Happiness can be subjective. What makes one person happy can be completely irrelevant to another person’s happiness. However, I believe there are some fundamentals that can be used as a universal foundation for happiness. Happiness can be found by working on three most important things that make up a human being; mind, body and spirit. The body is a gift that should be taken care of. Living a healthy lifestyle goes hand in hand with living a happy life. A healthy life comes from eating well as well as exercising. According to the website, “The Pursuit of Happiness,” researchers argue that exercise can improve happiness and decrease depression. “Regular exercise is associated with improved mental well-being and a lower incidence of depression.”
The site mentions a study (Blumenthal et al., 1999) that looked at the effect of exercise on clinically depressed adults. They found that exercise was equally as effective in reducing depression as some known anti-depressants. Other research has shown similar results when it comes to diet. Having a poor diet can have negative effects on ones overall well-being and mental state. Some of the more peaceful and rewarding sources of exercise is yoga. Yoga tends to be a more calm and focused exercise routine compared to things like running or weight lifting. Yoga can contribute to all three mind, body and spirit as it involves meditation and focusing your thoughts. Yoga can help increase happiness in more ways than one.
Exercise alone can not determine a person’s happiness but when your body feels good and you feel like you have made the right choices to be healthy, it can only have a positive outcome. There are many other aspects to life that can make someone a happier person if they improve on them and change they way they think and feel about them. Being healthy physically is just one important step to happiness.
“Happiness resides not in possessions, and not in gold, happiness dwells in the soul.” – Democritus
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