Editors Note:  Do we really need a reason to be happy, or is it a choice we can make because we want to be happy?  Think about this over the next week and see if you can allow yourself to feel “Happy For No Reason”.  You might be surprised how uncomfortable you feel or how easy it is.  Leave your comments below and let me know how you do! ~Nitika~

Not even a quarter of the way through reading one of my new favorite books, Happy For No Reason written by Marci Shimoff, I feel amazing.  Better, hopeful, inspired, excited, and yes, just a bit happier.  Little to do with the externals in my life, and without much effort at all, a shift has occurred. I can’t yet share with you the complete steps offered by Shimoff to being happy for no reason, but I can share with you the points that I’ve found most helpful and interesting.

1) We have a “happiness set –point.”  Although I have heard Deepak Chopra speak on this before, and was in awe then, I forgot about this important piece of the puzzle.  Shimoff writes based on Dr. David Lykken’s findings that 50% of our happiness comes from our genetics.  This may elate some of you, and scare most.  However the empowering information is that while only 10% of the other 50% is circumstance determined, the remaining 40% comes from our thoughts, feelings, words and actions!

This means that we have the ability to raise our level of happiness.  Perhaps this comes as shock or even as feelings of resistance.  Thoughts like “Well, how can I be happy when I have x, y and z happening in my life.” If you stop and truly feel what this means, it is empowering.  We have control over so little in our lives, although we live trying to control everything.  The ability to raise our happiness is truly a blessing, if we choose to contribute to it.

2) “All habitual thoughts and behaviors in the past have created specific neural pathways in the wiring in your brain, like grooves in a record,” says Shimoff. Yet, we can create new grooves. Working towards my happiness for a while, I have to tell you creating these new grooves has been, to be honest, quite easy.  I equate my new positive grooves to the contestants on The Biggest Loser! You may be thinking “huh”?  Let me explain.

On the show, overweight contestants drop pounds of weight each week after completing extensive exercise and diet because the human body was never meant to be excessively large.  With their willingness, the excess weight is shed.  This is the same for our state of happiness.  We are meant to be happy! Therefore, with the willingness and commitment our spirit quickly shifts back to its natural peaceful state – a great motivator to quickly develop happiness habits.

3) Every time we obtain something that we thought would make us happy, we actually experience less of a thrill.  Happiness from circumstances, people, things or situations actually becomes habitual thinking. The more we think these things will make us happy, the less happy we will feel as we acquire.  A scary notion at first, but all the more reason to get on the “Happy For No Reason” bandwagon.

We have ALL gotten or achieved things and desires that we’ve wanted.  However, we’re still searching for that one golden ticket to happiness- the end all and be all to fulfill our one true and deepest dream, to be happy.  If we keep searching in the world around us, we will keep ending up disappointed, and as Shimoff writes, less thrilled.  Perhaps upsetting at first, yet there is a hopeful alternative.  It’s described as being happy for no reason, and after completing the remaining steps, I’ll report back next month. Until then, I will leave you with one of the three guiding principals, Shimoff explains.

Assume that the universe is always on your side.  During the good, the bad and the ugly remind yourself that “rejection is God’s protection.”  Although you may not see it, understand or ever get it, there is a bigger power at work in our lives.  If we absorb this belief, we will spend less time worrying about why things happened, and more time being grateful.

Practice these points and report back on your findings. Stay tuned for more!