Finding the right mindset is crucial to having a positive outlook on life. With so many negative things happening in the world, it’s easy to get lost in a cycles of sadness.
The good news is there’s a way to train your brain to find happiness in more places than you did before. Some exercises and habits can guide our thinking toward a more peaceful and positive worldview. Neuroscience has come to the rescue, developing a simple habit that cultivates happy thinking.
Neuroscience hack to find happiness and positivity everywhere
In a 2025 article for Inc., Marcel Schwantes, an executive coach, speaker, and author, wrote about a brain hack to boost happiness. Schwantes writes, “When your brain is trained to focus on problems or threats, it reinforces stress. But when it’s trained to recognize moments of meaning, progress, and connection, it creates a more resilient and optimistic mindset.”
He offers up a simple exercise to incorporate into your daily routine for 21 consecutive days. It’s an effortless practice that shouldn’t take too much time.
The exercise is to write about one positive experience that occurred in the past 24 hours:
- Write down all the details you can remember about the experience
- List whoever was involved
- Write what happened
- Why it matters to you
An exercise that builds positive results
The idea behind the exercise is to allow yourself to relive the experience while teaching your brain the importance of positivity. You will enhance the neural pathways that facilitate recognizing and appreciating similar experiences. It will shift how you connect with other people. And, improve how you handle challenges in the future.
A 2023 study in the National Library of Medicine found that writing about something as simple as “Three Good Things” produced consistent increases in positive affect and life satisfaction. Chloë Bean, a licensed marriage and family therapist in Los Angeles, California, told GOOD, “I encourage my therapy clients to use visualization, daily journaling, and mindfulness to change their thought patterns.” She continued, “I think writing routines for 21 days definitely influences how one leads their life! This also combines mind and body coordination (if writing by hand, which can bring change to the neural network pathways).”
Biology sometimes leads us away from our happiness
Exercises like the 21 days suggested by Schwantes can reprogram our minds from the biological thinking patterns that helped the human species survive. Known as the “negativity bias,” this thought pattern helped us instinctively navigate the rigors of a hunting and gathering lifestyle.
A 2024 study in Springer Nature Link found that a bias toward negative cues was related to increased anxiety levels. A 2022 study in the National Library of Medicine discovered that negative or perceived dangerous stimuli hold our attention longer. These feelings led to higher levels of depression and post-traumatic stress disorder.
A great attitude can help you find happiness.
A healthy mindset enables us to handle stress effectively, navigate challenging situations, and make informed decisions. Positive thinking, self-compassion, and gratitude are habits that train our brains to see opportunities more clearly, rather than just focusing on threats and problems. Learning different activities to introduce into our daily routines can help us grow stronger, more capable, and closer to happiness.
Watch this professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School talk about the keys to happiness in this YouTube video below:
