Jack was a bright and curious child, always eager to learn new things and explore the mysterious world about science. However, he often found himself in disagreement with his mother. His mother was always busy with her work and she didn’t have enough time to learn about his interests and passions.

One day, Jack came home from school feeling particularly excited. He just found a sci-fi book about an adventure on the moon. Upon arriving at home, he couldn’t tear himself away from the book. He read and read until it was dark. Having finished reading it, he couldn’t wait to share it with his mother, only to be told that he should focus on more practical subjects like math and history, which would help him get into a good college and have a successful career.

Jack couldn’t understand why his mother didn’t see the value in what he was doing. He felt that she was holding him back and not allowing him to pursue his true interests. “Why can’t you see how important this is to me?” Jack asked his mother angrily. “I’m never going to be happy if I have to spend my life doing things that I show no interest in just because they are practical or make you proud.”

The once peaceful home was filled with tension and anger. His mother’s voice grew louder as she shouted, “You can’t just do whatever you want! You should be responsible for your future!” Jack, fueled by his own frustration, shot back, “I am tired of you always telling me what to do! I am not a child anymore! You only care about your own feeling! You never thought about my feeling!” They were so caught up in their own anger and hurt that they failed to see how their words and actions were affecting each other.

Jack rushed into his bedroom and locked the door heavily.

When Jack heard his mother’s words, regretful tears rolled down his face.

2 . We’ve all heard the expression, “Money doesn’t buy happiness.” Since happiness is a side effect of laughter, shift your focus from the secret of happiness to experiences that bring you laughter. Instead of asking yourself “How can I be happy?”, ask “What makes me laugh?” This approach creates space for more actionable practices.     1    

•Look at the situation through a child’s eyes.

When times get stressful, take a moment to think about how you saw things as a kid. The more we can experience that childlike wonder and enthusiasm, the less we sweat even the big stuff.

•Add laughter to your mornings.

    2     Therefore, laughter should be right up there with brushing your teeth on your priority list. If you’re short on time, kill two birds and brush your teeth to a funny YouTube clip (短视频)!

•Learn to laugh at yourself.

Relieving yourself of pressure is the joy of learning to laugh at yourself. It also allows you to show more of your true self.     3     And set an intention to find humor in hardship. Merely laughing will fight off depression and fill you with light.

•     4    

There is no better way to practice laughing at yourself than going outside your comfort zone. From learning German to taking up rollerblading and Zumba, plenty of new activities will fuel your laughter. With so many ways to laugh more, why wait for your bit of happiness?     5     A bit of laughter can be the best medicine!

4 . It's no surprise that stress and anxiety are often viewed in a negative light, but Lisa Damour, a private-practice psychologist, suggests they're not always bad for us. She claims that a little bit of both can help build mental resilience and these experiences can sometimes benefit us.

Damour explained how stress often occurs when people operate at the edge of their abilities - when they push themselves or are forced by situations to stretch beyond their familiar limits. This can result from both bad and good events, she said. For instance, being fired is stressful, but so is bringing a baby home for the first time. She described how stress is unavoidable in daily life and that medium levels of stress “can have an inoculating function”, which can lead to “higher than average resilience” when we face new difficulties.

“Anxiety gets an unnecessarily bad comment,” she said, “Anxiety is an alarm system inside the body, likely handed down by evolution, which informs us of threats from both outside, such as a driver turning aside suddenly, and inside, such as when we've wasted too much time and it's time to get started on a task.”

Viewing anxiety as sometimes helpful or even protective allows people to make good use of it, suggests Damour. For example, she often tells the teenagers she works with in her practice to pay attention if they start to feel anxious at a party because their nerves may be warning them of a problem.