All posts tagged: giving

10 Keys to Happier Living

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To celebrate World Mental Health Day earlier this month, Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) collaborated with Action for Happiness to produce a “10 Keys to Happier Living” poster. Listing everyday actions to boost wellbeing and improve your mental health. It’s a wonderful tool to print out and refer to when you’re feeling a bit low or out of kilter. You could even check it every day and take positive action to protect your mental health. Download a printable pdf here –  10-keys-to-happier-living  

Happy International Day of Friendship!

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Today is the UN’s International Day of Friendship. It’s annually held on 30 July to celebrate friendships worldwide. To mark the day, the UN encourages governments, organisations, and community groups to hold events, activities and initiatives that promote solidarity, mutual respect and reconciliation. But you too can get involved and spread the message of friendship without any prior planning! Remember friendship enriches our lives by increasing our sense of belonging and purpose, boosts our happiness and self-esteem, and is a proven antidote to depression. What other reason do you need to show your gratitude for friendship today? Here are our top 10 ideas: Write a “just because” card or letter and post it to a friend Plan a future date night Make a friend a playlist of your favourite songs and shared memories, then send them the link Pick up the phone and call an old friend – we all too heavily rely on whatsapp and texts nowadays, but there’s something so much more satisfying (and human) about actually hearing their voice Even better, go knock on their door unannounced and …

Be happy. Be productive. Build PERMA.

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We all want to be happy. When we’re happy we look on the bright side of life, take ourselves less seriously, become more motivated, loving, and are generally better people. Scientist know our genes and upbringing influence around 50% of the variation in our personal levels of happiness.  Our circumstances 10%, e.g our income and external environment. Which leaves as much as 40% accounted for by our daily activities – the relationships we keep, the work we do and the choices we make. Our actions strongly impact our happiness levels, which is great news because it means we have great control over them and can therefore almost instantly, boost our happiness. Respected positive psychologist Professor Martin Seligman developed a well-being theory called the PERMA Model. It combines the five building blocks required for a happy and flourishing life. These five blocks are – POSITIVE EMOTION (P) Experiencing feelings of joy, hope, love, inspiration, satisfaction, gratitude or any positive emotion allows us to experience wellbeing. ENGAGEMENT (E) When we’re fully engaged in a challenging task and time seems to stand still, we experience a state of flow (see blog post ‘How do you …

Redefine Success and Create a Happier Life

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When Arianna Huffington collapsed from exhaustion in 2007, she was forced to take a long hard look at her life and redefine what success meant to her. With her health so visibly deteriorating, the classic notions of success as money and power, were irrelevant. If she wasn’t alive, both would cease to matter. In her book THRIVE, we are introduced to a third metric of success. A metric that consists of four equal pillars. The pillars represent Wellbeing, Wisdom, Wonder and Giving and they make up the four chapters of her excellent book. An impassioned read, Arianna encourages us to look within ourselves and build a more meaningful and fulfilling life, aligned with our values. Touching on the importance of sleep and meditation to nourish our minds and bodies. We are also introduced to the power of giving back to our local communities and the joys of delighting in wonder. Something we rarely give ourselves the time to do. “Disconnecting from our technology to reconnect with ourselves is absolutely essential for wisdom.” Arianna Huffington Each page is filled with wisdom and insight, and I would …

Happy Earth Day!

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April 22 marks the anniversary of the modern environmental movement, started by Gaylord Nelson in 1970 in which 20 Million Americans took to the streets to demonstrate for a healthy, sustainable environment. Earth Day is the largest civic event in the world, with more than a billion people of all backgrounds, faiths and nationalities participating and celebrating simultaneously around the globe. Growing out of the very first Earth Day, the Earth Day Network (EDN) works with over 50,000 partners in 192 countries. Their mission is to ‘broaden, diversify and activate the environmental movement worldwide, through a combination of education, public policy, and consumer campaigns.’ This is your chance to be a part of the largest environmental service campaign in the world! Visit EDN’s website and sign the climate change petition, join the campaign to protect the Asian elephant or partake in A Billion Acts of Green. Whatever you do, make sure you do your bit to help sustain our beautiful planet!

Deliberately Cultivate Gratitude

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At work yesterday a colleague bought 19 members of our team a full size Easter egg. She crept in early and left one on each of our desks for a delicious surprise. The majority of us were overwhelmed by her kindness and ran straight to show our appreciation, but a select few said or did nothing. I watched in amazement as they simply glanced at the egg (as if it was expected!) and carried on with their morning routine. Zero appreciation, zero thanks. Shocked by their lack of gratitude, I decided to dedicate this post to them and the benefits of deliberately cultivating gratitude. It’s a no brainer that gratitude helps reduce negative emotions. By focusing on all that is right (instead of all that is wrong), we can learn to fully appreciate how lucky we are and start to notice the small things we so easily take for granted. A warm and cosy home, a stable job, a hug at the end of a stressful day, good health! Practising gratitude can also help us be more resilient in the …

25 reasons it’s better to give than receive

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During this over-indulgent, opulent time of year it’s important we take stock and remind ourselves that Christmas isn’t all about the parties and presents, but the season of good will and peace to all men! So if you were ever in doubt, the Acts of Kindness Advent Calendar is here to prove that giving is far more satisfying than receiving. Subscribe to their mailing list and receive 25 daily acts of kindness sent straight to your inbox. A different challenge is set each day – phone an old friend, leave a kind note, give to the needy – in the hope that we can re-educate ourselves and really feel the positive difference going out of our way to be more giving can make. Sign up now and see how many random acts of kindness you can carry out this Christmas. Sign up here.

Positive Psychology

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This book is an easy to follow introduction to Positive Psychology for anyone with an interest in mindfulness or searching for authentic happiness. Positive Psychology is the most recent branch of psychology, founded by Martin Seligman. It is summarised in his own words as the ‘scientific study of optimal human functioning, it aims to discover and promote the factors that allow individuals and communities to thrive.’ (Seligman & Csikszentmilhalyi, 2000). In this book you will find the results of scientific studies carried out to help us understand the key factors in creating and maintaining a happy life. Broken down into 15 easily digestible chapters including Optimism and Hope, Living in Flow, Happiness and Subjective Wellbeing, Time in Our Lives, Love and Positive Psychology interventions, it provides a brilliant overview of optimal human functioning along with simple tools and tips on how to apply it to your own life. A highly recommended read. Positive Psychology in a Nutshell: The Science of Happiness by Ilona Boniwell Available at all good book shops or via Amazon.

Go on I Dare You!

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Welcome to Technotox. A revolution to reconnect with our inner selves, to fight the digital age of smartphones, iPads, Sky TV and social media and rediscover our spirituality. By switching off to the distractions and drains of modern technology and learning to look within ourselves, we can begin to explore our inner sanctum, rediscover our intuition and nuture our own wellbeing. This makes us happier, more spiritual and satisfied individuals, better able to love and succeed in a world full of distractions. For regular ideas and inspiration, please sign up to our newsletter back on the homepage.