In honor of my daughter’s first day of kindergarten, I asked her at bedtime tonight:

“What are 5 things people should do to live a happy live?”

So here’s her 5 ideas, with a little added commentary from me with each.

1. “Play nice together”

This 20 year long study published in 2015 found that kids who play nice together have better outcomes in life. And you know what? We’re all kids at heart, so it’s never too late to start playing nicely.

2. “Work so you can have a house”

Humans are made to work. The trick is finding work you find meaningful. When you do, it doesn’t always feel like work. Sure, there’ll inevitably be specific tasks you don’t love, but there are few things more joyful than being proactively engaged in something you believe in.

3. “Go to sleep & take naps”

A Scandinavian study of over 1,600 people found that longer average hours of sleep are directly correlated with higher levels of happiness and life satisfaction.

This probably isn’t news to you, but I challenge you to go to sleep an hour earlier than normal for a week and see how you feel!

4. “Responsibility”

On this one, I followed up with, “Good one sweetie - but what do you mean by responsbility?” to which she responded, “I dunno, what *is* responsibility?”

I think responsibility is doing what you say you’ll do.

Taking care of things you’ve been blessed with.

And quickly owning up when you’ve made a mistake.

And I can pretty confidently say that if you forget everything else in this post and do just those 3 things, your life will be twice as good as it is now.

5. “Smile, wave, and talk to people”

Here’s a beautiful story of a friendship that started with a simple smile and wave, but turned into something much more.

6. “Close your eyes and think about Jesus”

A 2022 study found that people who pray tend to have a more positive outlook on life! Whether you’re a Christian, Muslim or Jew, seek God daily.

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It’s easy to toss aside ideas and advice like this for being overly simplified or surface level.

Yes, life can be complicated. Challenging. Unrelenting, even.

But what if living a happy life only feels complicated because we treat it so?

What if we decided to play along as if the playbook were in fact this easy… and tried it on for a week, or even a month?

Do you really think you wouldn’t feel quite a bit better?

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What ideas popped in your head while watching? Hit reply and let me know!

- Kody

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P.S. These take 5 hours to research, write, and design. It only takes you 5 seconds to share.