Simply happy

Humans appeared on earth without an owner's manual; no set guidelines as to how love may be attained, success breached, or ultimately happiness guaranteed. However, part of the human owner's manual may soon be written due to tremendous leaps which have been made in an attempt to understand the brain in correlation to both happiness and depression.
So, what have scientists learned about what rings our inner chimes? More than may be imaginable, according to scientists. "While there are many different things that contribute to happiness, the biological component is certainly an important part," pharmacist Joe Agan said. "Essentially, happiness is an emotion and like many it is controlled by petrochemicals in the brain."
Happiness occurs when chemicals such as dopamine, serotonin, and norepinephrine, are secreted in the brain. These neurotransmitters induce a feeling of contentment in the mesolimbic pathway by stimulating pleasure sensors.
These chemicals are also the building blocks for depression, a disorder that affects approximately 16 percent of the world at some point in time. "An example of situational depression would be somebody's dog getting run over, Agan said. "In this you are sad for a short period of time but soon you are able to overcome it. Clinical depression, however, is a chemical imbalance resulting from long term stress or prolonged situational depression in which serotonin or norepinephrine become deficient and you end up overworking the systems that keep your chemical balances."
"Certainly all happiness is not biological. A period of stress or unhappiness may deplete some chemicals that would make you happy," Agan said. "So, psychological components play a role in happiness too."
Although there are still very few definitive answers as to what psychology allows the human heart to belt out tunes of joy, some conclusions have been drawn.

Money, for instance, and all of the dazzling indulgences one can buy with it, helps us avoid certain types of economic strains, data from the National Opinion Research Center showed.
"Although buying power has more than doubled since the '50s, the average American's reported happiness has remained almost unchanged," the National Opinion Research Center said. Therefore, it has been concluded that money has no significant effect on happiness.
If wealth is not the key, it must be a good education, right? The truth is you should apologize to your parents for making them pay that hefty college tuition fee because the answer is no as well. In fact, studies show that not even a substantially high IQ can guarantee happiness throughout the winding path of life.
If education is not even the answer then it must be our youth; the lazy weekends, daily allowance of as much sugar as we can get out hands on, and the unique ability to drive a car while texting our friends and blasting the radio.
Yet, the answer is still no. In fact studies show that people of an older age are more constantly pleased with their lives than young people. A recent survey by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention concludes, "People ages 20 to 24 are sad for an average of 3.4 days per month, as opposed to just 2.3 days for people ages 65 to 74."
So if these factors are not determining ones, the question remains: what makes us happy? One answer is religion or faith, according to scientific research. Studies have shown that any form of religious faith may boost the spirit, therefore resulting in happiness.
Another influential factor of happiness is friendship. A study conducted by professors Edward Diener and Martin Seligman at the University of Illinois in 2002 showed that approximately ten percent of students who exhibited the highest levels of happiness and least signs of depression stated that strong ties to friends and family were the most prominent contributing factors to their happiness. "It is important to work on social skills, close interpersonal ties, and social support in order to be happy," Diener said.
Yet for those without a natural bubbly personality the question of how to put that extra spring in your step or grin across your face still lingers.
First and foremost, act happy. It is the old saying of mind over matter and it has been shown that we are sometimes able to act ourselves into a certain frame of mind. Talk positively and think optimistic thoughts. Studies show that people ultimately respond much better to this.
Next, focus on something beyond yourself by reaching out to others in need. It has been shown that those who volunteer are more grateful for what they have and ultimately end up in a happier state of mind.
Finally, Michael Wiederman, author of Why It's So Hard to Be Happy, suggests, "Practice living in the moment. Start small...then over time, spend less energy thinking about the past or the future."
Although the growing bodies of scientific research in the field have not yielded any definite or easy answers yet, they seem to have proved what we have known all along: essentially, as Wiederman phrases it, "Happiness ins not an ultimate destination but instead lies in appreaciation of the journey."