June Silny at Happify outlines 14 answers to the question, “ What’s so great about happiness, anyway?” O’Donnell A., et al., Life satisfaction and happiness in patients shielding from the COVID-19 global pandemic: A randomised controlled study of the ’mood as information’ theory. PLoS One, 2020. 15(12): p. e0243278. pmid:33306679 If you aim to create a bullet journal to improve your mental health and well-being, here are a few more ideas:

I wish I were more consistent with affirmations; they do wonders for me. If you get affected by other people’s words, you must try affirmations because you will be equally affected by them. But this time, that would be a good thing. Seligman, M. E. (2002). Authentic happiness: Using the new positive psychology to realize your potential for lasting fulfillment. Simon and Schuster. De Neve J.-E. and Krekel C., Cities and happiness: a global ranking and analysis. World Happiness Report 2020, 2020: p. 14.Eren K.A. and Aşıcı A.A., The determinants of happiness in Turkey: Evidence from city-level data. Journal of Happiness Studies, 2017. 18(3): p. 647–669. By the time you finish with all that, you already feel exhausted. You sit behind the kitchen table, and you either: However, in your journal, try and start each entry with a list of three things that you’re grateful for each day, whether that’s the birds singing, the music on your Spotify playlist, a friend or even dinner on your table. Realistically, just going to sleep early enough is a brilliant act of self-care many of us skip, but we could also do better. Diener E., The remarkable changes in the science of subjective well-being. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 2013. 8(6): p. 663–666. pmid:26173230

Moeinaddini M., et al., Proposing a new score to measure personal happiness by identifying the contributing factors. Measurement, 2020. 151. All of these factors can contribute to a happy life, but research has found that good relationships are a vital ingredient (Waldinger & Schulz, 2010). Hirschauer N., Lehberger M., and Musshoff O., Happiness and Utility in Economic Thought—Or: What Can We Learn from Happiness Research for Public Policy Analysis and Public Policy Making? Social Indicators Research, 2014. 121(3): p. 647–674. Rodríguez J.D., Molina M.G., and Becerra L.A.C., Felicidad en la política pública: una revisión de literatura. Cuadernos de Economía, 2018. 37(73): p. 95–119. The safety of one’s surroundings, of one’s city, town or neighbourhood (Sf), is another clearly significant variable, but not for the male gender. The situation is reversed when it comes to trust in people, in terms of personal relationships (Tr): in this case, the effect is significant, but if we break it down by gender, it is men for whom the effect is significant, as shown by the t-value. The issues of trust and safety are thus relevant and are one reason why, if we extract the information by the size of the place of residence, the results point to small cities or large towns as being advantageous for attaining a higher quality of life and greater life satisfaction.Happiness as an aggregation of multiple emotional reactions across time (Kim-Prieto, Diener, Tamir, Scollon, & Diener, 2005). Diener E. and Seligman M.E.P., Beyond money: Toward an economy of well-being. Psychological science in the public interest, 2004. 5(1): p. 1–31. pmid:26158992 To further explore and spread the benefits of journaling, try this Benefits of Journaling and How to Get Started guide. It provides a handy run-through of how journaling can improve our happiness and overall wellbeing. A recent study explored the association between happiness and mental health in college students and found that a relatively strong, positive correlation connects the two factors (Shafiq, Nas, Ansar, Nasrulla, Bushra, & Imam, 2015). This correlation held, even when gender and socio-demographic variables were added to the mix.

definitions of happiness: A time-sequential framework of subjective well-being. Journal of Happiness Studies, 6, 261-300.

Since the 1960s, the analysis of people’s quality of life has attracted the attention of researchers from many disciplines. Specifically, in the last decade there has been growing academic interest in quality of life, which in turn has included a series of studies that investigate well-being and happiness [ 22], with the latter becoming an important indicator of a country’s development. Finally, in terms of items regarding the individuals’ surroundings, we see a uniformly significant effect of the culture and sports variable (CS) in all equations. Eudaimonic happiness/well-being conceptualizes happiness as the result of the pursuit and attainment of life purpose, meaning, challenge, and personal growth; happiness is based on reaching one’s full potential and operating at full functioning (AIPC, 2011). Happiness can be either feeling or showing, meaning that happiness is not necessarily an internal or external experience, but can be both.