Unlock Happiness with 7 Out-of-the-Box Life Hacks | Holistic Happiness Coach | EP 66

🎙️ Holistic Happiness Club presents a brand new episode: “7 Quirky Happiness Hacks You’ve Never Tried (But Should!)” 🎧

In this episode, we dive deep into unconventional ways to boost happiness that go beyond the typical self-care routines. If you’re tired of hearing the same advice about mindfulness and gratitude, then this episode is for you! Discover surprising techniques to increase happiness instantly, like writing a letter to your future self or doodling with your non-dominant hand. These are scientifically backed quirky methods for emotional well-being that can transform your mood and mindset.

Here’s what you’ll learn:

1. Creative ways to improve your happiness quotient in just a few minutes.
2. How doodling with your non-dominant hand can activate new brain pathways and reduce stress.
3. Why eating a fruit blindfolded is an underrated mindfulness exercise.
4. How starting a self-compliment jar can skyrocket your self-esteem and positivity.
5. The power of looking at beautiful things like clouds to instantly reduce stress.
6. Why spending money on experiences, not things can lead to lasting joy.

Whether you’re interested in practical strategies for instant happiness, mindfulness activities to reduce stress, or looking to unlock creativity through unconventional methods, this episode offers a fresh perspective on how to live a happier life. These weird but effective happiness techniques are perfect for anyone looking to level up their happiness game in unexpected ways.

Transcript

Hello, and welcome back to another

interesting episode of Holistic Happiness Club.

And today's episode is about 15

weird ways to boost your happiness.

This is the part one.

So we will talk about seven

weird ways to boost your happiness.

So I was thinking that when we talk

about increasing your happiness quotient, we talk about

mindfulness, gratefulness, forgiveness, surrender, letting go and working

on your goals, eating healthy, etcetera, etcetera.

But I was thinking, okay, these are the

things that are available all over the places.

Let me dig deeper.

Let me find out some unconventional ways, some weird

ways that can help you apply these things in

your life and increase your happiness quotient instantly.

As soon as you try them out,

they will increase your happiness quotient.

So this is what I was thinking to do, and I

came up with 15 weird ways to boost your happiness.

And this is the part one.

And here we will talk about seven weird ways.

In this part one, we are going to discuss

seven weird ways of increasing your happiness quotient.

So stay tuned till the very end

because the last one might surprise you.

So without further delay, let's dive into today's

topic, 15 weird ways to boost your happiness.

Hi, my name is Akshay Tiwari.

I'm a holistic happiness coach, author of the book

named Usher, and the founder of Holistic Happiness Club.

Holistic Happiness Club is the place

where we talk about happiness holistically.

We understand that happiness is

not a single faceted thing.

It's a multifaceted concept.

And that is why we need to look at

every aspect that is connected to happiness and everything

that is connected to our life, be it our

health, relationship success or financial success, wealth, career, everything

is related to our happiness.

And that is why we try to

talk about everything in holistic happiness club.

More about me and more about holistic Happiness

club at the end of the episode.

But for now, sit back, relax, and

enjoy the episode of the day.

All right, so let's begin.

Our topic of the day, 15 weird

ways to increase your happiness instantly.

So the first weird way to increase your happiness

is write a letter to your future self.

The way you are going to do this

activity is you need to write a letter.

You need to take five to ten minutes aside.

You need to keep that time aside, and you need to

write a letter to yourself, considering that you are going to

receive this letter five to ten years down the line.

So what all the things you are going to write

in this letter, you can write anything in this letter,

but my recommendation will be that you can write about

your emotional reflection, what you are going through right now

and what you are feeling right now, your challenges.

What are the challenges that you are facing

right now and what are your future plans?

What are your future dreams, what you are going

to accomplish in the near future and maybe in

three years, five years down the line, what you

are going to accomplish and what are the challenges

that you are facing right now?

How you are planning to tackle all those challenges?

That is going to be rough

structure of your, of your letter.

And then after writing this letter, and you can lock it

out and you need to give yourself a specific date.

Six months or three months or one year down the line.

That you are going to open the letter one year

after writing this or six months after writing this.

So this activity is going to help you in two ways.

Number one, writing itself is a very, very powerful tool

when it comes to self help and personal growth.

Now, you might also say that what

is the need of writing a letter?

I can just think about these future plans

and how am I going to tackle the

personal challenges that I'm facing right now?

I would say no.

Thinking and writing are two different things.

Completely different thing.

See, the way we are evolved, the way we are

raised when we have gone to school, the way we

read things and the way we write things.

It needs to have a structure, right?

It needs to have a beginning, it needs to

have a story, it needs to have a middle,

and it needs to have an end.

Whereas our thoughts are completely unstructured.

You will be keep on jumping from one

thought to another thought and you will be

digressing from the topic again and again.

And the purpose of the

activity will be missed somewhere.

That is why writing is the

one which is recommended thing. All right?

So that you have a structure, so that you have a plan.

What you are going to write, so

that you don't digress from the topic.

So that you thoughts do not jump

all over all over the place, right?

So that is why you need to write.

All right, so one thing that you will give structure to

your thoughts which are going in your mind right now.

So it will give you a perspective shift.

It will give you emotional reflection.

Also, it will give you motivational boost because you

will be writing about the progress that you are

going to make in the near future and some,

some distant future down the line.

So you will be writing about your progress,

you will be writing about your dreams.

So it will give you a reassurance, it will

give you a motivational boost, and it will give

you an increase in happiness because of perspective shift,

because of emotional reflection, and because of motivational boost.

So that is one way this activity is going to help you.

And another thing, most of the time we get

so many thoughts in a day and most of

the thoughts we forget next day, right.

When you are going to write this letter and when

you are going to lock it to open in a

future date, then what is going to happen when you

are going to open this letter in a future date?

It will give you so many reflection that what was

going on in that day, what was going on in

your mind about your dreams, about your challenges?

Some of the challenges.

Challenges must have been resolved by that time.

Some of the challenges might still be there, but,

and some of the solution that you have thought

at that time, they still might be relevant.

So there will be so much of so much

to reflect on that letter when you are going

to open that in the future date.

So this activity is going to help you right there,

right now when you are writing the letter and when

you are opening the letter three months, six months down

the line, then it will give you another kind of

help that can only be experienced.

I am short of words means I can explain,

but that will, I mean, that will fall short.

When you are going to do this activity, when

you are going to open that letter, that reflection

is going to help you in multiple ways, right?

So that is the first activity that you need

to write a letter to your future self.

It will take five to ten minutes, but it

will give you a tremendous boost of happiness.

It will give you emotional release.

It will help you to come back on the

path and refocus on what is more important things.

Alright, so that was the first thing.

Let's move on to the second thing.

Second thing is doodle with your non dominant hand.

All right?

So doodling is like creating some kind of, some kind

of shapes and designs, whatever you like to call them.

It does not necessarily mean to have something,

it does not necessarily mean to mean something.

It does not necessarily have to have a flower or

a natural thing or a, or a face, anything.

You just keep on doodling.

So that's what doodling is, that you keep on

designing something, whatever is coming to your mind.

It does not have to exist in the real

life and it does not have to make sense

to anyone else, just to you, alright?

So that's what doodling is.

So we all have one dominant hand, right or left? Right.

In this activity, you are not

going to use your dominant hand.

If you are right handed, use your left hand.

If you are left handed, use your

right hand and try to doodle something.

Take again five to ten minutes and try to

create some design with the non dominant hand, alright?

And this is going to give you a

boost of happiness instantly by engaging your brain,

number one, reducing stress and boosting creativity.

How it does that?

Because we are very much used to use our dominant hand.

We do everything in the day

using our dominant hand, right?

But when it comes to doodling with

a non dominant hand, we force ourselves.

We force ourselves that we are going

to use our non dominant hand now.

And that's how we stimulate our brain.

The other part of the brain gets stimulation that,

okay, I am going to be used now.

It stimulates new neural pathway that helps you create

new habit and break free from the old pattern.

Also, because you are not used to draw or use

your non dominant hand, it is like learning something new.

It is like learning driving for the first

time, because it's completely new for you.

So your mind will be focused,

completely focused on that particular activity.

So it's kind of a mindfulness activity that

will reduce your stress, it will increase your

productivity, it will increase your focus.

And also because it is

doodling, it's a creative exercise.

It will boost your creativity as well.

So that was the second activity that you

need to doodle with your non dominant hand.

Again, it is going to take five to ten minutes,

but the benefit, the result that you are going to

achieve with this is going to be tremendous.

Alright, so next activity is eat a fruit blindfolded.

Again, this is a mindfulness

activity because we usually eat.

So let me ask you this question that we usually eat

by watching tv, by talking to someone, by using our phone.

What was the last time when

you ate something without any distraction?

Some, some of us, very small percentage of

us use, I mean, we eat undistracted.

We, I have seen most of the people eat by watching tv

or using the phone or maybe they are on a phone call

or something, or maybe they are in a meeting or something.

They are a working professional saying that I don't

have any other time I need to eat while,

I mean, I am in a meeting. Alright?

Not true, but it's okay.

I'm not getting into that right now.

So the activity is you need to eat a fruit blindfolded.

Why fruit?

Fruit is more tastier than the usual meal, right.

And when you are eating, going

to eat a fruit blindfolded.

When you are going to do anything blindfolded,

you need to heighten all your senses.

You need to heighten the touch sense, you need

to heighten the smell and the taste senses.

You need to heighten your ears

because your, your eyes are closed.

So all other senses needs to

compensate the requirement of eyes, right?

So all other senses will be heightened.

And when they are heightened again, it's

a mindfulness exercise, as I said.

So it will force you to be mindful

about what you are going to eat.

You will not be able to watch tv, you will not be

able to do anything else, but you just need to eat.

Eat when you are blindfolded, right.

Also it will help you overcome limits because we

are not used to do things blindfolded, right.

So when you do these things, when you eat a

fruit blindfolded, it will help you, give you, it will

give you a signal that you can do unusual things

which you might be fearing, which you might be thinking.

That is a limit to you. Alright?

So that also will give you a signal

and it will help you overcome your limit.

And because it's a mindfulness activity, it will reduce

your stress, it will refocus, it will help you

refocus on more important things and it will increase

your productivity and it will increase your happiness.

So that was the third activity.

Eat a fruit blindfolded. Alright.

So next activity is start a compliment jar.

What is a compliment jar?

You might have heard of gratitude jar that you did.

You keep a jar with yourself in your

study desk or in your living room.

And every day, or maybe more than once in

a day, you write something in a, in a

small piece of paper that what you are grateful

for and why you are grateful about it.

And you need to put that piece of paper in that jar.

And a later point in time, maybe one month, two months, when

the jar is full, you need to open the jar and you

need to pick the piece of paper one by one.

And when you are reading about it, it

will give you a great sense of gratefulness

and the happiness and also a great reflection

about the things that you are grateful for.

Most of the things we might have forgot, forgotten

by that time, but it will remind you.

It will again refocus your mind on

the blessings that you had that day.

All right, so let's say, for example, somebody

had given us a very good compliment.

If we are not making a note of it, we are most

likely going to forget about it maybe in a day or two.

But when you take a note of it, when you put,

put it in a jar, and when you reflect on it

after month or two, month or three month, maybe in your

conscious mind, you might have forgotten about it.

But when you open the jar and you pick that

note out, when you take that note out and when

you read about it, the whole story, the whole scene

gets revisited in your mind, and that's how you can

get, you get another shot of gratitude for that event,

for that day, for that blessing. Right?

So that's how gratitude jar works.

It is similar in the compliment jar as well.

So what you need to do here, just, you need to just take,

you need to make a jar in a day, or maybe at the

end of the day, you just need to take a piece of paper.

You need to write something positive about you.

You need to compliment yourself, all right?

You don't have to compliment anyone else,

or you don't have to wait for

anyone and anyone else to compliment you.

You need to compliment yourself about something

that you did that particular day.

So, for example, I'm recording this podcast right now.

So I'm accomplishing something which is very important.

Podcast frequencies once in a week.

So it has to go because there are

people who are listening to me, right?

And so it is very important.

So I'm doing something good, I'm doing something productive,

and I'm doing something that I like, right?

So I'm accomplishing something on this particular day.

So at the end of day, I can write to

myself that I have completed a beautiful podcast episode.

I did research about unconventional way of increasing happiness,

and I did, I created a beautiful podcast.

I put together all those things

and I created a beautiful podcast.

So well done.

Kudos to you, Akshay.

And I can put that slip and that

piece of paper in that compliment jar.

And when I'm going to, you know, three months down

the line, when I'm going to open that compliment jar,

it will boost my self esteem because I will have

so many compliments, I will have so many accomplishment on

my name for the last three months, right?

On a daily basis, we accomplish something,

something or the other thing, right?

Small thing or maybe big thing.

But we do something, we accomplish something.

But when we do not make a note of

it next day, we tend to forget it.

When we are going to start a compliment jar, it

is going to boost our self esteem that, hey, I

am an achiever since last three months, every day I

am achieving something or the other thing, right?

So I am an achiever.

I can achieve many more things because part three months

says that I have achieved at least 90 things, right?

So it will boost your self esteem.

It will give you the dose

of that positivity, all right?

And when you are writing that compliment to yourself,

that day itself will, it will look like it

was worth, you did something great and you will

also look forward to complete something so that you

can write that on a piece of paper, right?

And it will also cultivate gratitude because you will

have so many blessings and you will have so

many things that are helping you accomplish something.

So you will be having this gratitude

sense also by starting a compliment jar.

So it's a, it's a, it's an activity which will help

you in multiple ways when you are doing this activity at

that time also, and three months, six months down the line

also, when you are going to redo this jar, when you

are going to pick up the slips and a piece of

papers, then also it is going to help you out. Alright?

So it's a beautiful, beautiful activity is, I would

say it's a must try activity for everyone.

Alright, so this was the activity

that start a compliment jar.

So it was a fourth activity out of

seven that we are going to cover today.

Alright?

So before we move forward and figure out rest

of the activity for increasing the happiness, the weird

ways of increasing the happiness, I have a very

special request to all of you.

If you are listening to this podcast on iTunes

or Spotify, they have a very special feature where

you can rate this podcast up to five star

and you can give this a review as well.

So I have a request that please give, please rate this

podcast up to five star and provide me your review.

I want to hear from you, your feedback, what you are

learning from this, what else you want me to talk about.

And if you are listening this on YouTube, then

you can provide me the feedback on the comment

section that what you are thinking about this particular

episode, what you think about this podcast overall, what

else you want me to talk about?

And if you have any question you want to

ask, you can ask that question as well.

And again, if you are

listening this podcast on YouTube.

Please like this video, please

share this video with others.

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we can reach to more and more people.

So that more and more people can get benefited

from what I share on a weekly basis.

So, thank you so much.

This was the special request from my side, and

let's move forward to the content of the episode.

All right, fifth thing is, look at beautiful things.

All right.

What, what does it mean?

So we all have our idea of beauty.

Some people find that beauty in flowers.

Some people find that beauty in maybe water bodies.

So whatever you find beautiful, and

it also applies to artificial things.

Some people might find beauty in beautiful paintings.

Some people might find beauty in technology. Right?

So whatever you find beautiful, I

mean, I'm talking about things.

So whatever you find beautiful, you can take some

time, two or three minutes or five minutes maybe,

and you can look at those beautiful things. All right.

What will happen with that?

Because you are looking at beauty and if

it is natural, it is much better.

Because you are looking at beauty,

it will reduce the stress level.

Because beauty has been shown in studies to

have a calming effect on your nervous system.

When you're looking at something

beautiful, you tend to get.

Tend to reduce your stress, all right.

Because when you are stressed, when you are in

a dire situation, you forget about beauty, right?

So it works other way around that

you are looking at something beautiful.

It gives the mind a signal that everything is okay.

And that is why I'm

looking at something beautiful, right.

And that's how it reduces the stress.

Also it boosts the mood because visually

pleasing object inspire joy within, right.

And also because it is

beautiful, it stimulate creativity.

So it will stimulate your mind and give

you new ideas, beautiful ideas, so that you

can solve multiple of your problems as well.

You might not find it like completely related or maybe like

when you are looking at a flower and suddenly you will

not get any new idea, but slowly it helps your mind

to find and create new neural pathways that will help you

solve the problem in a more creative way.

And as I said, you might not see the

result immediately or you might not find that, okay,

this was the result of looking at something beautiful.

But studies have shown that if you are looking at

things that are beautiful, you are spending time with that.

It will help you be more creative, it

will help your help to boost your mood,

and it will reduce your stress as well.

And the next thing is a related

thing is makeup cloud stories, meaning.

So the previous one which I talked about that

look at beautiful things, clouds are also beautiful.

Very beautiful.

And the.

And the added advantage of looking at clouds

is they keep on changing the shapes, right?

It's a natural thing.

It's a natural. It's.

It has a calming and cooling effect on your mind.

Plus, because it shape shifts every second, you can

try to make up stories there can, you can

look and you can find shapes in the cloud.

And as and when they are shaped

and their shape is changing, right?

You can try to find new shapes and you can

connect the previous shape from the new shape, right?

And you can try to find.

Try to create stories that, again, unleash,

it will help you unleash creativity.

It will again reduce stress because

you are looking at natural Wonderland.

And it will also help you

connect with the nature as well.

If in the previous activity, you are

looking at something which is artificial.

So when you are looking at cloud one, because

they are beautiful, so it will give you all

the benefits of looking at a beautiful thing.

Also, because they are changing all the time, it

will help you be more creative with them and

it will also help you create the nature.

Also, when you are looking at open sky and when

you are looking at clouds, chances are that they are

a scattered cloud and you are also looking at the

open sky, it will help you get.

I mean, it gives you the idea

of endless opportunity, endless possibilities, right?

So it also help you get

the sense that opportunities are endless.

We just need to go and grab them.

So that's how it reduces your stress.

It unleash your creativity and

it increases your happiness.

All right?

So last but not the least

is spend money wisely, all right?

I hear you.

Many people would say that money can't buy happiness.

Of course it cannot.

It cannot buy happiness because happiness is not a

commodity which is being sold in the market, right?

So that is why you are not going to.

You are not able to buy happiness with the money.

But wise use of money can

help you get more happiness, right?

So if you are spending money on materialistic thing,

on objects, on items, they are shown in the

studies that they will not increase your happiness.

But if you are spending money on

experiences, not on items and objects and

positions, then you will create memories.

You are going to get experiences

that will increase your happiness quotients.

Also, I will talk more about how you can spend

money in the next episode to get more happiness.

So one of the way is by experiences with the money.

So if you are eating some food every day, we

eat food at least two times or three times, right?

Two days or three days or one week

later, we don't remember what we have eaten.

But if you go to a nice restaurant,

a good ambience, maybe a candlelight dinner or

a live music is being played there, right?

And there is excellent service, etcetera.

You tend to remember that for a long time, right?

Because it was not about the food, it was about

the experience that you have got in that restaurant.

So try to spend money on experiences rather

than on positions to increase your happiness.

I'm not saying that you should not spend money on

your position, if that those are the necessary item.

You need to spend money on those things,

but extra money when you want to spend

to get more happiness, items, objects and positions,

they will not give you happiness.

They might give you the illusion that they

will give you happiness, but they will not.

Because studies have shown this time and time again.

And forget about studies, you can

practice this on your own.

You have bought so many items in your life.

How many of those items give you happiness?

Most of them will not, right?

Maybe they are, they are, they are solving

some problem, they are giving you some extra

time, they are helping you out.

So that experience, that problem solving

experience is a plus for you.

But the item, the object itself will

not give you any happiness, right?

So experience, spend money on experience.

And second way of spending money

to get some happiness is supporting

the small businesses in your neighborhood.

So that will give you the sense that

you are boosting your local community, you are

belonging to the community, and also it tends

to create more connections with them, right?

So that these are two small ways

to spend money to increase your happiness.

I will talk two more surprisingly good ways

of spending money to increase your happiness. All right.

All right.

That I will talk in the next episode.

So this is, this was seven

ways to boost your happiness.

Seven weird and unconventional ways

to boost your happiness.

So with that, we have come to the

end of the topic of this episode.

But before I end the episode itself,

I want to make some announcement.

The first announcement is that I have written an ebook.

The name of the ebook is the happiness

blueprint, practical strategies for a fulfilled life.

It's a pocket size ebook full of practical strategies

that you can apply right now in your life

and you can experience the instant boost of happiness.

So, to download this ebook, the

link is given in the description.

Go ahead and download this ebook. Right.

Also, if you want to connect with me on a one

to one basis, if you want to discuss your roadblocks of

happiness, and you want to discuss how you can be more

happy and successful in life, then you can connect with me

on one to one basis and the link to connect with

me to schedule a call with me on a one to

one basis is given in the description.

You can follow the link and you can schedule a

call with me on a one to one basis.

If you want to follow me on social media, Instagram

is the place because I'm most active on the Instagram.

Otherwise, I'm also available on

LinkedIn and Facebook, etcetera.

Right on Instagram.

My handle is happiness architect and other places

you can find me with Holsteak Happiness Club

if you want to know more about me.

If you want to get more information about me and

my programs, then you can go to my website.

My website is akshaywari dot in.

Alright, so that was the end of the episode.

Thank you so much for tuning in.

Thank you so much for spending time with me till

the time we are connecting with each other again.

Take care of yourself, take care of your loved

one, and take care of the people around you.

And always remember, happiness is a lifestyle.