So for the last few weeks, I've been doing a few courses (all in the name of research of course). Two are on Happiness - (A Life of Happiness and Fulfilment and The Science of Happiness), and the other is on Resilience. (Through Coursera and Edx). All are excellent courses and highly recommended.

In all the courses they talk about how humans are naturally wired to seek the 'bad' or negative in circumstances - it's a life saving strategy (noise in the bush - better think it's a lion rather than a bird, rather being the other way around). However, clearly it doesn't always serve us well in the modern world

Have you ever suffered from butterflies in your stomach? A feeling of dread? Sweaty palms? Feeling that you are struggling to get a breath? Feeling nauseous? Or a general feeling of being on edge, startling easily?

Most of us have experienced this feeling at some point in our life. Usually brought about by being asked to speak publically, awaiting a job interview or waiting for life changing good or bad news. It's normal, it serves a function and we wouldn't be human without it.

But what do we do when it's seems to stay? When the feeling appears to come on for no reason and then doesn't leave us?

Want to be a little happier? Start Giving.

I've taken a couple of courses recently - one of them was on the concept of happiness. The course looked at extensive research about what helps us to become happier people. Among other behaviours (which I look forward to writing about in other blogs!) giving has shown through various studies to be an action that promotes happiness and well-being - and it is the giving which makes the individual happy - rather than the other way around. We as humans appear to be hardwired to loving and giving - it is seen to be a natural trait we have. And while we all know that giving actually feels good - i.e. makes us feel happy - did you know it leads to other positive consequences as well? 

There is more and more evidence arising about how our gut bacteria not only is hugely influenced by what we eat, but more importantly - that our gut bacteria may be having huge influences on how we feel. Yes, that's right, whether we are happy, sad, anxious, depressed or otherwise 'not quite right'.

....A couple of clients I have seen in the last week, commented on their issues with eating. They (I didn't think) were particularly bad, but clearly they weren't happy with it. It mostly related to 'binging' occasionally on junk food.

Eating mindfully is part of the Mindfulness trend – and it's benefits are significant.

Mindful eating has helped people lose weight, make better food choices, enjoy their food more, eat less in general and also creates an awareness of what emotions might drive food eating behaviours

The nightmare of insomnia. Most of us have been there at some stage in our life.

The amount of sleep that an individual needs varies, and often changes with age, but research suggests that sleeping too little (less than five – six hours) or too much (more than 8-10 hours)  is hazardous to your health and increases your chances of stroke and developing metabolic syndrome among other things.