Everyone wants to live happily. But the problem is that, you retrieve all sorts of happiness advice from people on the internet who themselves don’t know what they are talking about. You don’t need to trust them.
In fact, do not trust me too. Rather, trust neuroscientists. They study your black box all the day and have found a lot regarding the things that will truly make you happy. Alex Korb, the UCLA neuroscience researcher has some findings that can help raise the happiness level in your life. Scroll down learn from the individuals who truly know answers:

1. When you feel down?

The first and foremost vital question is to ask yourself when you feel down. Sometimes you feel like your brain does not want you to be happy. You may feel shameful of guilty. Why?
As a matter of fact, shame and guilt activate the reward center of brain. Regardless of their variances, guilt, shame and pride all activate alike neural circuits. Among these emotions, pride is the most powerful at prompting activity in certain brain areas, while other brain areas are controlled by shame and guilt. This is the reason it can be so tempting to mound shame and guilt on ourselves because they are triggering the reward center of our brain.
So neuroscientists want you to ask yourself following question:

What am I thankful for?
Gratitude is so good because, it impacts your brain at the biological level. The advantages of being thankful begin with the dopamine system, because when you feel grateful, it triggers the part of brain stem that form dopamine. This is exactly what the antidepressant Wellbutrin does. It also activates social dopamine circuits, making your social exchanges pretty more pleasant. Moreover, it enhances neurotransmitter serotonin; the phenomenon that is exactly achieved with Prozac.

However, sometimes life gives you a severe punch and you get completely overtaken by bad feelings. When you are truly down in the dumps and do not know about dealing with it, then the solution is simple. Identify the things that make you upset.

2. Name negative feelings

Whenever you feel awful, name that awfulness; Angry, Anxious or Sad!
In one study, some participants were asked to view images of people showing different emotional facial expressions. Most probably, amygdala of every participant triggered to the emotions in images. But when researchers asked them to name those emotions, the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex triggered and condensed the reactivity of emotional amygdala. In simple words, deliberately distinguishing the emotions decreased their impact. Suppressing your emotions won’t work and can go wrong on you.

It is found that individuals who attempted to overpower a negative emotional feeling were unsuccessful in doing so. Meantime when they looked quite cool outwardly, interiorly their limbic system had no effect of that suppression, rather more aroused in some cases. Trying not to sense something doesn’t prove fruitful. On the other hand, giving them names makes a real difference.
In order to decrease emotional arousal, all you need is to label an emotion, and preferably use symbolic language, like metrics and indirect metaphors. It triggers your prefrontal cortex and reduces the urge in limbic system. Labeling is an essential tool of mindfulness that was used in ancient meditation techniques. Even this labeling affects is used as a primary tools by FBI for hostage negotiators.

However, sometimes you don’t feel anything like angry, sad or anxious, rather you feel simply bored. Well, to tackle with this state, simply involve yourself in things you enjoy.

3. Make that decision

Brain researchers found that making decisions decreases anxiety and worry and also helps solving your problems. When you make decisions, you tend to create intentions and set goals; all 3 are linked to same neural circuitry and trigger a positive way on prefrontal cortex, dropping anxiety and worry. It also reduces striatum activity, pulls down the negative routines and impulses. Finally, when you make decisions, you basically see the world from different angle, trying to find solutions to your problems.

However, making decisions is not easy itself. So what sort of decisions should be made? Neuroscience suggests making decisions that are “good enough”. Being perfectionist causes stress, so don’t go for 100% best decisions. Going for perfection overpowers your brain with emotions making you feel out of control.
On the other hand when you make a good enough decision, you keep your mind under control and this sense of control decreases stress. And the good thing about decision making is that, it boosts pleasure when you receive expected outcome. Moreover, when you make decisions, you are more eager towards achieving those targets. Dragging yourself unwillingly towards a thing increases stress rather than boosting your pleasure. So neuroscientists suggest making more decisions.

Now once you are being grateful, have labeled negative emotions and made pretty more decisions, but how to tackle with the feelings of loneliness while being happy at the same time?
No problem, brain docs do have the answer for this problem too; and that is to have fun with your buddies.

4. Touch people

With this point, we do not mean to touch people literally and get in trouble. Rather, we need to feel acceptance and love from others. When we do not feel it, it is painful. Not the pain of being “disappointing” or “awkward”, rather real painful. This finding was proven by an experiment in which a team of participant was required to play a ball-tossing video game. The opponent team was just computer players but the participants were not made aware of this fact and they consider them humans too. The game was designed in a way that a time came when computer player stopped playing good and sharing ball. The brains of human participants acted in the same way as if they underwent physical pain. They found that rejection not only hurts like a broken heart, rather you feel like a broken leg.

Let’s take the research to next level and talk about touching people literally. In that case, your relationships are vital to your brain’s sense of happiness. When you touch, it increases oxytocin release. For people you are casual with, small touches including pats and handshakes are good enough. With the people you are closer; try to touch more often. Touching is not given much credit but it is really powerful. It escalates team performance, makes you more convincing and of course, increases your flirting. Touching your loved in fact decreases pain and married couples tend to enjoy more powerful effects if their bond is strong.

Moreover, holding someone’s hands can help ease you and your brain in throbbing situations. A research took some women participants who were to receive small electric shock. They were scanned at the time of receiving shock and their brains showed an expectable pattern of response in worrying and pain. Another experiment was conducted in which women were allowed to hold hand of their husband or experimenter. Now the scans showed smaller effects. The brain displayed condensed activation in dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and anterior cingulate cortex, resulting less activity in worrying and pain.

Moving a step further, long hugs releases oxytocin, which shrinks the amygdala reactivity. Studies found that 5 hugs a day for 4 weeks upsurges happiness to a great extent. If you don’t have someone to hug you, according to neuroscientist, a massage serves pretty good alternative.
A good massage increases serotonin level 30 percent. It decreases stress hormones and increases levels of dopamine, helping you build new good habits. It also reduces down the pain as the oxytocin system triggers painkilling endorphins. Moreover, it reduces fatigue and improves sleep.
Here are some other home rituals that help increase your happiness level. You may find them strange, but they are practical and they really work.

5. Smudging

It is a Native American mechanism of clearing the energy in some given space. They belive that Energy becomes stagnant, whether bad or good and some are of the view that negative occurrences or bad luck endure to emerge because of energy in the home getting figuratively trapped. In smudging, you burn fresh and dried herbs like juniper, lavender, cedar and sage and allow the smoke to disperse throughout room and rinse the space’s energy. The individual clearing the space need to have a clear and positive purpose for what sort of change they wish in their life and their home after smudging. In order to do it, you need you home tidy and neat with all the doors and windows open. Select some dried herbs and burn them until they smoke. Blow the flame out and stroll across the space, permitting the smoke to float and puff around you and every corner of your house. The most vital thing is to meditate on the deed of cleansing the home.

6. Diffuse Essential Oils

You might felt some typical fragrance in yoga studios. This is because of some essential oils that they use for creating a soothing ambiance. Therefore, it is considered that dispersing essential oils at your home can cleanse the air, the energy of space, and affect anyone’s mood in the space.

7. Crystal Energy Healing

It might sound odd but believers of crystal therapy are of the view that setting crystals in a space affect the energy of that space and those live within. Placing crystals in precise areas of your home give advantageous effects relating to topics like abundance, love, wealth and family.
Here we are providing you some other significant rituals that can increase your happiness. Keep scrolling down for further methods that can help you in being happy.

8. Count Blessings

It is a simple thing to do. All you need to do is to spare 10 minutes before going to sleep and note down 3 things that went well that day and what was the reason.

9. Absence of blessing

Here we are telling you a method to transform your thinking pattern. Despite of thinking about something you don’t have, think of absence of something that you have. For example, how would you be living if your father was not alive? How would be your life without the spouse you have? Mentally deducting something good from your life makes you more thankful for the life you are living.

10. Think About Something Bad

This point might contradict with what else we have stated in this article but let us explain. If anything happened to you in past, you need to think what was the positive consequence of that event? How positively it changed you? What were the lessons you learned? How you can thank that event for the consequences it caused?

11. Gratitude Visit

And finally, another best thing is to express your gratefulness to a person important in your life. Visit him or her and present the thanking note in person. Studies found that gratitude visit decrease depression and increase happiness for at least 3 months after the visit.