I had a great gathering with some wonderful Wishful Thinking Women in Tampa, Florida on Saturday. We talked about identifying how we want to feel, before deciding where we want to go or who we want to be.

I believe one of the easiest ways to accomplish that is to begin recognizing and savoring the moments that make you feel happy, confident, or relaxed. These moments can lead you from where you are now to where you want to be.

Becoming aware of how you feel in those moments will help you build a reservoir of positive emotions, and may increase the likelihood that you will want to recreate them in the future. It’s like resetting your emotional compass to point to positive rather than negative, which positive psychology studies show can increase your creativity and your ability to think broadly.

For many of us, the most common feelings we recognize are frustration, sadness, worry or regret. We keep them close to the surface where we can retrieve them at a moment’s notice. We become so accustomed to falling-back on draining or taxing emotions that we don’t bother to notice or we downplay the energy-enhancing ones, such as happiness.

By becoming more adept at identifying and fully experiencing the positive moments in our lives, we can retrain our brains to key-in on them and reduce our attraction and attachment to the energy-sapping ones. Little-by-little our stockpile of positive moments will outweigh the heaviness of the negative ones and can tip us over to the light-side of life.

The light-side of life is where all the really good stuff develops as our more relaxed state-of-mind allows our brains to broaden and our options to grow, which is the perfect time for planning what we want to do and who we want to be.

You can reset your emotional compass by making it a habit to notice and savor the moments when you feel light, peaceful, proud or happy. Notice what makes you smile, laugh, or relaxes your shoulders. Catch yourself feeling good, and savor the moment. Savoring locks in the richness of the moment, and makes it easier to find and recall the positive emotions attached to it, which may lead you down a whole new path.

Don’t let the good moments slip by you. Learn to identify and savor what makes you happy. When you do you are “exercising” your happiness muscles, which may help you build the life you really want.

 Wishful Thinking Works life coaching can help you build your happiness muscles. Having a coach in your corner, is a great way to quickly move forward with the changes you want to make in your life. For more information, click here or contact Patrice Koerper at 813-719-0769.