Celebrating Holidays Can Make You Happier

Celebrating holidays and life events can lead to improved mental and physical well-being and stronger relationships, according to Blue Zones, the organization that tracks the world’s longest-lived cultures.

Five places that Blue Zones has identified as having the highest life expectancy in the world—Barbagia, Sardinia; Ikaria, Greece; Nicoya, Costa Rica; Loma Linda, California; Okinawa, Japan—are noted for having strong community and family social bonds.

Residents of Okinawa, for example, traditionally form small groups, known as moais, that get together often to celebrate life events. In Sardinia, happy hour, when families and friends gather to socialize, is an important part of the day. In Mexico, which ranks high in Blue Zones’ happiness rankings, social interaction is commonplace, and holidays and life events are celebrated year-round.

Research shows that savoring the small things in life, like family holiday celebrations, helps manage stress, strengthen relationships, and improve mental and physical well-being. 

Matthew Killingsworth, a Robert Wood Johnson Health and Society scholar, has collected data from over 20,000 people who report how they feel at randomly selected moments during the day. His data shows that people are happier during holidays and when spending time with friends and family.

In research published in PLOS ONE, language patterns used by 75,000 volunteers on Facebook was analyzed. Analysis of the words in posts revealed, among other things, that participants who used words indicating that they interconnected socially, like “coffee,” “holiday,” “weekend,” scored high for positive emotions in the personality tests that they took as part of the study.

In another interesting study, researchers examined what message holiday decorations send about the homeowners’ sociability. The authors concluded that Christmas/holiday decorations communicated to neighbors that the residents were friendly and accessible.