This post is part of the Sparking Zing series: I came across a list online of “things to do to feel happy”. My life has become an exploration of what it means to be happy so this list formed the perfect basis for a very-very-scientific experiment. I’m trying each of the suggestions on the list to assess how each of them impacts my happiness levels. (Hereon referred to as Sparking Zing). If you’d like a visual accompaniment, you can also follow along with my journey as I document it on my Instagram stories here.
Sparking Zing Experiment One: Workout for the endorphins
The first task randomly selected from the list was to workout for the endorphins. This was the perfect way to ease me into the experiment as I already know that working out and the associated endorphins spark a lot of zing. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that this is my number one preferred method for feeling generally happier.
You can read more about how exercise has impacted my mental health in this post: 6 Things I did to Improve my Mental Health
In the name of very-very-science though, I decided to workout for the endorphins whilst taking conscious note of my happiness levels before/during/after.
Before:
I was having a slightly off morning and I was feeling a bit irritated by a conversation that I’d had and was letting that irritation creep into my overall mood. I didn’t really feel like going for a run but I did feel accountable after publicly announcing I was doing this experiment.
During:
At the 1km mark I toyed with turning home because I was in a cba mindset, but decided to push through. Before I knew it I’d run about 4km away from home which meant I was forced to cover that same distance back again. I stopped thinking about quitting as the kilometres clicked on and I actually started to enjoy myself.
After:
Just over 8km later I was home, brimming with endorphins, and my mood had done a complete 180. I felt significantly less irritated – joyful even. Exercise is such a mood booster.
Very-very-scientific findings: Successful first trial. Working out for the endorphins gets a big, old tick for sparking zing.