Happiness

Stay positive. Look on the bright side. Project happy thoughts. It’ll all work out. We’ve all heard these optimistic phrases. They sometimes come at exactly the wrong time. When we feel flat, depressed or just irritable, have you ever felt annoyed when someone comes along trying to snap you back into a positive mindset?

Perhaps you should tell them that suppressing emotions can make those very same emotions bounce back even stronger and may possibly generate feelings of frustration. It’s called the ironic rebound effect.

But you may have also heard of research that shows that forcing a smile can make you feel happier? In these studies, participants are made to smile without them knowing. That is, they complete an activity that stimulates the muscles used for smiling but the participant is completely unaware that this is happening.

It’s assumed that the brain mindlessly responds to the muscle movement and the emotions correspond in harmony.

So, perhaps we can control happiness by simply forcing a smile?

No doubt you’ll try this to see what happens. But get ready to frown (no, don’t force it!). In  a recent experiment, participants were asked to force a smile and told that doing so would make them feel happier. Instead they felt deflated.

Knowingly forcing the smile, therefore, contradicted their aim to feel happy, consistently (not ironically) supporting the ironic rebound effect.

When at work, humans often feel the need to suppress inappropriate emotions, such as sadness, anxiety, and anger (and occasional murderous fury). What if suppressing these emotions is actually making people feel depressed, panicky and enraged? But look on the bright side, just project happy thoughts and maybe it’ll all work out.