The Science of Feeling Better
Small, Research-Informed Strategies for Well-Being
Before You Read This, Try Something

Think about the last seven days. Can you remember one moment when you laughed? One person who made you feel better? One moment when you stopped rushing? Or one small thing that made you think, “This is good”?

Now here’s the interesting question: Were those moments easier—or harder—to remember than the things that went wrong?

Our minds are remarkably good at holding onto the unfinished task, the difficult conversation, the worry at 2 a.m., and the thing we wish we had done differently. So here is my September challenge: For one month, don’t try to become happier. Instead, become curious.

What happens when you deliberately create and notice more of the experiences that research associates with well-being? One conversation. One moment of gratitude. One act of kindness. One experience of awe.
One compassionate response to yourself. Think of September as a personal experiment: What happens when we stop waiting to feel better—and begin practicing some of the behaviors associated with feeling better?

Well-Being Is More Than Feeling Happy

September has a particular rhythm. Summer begins to loosen its grip, schedules fill again, children return to school, and work accelerates. For many of us, September feels less like the beginning of fall and more like the beginning of another year. It is a good time to ask ourselves: How am I doing—not just functioning, but actually doing?

Psychology has traditionally been very good at studying what goes wrong: depression, anxiety, trauma, stress, conflict, and burnout. But positive psychology asks an additional question: What helps human beings live well? Martin Seligman’s work on flourishing emphasizes several contributors to well-being, including positive emotion, engagement, relationships, meaning, and accomplishment.

Importantly, well-being does not mean being happy all the time. It means developing a life that can contain difficulty andconnection, meaning, engagement, hope, and positive experiences. Research suggests there are practical ways we can cultivate more of these experiences.

1. CONNECT — Relationships Are Not an Extra

One of the most consistent findings in well-being research is the importance of relationships. Longitudinal research, including the Harvard Study of Adult Development, has repeatedly pointed to the importance of good relationships for health and well-being. Yet when life becomes busy, relationships are often the first thing we postpone. We tell ourselves, “I’ll call when things calm down,” or “We’ll get together when I’m less busy.” But perhaps connection shouldn’t be what happens after the important things. Perhaps connection is one of the important things.

This September, try the One-Person Rule. Once each week, deliberately contact one person you value. Call them, have coffee, take a walk, or eat together. And when possible, put the phone away. Connection is not time away from well-being. Connection is part of well-being.

For therapists, this can also mean looking beyond symptoms and coping and asking, “Who in your life helps you feel safe, understood, or more like yourself?” Rather than simply suggesting that a client “be more social,” consider identifying one person and one realistic action the client can take before the next session. The intervention should always fit the individual.

2. NOTICE — Gratitude Without Pretending Everything Is Wonderful

Gratitude is probably one of positive psychology’s best-known practices, but it can also be misunderstood. Research has found that expressed-gratitude interventions can produce a modest benefit for psychological well-being. The word modestmatters. Gratitude isn’t magic, and it certainly isn’t a substitute for psychotherapy, appropriate medical treatment, changing a harmful situation, or addressing genuine problems.

Instead, gratitude gives us permission to recognize that difficulty and goodness can occupy the same day. Tonight, try something simpler than keeping an elaborate gratitude journal. Identify three good moments. Not three extraordinary things—just three moments. A good cup of coffee counts. Sunlight through the window counts. Someone making you laugh counts. The goal isn’t to persuade yourself that everything is wonderful. It is to become better at noticing what is already good.

For therapists, timing matters here. With an appropriate client, consider asking near the end of a session, “Was there one moment this week that was better than you expected?” Someone who is frightened, overwhelmed, grieving, or highly dysregulated may need attunement and safety rather than a gratitude exercise. A potentially helpful intervention delivered at the wrong time can feel invalidating.

3. BE KINDER TO YOURSELF — Self-Compassion Is Not Letting Yourself Off the Hook

Think about what you say to yourself when you make a mistake. “How could I have been so stupid?” “I should be handling this better.” “What’s wrong with me?” Many of us speak to ourselves in ways we would never speak to another human being.

Self-compassion doesn’t mean abandoning standards or responsibility. It means learning to respond to difficulty without adding unnecessary self-attack. Try the Friend Test. The next time you notice harsh self-talk, ask yourself: Would I say this to someone I love? If the answer is no, don’t replace the thought with artificial positivity. Instead, make it more accurate and humane. Rather than saying, “I completely failed,” try, “That didn’t go the way I wanted. What can I learn from it?” That isn’t making excuses. That’s compassion with accountability.

For therapists, when you hear strong self-criticism, consider asking, “If someone you cared about were in exactly this situation, what would you say to them?” Then follow it with, “What makes it difficult to offer that same response to yourself?” That second question can sometimes take the therapeutic conversation somewhere important.

4. LOOK UP — The Surprising Psychology of Awe

Awe has become a fascinating area of well-being research. We experience awe when we encounter something that feels larger than ourselves—nature, music, art, beauty, courage, generosity, or even an extraordinary idea. Research suggests that experiences of awe can influence well-being and shift our attention away from excessive self-focus. And fortunately, you don’t need to stand at the Grand Canyon to experience it.

Try taking a ten-minute Awe Walk. Don’t count your steps. Don’t check your phone. Don’t listen to anything. Instead, look outward. Notice the sky, the trees, the architecture, the light, other people, sounds, something beautiful, or something unexpected. The point isn’t to escape your problems. It’s to remember that your problems are not the entirety of your world.

For therapists, a simple question can open this conversation: “When was the last time something made you stop and really notice?” The therapeutic value may not simply be in the experience of awe itself, but in helping someone rediscover the capacity to engage with a world beyond their symptoms.

5. GIVE — Happiness May Be More Social Than We Think

Research on prosocial behavior suggests that doing things for other people can also contribute to our own well-being. This gives us an interesting alternative to asking, “What can I do to make myself happier?” Instead, ask: “What could I do today that makes somebody else’s day slightly better?”

It doesn’t have to be extraordinary. Send the encouraging message. Thank someone specifically. Let somebody into traffic. Make the coffee. Check on someone who may be lonely. Tell someone what you appreciate about them. You don’t have to change the world today. Change someone’s next five minutes.

For therapists, a small prosocial experiment may also be useful when clinically appropriate. Ask a client to do one small thing that makes another person’s day easier and then notice what happens internally. Did they experience pleasure, connection, meaning, discomfort, or even awkwardness receiving appreciation? The goal is not to assume the outcome will be positive, but to explore what the experience reveals.

For Therapists: One Important Caution — Timing Matters

There is an important consideration when bringing well-being science into psychotherapy: A good intervention delivered at the wrong time may still be the wrong intervention. A frightened client may need safety before gratitude. A highly dysregulated client may need regulation before meaning-making. Someone experiencing profound grief may need attunement before being asked to identify positive experiences.

Another client may have regained sufficient stability to begin exploring connection, agency, purpose, engagement, and flourishing. This is why, before choosing a well-being strategy, it can be useful to ask three questions: What state is the client in right now? What does the client appear ready to engage with? Which intervention best fits that readiness?

Well-being strategies then become more than a collection of positive psychology exercises. They become interventions chosen with attention to readiness, fit, and timing.

Your 7-Day September Well-Being Experiment

Don’t try to “be happier” this week. Run an experiment. On Monday, connect with one person you care about. On Tuesday, notice and write down three good moments. On Wednesday, pause and spend ten minutes outside without your phone. On Thursday, give by performing one small act of kindness. On Friday, engage in something that absorbs you for at least 20 minutes. On Saturday, find awe by looking for something that makes you stop and notice. And on Sunday, reflect by asking yourself: What gave me energy this week, and what repeatedly took it away?

Don’t judge your answers. Use them as data.

Before You Go: One Last Experiment

You began this newsletter by thinking about the last seven days. Now think about the next seven. Not the next year. Not even the next month. Just seven days.

Ask yourself: Who will I connect with? What will I stop long enough to notice? Where might I find awe? Who could use a small act of kindness from me? And perhaps most importantly: How will I speak to myself when the week doesn’t go according to plan?

You don’t need to do everything in this newsletter. Choose one thing. Put it on your calendar. Then try it.
Because perhaps one of the most useful lessons from the science of well-being is also one of the simplest: We don’t have to wait until life gets better to begin building a better life.

Small moments matter. Small choices accumulate. What we practice repeatedly can gradually become how we live.

Continue the Conversation

If you’d like to go deeper into the science and everyday practice of well-being, I invite you to read my book, Happy Is the New Healthy. In it, I explore practical, research-informed ways we can exercise more influence over our psychological well-being—not by pretending that life is always positive, but by developing habits that help us live it differently.

And if you prefer listening, join me on my podcast, Happiness On Demand, where I continue the conversation about the science and practice of happiness, resilience, relationships, self-compassion, meaning, and living well.

Take one idea from this newsletter and try it this week. Then come back to one simple question:

“Did it change my day?”

Because sometimes changing a life begins by changing a day.

Research & Further Reading
1. Seligman, M. E. P. (2011). Flourish: A visionary new understanding of happiness and well-being. Free Press.
2. Waldinger, R., & Schulz, M. (2023). The good life: Lessons from the world’s longest scientific study of happiness. Simon & Schuster.
3. Helliwell, J. F., Layard, R., Sachs, J. D., De Neve, J.-E., Aknin, L. B., & Wang, S. (Eds.). (2025). World Happiness Report 2025. Wellbeing Research Centre, University of Oxford.
4. Kirca, A., Malouff, J. M., & Meynadier, J. (2023). The effect of expressed gratitude interventions on psychological wellbeing: A meta-analysis of randomised controlled studies. International Journal of Applied Positive Psychology, 8, 63–86.
5. Neff, K. D. (2023). Self-compassion: Theory, method, research, and intervention. Annual Review of Psychology, 74, 193–218.
6. Monroy, M., & Keltner, D. (2023). Awe as a pathway to mental and physical health. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 18(2), 309–320.
7. Hui, B. P. H., Ng, J. C. K., Berzaghi, E., Cunningham-Amos, L. A., & Kogan, A. (2020). Rewards of kindness? A meta-analysis of the link between prosociality and well-being. Psychological Bulletin, 146(12), 1084–1116.

Dr. Joan Neehall
Clinical Psychologist | Author | Speaker
Happy Is the New Healthy
Habit of a Happy Life
Host, Happiness On Demand