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" Notice something pleasant that’s already present in your experience. Perhaps a relaxed sense of breathing, comfort, or curiosity. • Find something good in your immediate situation. Perhaps something sturdy, well made, protective, useful, or beautiful, such as a cozy chair, a tree out the window, or a picture on the wall. • Think of something you are glad about, in your life these days or in your past. It could be as simple as having a roof over your head. • Bring to mind someone who makes you feel cared about. It need not be a perfect relationship, but the caring—the warmth for you, the wishing you well—is genuine. • Bring to mind someone you like. • Think of some things that help you feel strong … peaceful … grateful … happy … loved … loving. "
― Rick Hanson , Hardwiring Happiness: The New Brain Science of Contentment, Calm, and Confidence
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" As you read this, in the five cups of tofu-like tissue inside your head, nested amid a trillion support cells, 80 to 100 billion neurons are signaling one another in a network with about half a quadrillion connections, called synapses. All this incredibly fast, complex, and dynamic neural activity is continually changing your brain. Active synapses become more sensitive, new synapses start growing within minutes, busy regions get more blood since they need more oxygen and glucose to do their work, and genes inside neurons turn on or off. Meanwhile, less active connections wither away in a process sometimes called neural Darwinism: the survival of the busiest. "
― Rick Hanson , Hardwiring Happiness: The New Brain Science of Contentment, Calm, and Confidence
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" You can also take in the good at specific times. For example, on first waking, you could call to mind an experience that’s important to you, such as good wishes toward others. Meals are a traditional opportunity to feel thankful. Just before bed, your mind is very receptive, so no matter what went wrong that day, find something that went right, open to it, and let good feelings come and ease you into sleep. "
― Rick Hanson , Hardwiring Happiness: The New Brain Science of Contentment, Calm, and Confidence
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" There are people who wish you well, who like you, who see the good in you. Almost certainly, you are loved. Your kind heart and good intentions are real, they exist. You’ve created much good in the past and you continue to do so in the present. Like me, you’re not a perfect person—no one is—but you are a good one. Good facts abide and abound no matter how obscured. In this moment—and in most others—you are all right right now. Each moment of experience is saturated with an almost overwhelming fullness. You are continuously connected with all things. If you have a sense of something transcendental such as God, Spirit, or whatever is meaningful to you, then this, too, is a marvelous goodness. "
― Rick Hanson , Hardwiring Happiness: The New Brain Science of Contentment, Calm, and Confidence
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" In your body, the gradually accumulating burden of reactive experiences is called allostatic load, which increases inflammation, weakens your immune system, and wears on your cardiovascular system. In your brain, allostatic load causes neurons to atrophy in the prefrontal cortex, the center of top-down executive control; in the hippocampus, the center of learning and memory; and in other regions. It impairs myelination, the insulating of neural fibers to speed along their signals, which can weaken the connectivity between different regions of your brain, so they don’t work together as well as they should. "
― Rick Hanson , Hardwiring Happiness: The New Brain Science of Contentment, Calm, and Confidence
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" When you feel safe, your avoiding harms system enters its responsive mode, which brings feelings of relaxation, calm, and peace. When you feel satisfied, your approaching rewards system shifts into its responsive setting, with feelings such as gratitude, gladness, accomplishment, and contentment. And when you feel connected, your attaching to others system goes responsive, evoking feelings of belonging, intimacy, compassion, kindness, worth, and love. "
― Rick Hanson , Hardwiring Happiness: The New Brain Science of Contentment, Calm, and Confidence