Happiness
is physiologic.
Mammal
DNA codes for positive and negative emotions that correlate with
survival probabilities.
In
general, negative emotions due to poor survival circumstances
motivate us to take actions to acquire something better, and positive
emotions due to rich circumstances allow for either lazy
actions (to keep things the same) or extra-curricular actions like
playing.
Either way, happiness is pretty much guaranteed since there
is a low level of happiness that creeps in during the actions taken
(triggered by negative emotions) to improve one's life (felt as
hopeful anticipation).
Lack
of food, shelter, sleep, and friendship all
lead to negative emotions and tend to motivate us to attempt to acquire them.
In
modern USA, 99% have plenty of calories, shelter, sleep, and
friendship. Yet depression, anxiety, or just general unhappiness is
rampant. Now there's droves of people trying to "find"
happiness. So what's gone wrong? Have the old DNA rules on how to be
happy been broken?
The
DNA programming is not broken, we just missed an ingredient. Who can
guess which required ingredient is almost necessarily missing from a
modern lifestyle?
One
major ingredient needed to turn on human happy genes: copious amounts
of midday unfiltered sunlight shining directly on bare skin.
Here
is a good presentation to get started learning more about why we
can't be healthy and happy without lots of direct skin sun exposure.
I
have a full body artificial sun lamp in my clinic. So far I am 2 for
2 using this on people with severe anxiety/depression who were
unresponsive to medication. I thought the light therapy would help by
maybe 30%, but instead was surprised to find 99% resolution after 4-8
weeks of every other day full body bare skin light therapy sessions. Only 2-4 sessions monthly seem to be needed to
maintain improvements in these two cases.
It's
been recently shown that endorphins, molecules of happiness, are
created in the skin from direct sun exposure. And,
serotonin/melatonin cycles are created and maintained by sunlight
exposure. See this research discussion link, look about 4/5 of the way down:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2290997/
In
short:
Modern
human unhappiness is an artifact of an ubiquitous sub-clinical
illness caused by lack of direct sunlight.
Simply
procure food, shelter, sleep, friends, and lots of sunlight and you
will have happiness whether you want it or not.
Correction:
Provide lots of sunlight and have happiness whether you already have
basic needs met, or are expecting to acquire them in the future through work.
Call to Action:
Are you at all unhappy in your life? Read my blog article...
about how to sunbathe so you can fix yourself, or come into the clinic and use our light therapy bed. Then spread the word to your friends and family so that they too can be happier.
Extra curricular:
Isn't too much
happiness a bad thing because we wouldn't lift a finger to feed
ourselves if we were in constant bliss?
There
is no such thing as too much happiness, because it just leads to
play. Play fosters creativity and generally leads to invention of new
stuff to make our lives even more fun. Play is so fun that we invent
machines to grow food for us so that we have more time to play. These
actions are motivated and achieved by lots of happiness and the drive
to have even more happiness. It's wrong to assume that a person who
works to get more happiness is always motivated by unhappiness.
Just imagine what our world would be like today had we known about the essential qualities of direct sunlight exposure 100 years ago and took action! We could have eradicated war, poverty, disease, old age, and even having to work for a living by now. Instead we would all be playing for a living!
I don't buy the old idea that we are here to suffer and develop character through hardship. I say we are here to develop character by creating better ways for people to enjoy life through camaraderee with others. But just like in an airplane, "in case of loss of cabin pressure, put your oxygen mask on first before helping your loved ones with theirs." Take responsibility for your own happiness and get optimal levels of light. Then spread the word.
We will soon have a new light therapy bed, this one is all red light. Most people feel slightly stoned after 20 minutes under these red lights, they make you feel that good. When I use the red light bed, I literally feel like I'm eating a depleted nutrient through my skin!
We are in the process of lowering our prices so you all can use the light therapy more. We should have the discounted price schedule out soon.
