Training the Brain for Happiness

Training Your Brain to Get Happy by Teresa Aubele, PhD, San Wenck, EdD, and Susan Reynolds
Intro and Chapter 1: Happiness Is All In Your A Brain

• The happiest people are those who have learned how to train theirs brains to be happy
• Studying the brain has led to more research on what things like happiness really are
• General definition for happiness: pervasive (spread out) and long lasting sensation of well-being
• Money can only go so far when dealing with happiness. 
• Generally the only long lasting happiness that money can provide is when a person is moving up from below the poverty line to middle class; that's most likely because it's not easier for that person to fulfill their basic needs
• Neuroplasticity helps increase happiness because it allows us to change our brains to think more positively. Without neuroplasticity, training the brain to be happier would probably be impossible
• The brain can be reshaped by thoughts; for example, by just thinking more positive thoughts, your brain can rewire itself to be more positive
• If you imagine an emotion, you'll probably feel it as well; for example, you don't have to actually laugh to feel the joy associated with laughing, you just to imagine it. 

In the first chapter of this book, Teresa Aubele, PhD, Stan Wenck, EdD, and Susan Reynolds claim that happiness is something that can be created and exists in a person's brain. One example that supports the main idea is the invention of drugs that increased people's happiness by changing the amount of certain hormones in the brain proving that happiness can be partially created by hormones. Another example is the discussion on neuroplasticity in which the brain remolds according to the circuitry that is most often used, proving that a person can rewire his or her brain to be more positive. Finally, the authors give the example of Dr. Hebb's research which stated that "Neurons that fire together, wire together." What this research says about happiness in the brain is that the brain can be wired to be positive or negative based on which associations made between neurons are used a lot, and by thinking positively a lot the brain can rewire itself to have more positive associations. This is connected to the Buddhist idea of train your brain to be enlightened. If you can train your brain to be happy, then I think they're right- you can train your brain to be enlightened as well.