Compliments activate the same part of your brain, as does receiving money.

One of the most beautiful practices, which as a human race we have followed, is giving compliments. If you ask anyone across nationalities, places, or age groups, you will find that everyone feels good about it.  But how does feeling good matter? Is it just a temporary shift in emotions or does it have an impact over our body, mind and life?  If you just skim through the findings of positive psychology, you will discover the incredible effect that positive emotions have in our brain, body and almost in every area of our lives.

Concrete data shows that when you are experiencing positive emotions like happiness, gratitude, care, joy, optimism, it helps your immune system to become stronger to fight disease in your body. It reduces the stress levels tremendously. It helps you with enhanced cognitive functions as the pre-frontal cortex (front brain) works much better and faster. It helps you to perform better at your work place, get quicker promotions, appreciation, satisfaction and much more.

In one of the studies conducted on giving compliments at the National Institute for Physiological Sciences, Nagoya Institute of Technology and the University of Tokyo, a scientific basis to the impacts of compliments was found. The studies prove that compliments activate the same part of your brain, the striatum, as does money, and both motivate people to work better.

Researchers recruited 48 adults for the study and they were asked to type items in the keyboard in a specific pattern. After this exercise, the adults were divided into 3 groups. Group 1 received personalised compliments from one of the administrators of the study. Group 2 were asked to watch group 1 while they were getting compliments. Group 3 were simply asked to evaluate and analyse their own performance.

When next day, the participants were again asked to carry out the test, the researchers found that Group 1 outperformed both the other groups. It was concluded that this effect was because of the group getting compliments.

Norihiro Sadata, an author of the study, said in a statement, “To the brain, receiving a compliment is as much a social reward as being rewarded money. We’ve been able to find scientific proof that a person performs better when they receive a social reward after completing an exercise. There seems to be scientific validity behind the message ‘praise to encourage improvement’. Complimenting someone could become an easy and effective strategy to use in the classroom and during rehabilitation.”

Studies also suggested, “These results are the first to indicate that praise-related improvements in motor skill memory are not due to a feedback-incentive mechanism, but instead involve direct effects on the offline consolidation process.” This simply means that after receiving the compliment, during the sleep, the learning or skill consolidation process was much stronger in the brain. The application of it may be that, if you wish to help someone improve in a particular task, be it your junior, senior, friends or children, give them a genuine compliment and you may find substantial improvement in their learning.

Now we understand there is a science behind it. So then, what would be the right process to give compliments.

One of the most important things about sharing compliments is that it has to be genuine.

As an intelligent being, and at the subconscious level, we all can make out when someone is buttering a person or when someone is genuinely sharing a compliment. So here I suggest a few beautiful and powerful ways to share compliments which also help us tremendously.

#1. Always keep it genuine and everyone has something good about them to be complimented on.

#2. While doing this, don’t rush. Take your time and observe how the other person felt when you shared the compliment.

#3. After giving the compliment, watch and observe your own self and your emotions. How do you feel?

#4. Make a journal of these experiences.

#5. And as a last step, celebrate it by saying, “Yes I did it or Task accomplished or I am so happy” and accompany this with happy emotions and body movements so the brain and nervous system records these experiences.

To make it a part of your habit and to re-wire your brain, you must practice this habit for at least 30-40 days and then it will no longer feel awkward, but will become a part of your system.

Apart from all this, it’s like you are being a conscious co-creator in spreading happiness and joy in this world. It’s time we become a co-creators of this world, for the negativity, sadness, violence will not disappear on its own. For all this to go, we have to allow the goodness to rise within us and in others. That’s a life worth living.

So, before we start complimenting others, it’s a wonderful idea to first give your own self a genuine compliment.

Affirm in the comment with a strong intention, “I am brilliance in action, love myself unconditionally and accept myself fully and deeply”

Be a champion of Happiness,

Avinash Anand Singh

Speaker | Writer |Transformational Coach | He works in the area of connecting Science and Spirituality with the mission of “helping people connect back to their Inner Genius”

www.bdtc.in | www.bdtc.in/blog

PS – On 6-7-8th May 2016, we are conducting two powerful programs for Self – Transformation in Pune. “Self Mastery & Law of Attraction Mastery” both these programs encompass a detailed understanding of mind, body and spirit and are focussed to shift people to next level in all the areas of their life. To know more, visit this link –  https://bit.ly/1XqpOBD

Reference:

https://www.nips.ac.jp/eng/contents/release/entry/2012/11/post-223.html

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0048174

https://www.pursuit-of-happiness.org/science-of-happiness/positive-thinking/