel like the most difficult thing in the world to do. Here’s some good news – it doesn’t have to be.
Creating health and happiness isn’t one big giant step you take now or down the road at some point that instantly provides you with all the health and happiness you desire.
Creating health and happiness begins with small steps.
Putting your thoughts into action can feel difficult, challenging, and overwhelming.
I created this 7-step process to help you create more health and happiness in your life so that you can begin to do more of the things you want to do, the things that make you happy and come alive.
When you begin creating a healthy lifestyle, you also begin to increase your happiness by having the ability to do more.
The 7-Step Process For Creating Health & Happiness
Step #1 Get Your Head In The Game
Before anything can happen, you must have the right mindset if you’re going to succeed in creating more health and happiness. There’s three areas to focus on:
Thoughts
What are your thoughts? Do you think about succeeding or failing? Do you think that you’re not good enough or smart enough, or worthy or love or success? Listen to your thoughts and what and how you think.
Replace your limiting thoughts with positive reinforcing thoughts that you can and you will, that you are smart enough and good enough, worthy of love and success.
Remember, 40% of your happiness is determined by your thoughts.
Words
What words do you use when you’re speaking to others? Do you talk about all the reasons why you can’t, why you don’t have time, or why it won’t work?
Take notice of your words. Change them from speaking about all the reasons why you can’t and you’ll fail to reasons why you can and will success.
If you think you can’t and say you can’t, then you won’t. Watch your words, they’re powerful.
Visualize
Visualize yourself already there. If you want to lose 50 pounds, visualize yourself 50 pounds lighter. What will you look like and feel like in your clothing? How will you feel at the beach, in a bathing suit? How will you feel in front of your spouse or at a class reunion? What will you confidence be like?
Professional athletes understand the power of visualization. They’ll visualize an entire game before ever stepping foot on the playing field. They visualize throwing the perfect pass, catching the winning touchdown, hitting a home run.
They understand the power of visualization and how doing so, the results they want are conceptualized.
Step #2 What Matters
When it comes to your health and happiness, identify what truly matters to you.
It could be losing weight, running a marathon, starting a business, writing a book, improving your relationships, spending more time with your kids.
Think about what you’ll regret not doing when you’re at the end of your rope and time is limited. What will you wish you had done more of? What would you have done differently? Identify what truly matters to you.
Once you’ve identified these, it’s important that you write it down.
When you write it down, it’s no longer just a thought or a dream, it becomes real. It lets you know you’re serious and ready to take control and action on what matters most to you.
Don’t underestimate the power of writing down your health and happiness goals.
Write it down.
Step #3 Plan Your Work, Work Your Plan
Pick one small action you can complete daily for each of the things you’ve identified above that matter most to you when it comes to your health and happiness
Make it a small action you know you can commit to daily. For example, if losing weight matters to you, your small daily action could be to walk for 15 minutes every day, have an apple instead of chips at lunch, water instead of cola.
Once you’ve identified these small steps, commit to doing them daily. It’s these small steps that will begin to build momentum and your one small step will soon become a bigger step, and then two steps, and then four, and six.
Momentum.
Step #4 Create Accountability
Regardless of the plan, course, workbook, or seminar you’ve purchased, how much you paid for it, or how well renowned the person offering the material may be, without accountability, your chances of success are slim.
Identify one person who sincerely cares about you, your health, and your happiness. Someone you can count on and you know will help you. It could be a family member, a friend, a neighbor, a colleague.
Once you’ve identified this person, tell them your health and happiness goals and the one small action you’ve committed to daily.
Create an an accountability system where you check in with them regularly. It could be daily, every few days, or weekly.
It must happen regularly though, whether through emails, phone calls, text messages, Skype sessions, whatever it may be.
Step #5 Take Action
Nothing works unless you do.
Now that you have a complete plan in place, it’s time to put the plan to work and begin working your plan.
Set daily reminders so that you remember the daily actions you’ve committed to. Shoes and gym bag by the bed so it’s the first thing you see in the morning. Phone reminder to leave work so that you can head home and spend more time with your kids or spouse.
Making progress contributes to your happiness. It’s a must. If you’re not making progress, make the necessary adjustments to your plan, and get right back at it again.
Step #6 Environment Is Everything
There’s no faster way to get from where you are to where you want to be than by putting yourself in the right environment.
Evaluate
Take notice of the things you do and people you interact with on a daily basis. Identify the things that contribute to your health and happiness goals and the people that support you, build you up, and tell you all the reasons why you can and will succeed, and the ones that do not.
Eliminate
Stop doing the things that do not contribute to your health and happiness goals. If there’s people you can’t or don’t want to eliminate who do not support you, spend less time with them or don’t discuss your health and happiness goals with them.
Create
Find people, friends, family, groups and communities that can and will support you.
If you want to run a marathon, join a running group. It you want to lose weight, find a workout and accountability partner or consider Weight Watchers.
Surround yourself with those who support you and believe in you.
Step #7 Serve Others
There is no bigger happiness hack out there then simply serving others.
Help people – family, friends, neighbors, colleagues, strangers, volunteer your time.
Go out of your way to make a positive difference in the lives of others. Hold the door for someone, smile, let someone in your driving lane who’s merging, buy the person behind you in line a cup of coffee.
We’re happiest when we give, when we serve, not when we receive.
“The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the services of others.”
~ Mahatma Ghandi ~
What Matters….
Whatever it is you decide to do, be sure it’s contributing to your health and makes you happy.
The foundation for all happiness is health.
I recently read a great book by Chris Guillebeau, The Happiness of Pursuit.
There was a paragraph towards the end of the book that’s stayed with me.
“The aware of our mortality can help us pursue a goal. Those who live in active awareness of this reality are more likely to identify goals and make progress towards them. Or to put in another way: Everyone dies, but not everyone truly lives.”
What is it that you want to do?
What truly matters to you when you think of your health and happiness?
What will you look back on and wish you would have done more of, done differently, spend more time with, taking a chance on?
It’s not too late, but at some point, it will be. Don’t wait until then, start now – today.
Choose to be healthy.
Choose to be happy.
You live once. Do it your way, and once will be enough.
“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointment by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sail. Explore. Dream. Discover.
~ Mark Twain ~
Mike,
You said, “What you do and how you think is largely responsible for your overall happiness.” in your post. I agree. I like Zig Ziglar’s quotes. There’s many… that mention attitude. Attitude in life determines the outcome of everything.
Great post. Suggestion though… I personally would’ve broken it up into segments [several posts to make a series] so it is not LONG. But, that’s just me.
It’s great content either way!
By the way: my business blog: http://anewlifeoasis.com/category/blog is complimented by your blog. I focus on mindset. Occasionally, there’s a post about health. I just did one about self-care recently.
Thanks for your comments Kimberly. Interestingly enough, I didn’t realize that Zig Ziglar made that same statement, apparently I’m onto to something then. 🙂 Thanks for being here…. Cheers!
Thank you for sharing this material again! What a great webinar and I look forward to the many more that lay ahead!
My pleasure Kristen, thanks for your support and being a part of this first webinar. No question that there will be many more to follow. 🙂 Cheers!
Hey Mike, Math might become your friend with these little equations you need to answer to comment.
Great quote from Lennon and nice novelette post.
John
Haha, thanks John. Thanks for your comment and words of support. This was definitely one of my longest posts. Apparently there’s lots to cover when it comes to health and fitness. 🙂 You’re awesome man… thanks for being here. Cheers!
These are great tips, as always, Mike! I especially agree with momentum and taking action. I totally subscribe to the idea that happiness is a choice and I do think that health plays a huge part in that. If we have the ability to impact our health, it absolutely leads to happiness, at least in my personal experience. However, I think that the choice is more powerful than the circumstances – I’m thinking about those who struggle with a disease that has them “unhealthy” but who have great outlooks and happiness. This is really inspiring. Thanks for sharing, Mike!
Thanks for your comments Anne, always appreciated. It’m amazing the momentum that small steps done daily can create. You bring up a great point when considering those who are struggling with disease and still make the choice to have a positive outlook on life. Inspiring indeed. Thanks again Anne, you’re awesome…. Cheers!
Hey Mike, such a great post. I was actually just talking to someone today about this very topic. We talked about how important good health is to being where you want to be in life and how it’s really the foundation for everything. And I think the 7 steps are great ones for people to take. I especially like 5, 6, and 7. Great job!
Melissa
Thanks for your comment Melissa. It’s amazing how important good health is for more than just looking and feeling good. It trickles into every aspect of our lives and has the ability to make a positive contribution in all that we do. Thanks for being here, you’re awesome! 🙂 Cheers!
Excellent post, Mike! You’ve got very clear, actionable plan.
Health and Happiness are the subjects I hold close to my heart, and this is what I write about on my blog (hence, lean happiness).
I agree with you, happiness largely depends on health. When I was a teen, I had serious health issues. My grades started to slip, I couldn’t concentrate on my study, and honestly, I didn’t care. I was miserable and all I wanted was to be healthy. With the help of my mama, I was healed naturally.
Both happiness and health are in our hands. Thanks for this article, I know a lot of people will benefit from it.
Blessings.
Thanks for being here Anna and for your comments. Thanks for sharing your story and experience with us and congrats on the successful transition you’ve made in your life with the help of your mama and a healthy lifestyle, awesome! Health = happiness regardless of age. A healthy lifestyle will most always equal a happy one too. You’re awesome Anna, cheers to you and your health!