Following celebrities or people you don't regularly see in person often doesn't add to our happiness. The best use of social media is to deepen existing close relationships or create new ones.

People will often say "You can't change other people." My research shows this societal belief is not only dis-empowering, it is scientifically false.

I've learned to stop being so serious!

Too often we forget how powerful we are as individuals to shape how other people see the world. Each one of us constantly broadcasts to other people - whether consciously or unconsciously - verbally or non-verbally - and those messages influence their brain.

Instead of running from the negative, I've started running towards the positive.

My big "double-aha" moment came while anchoring the national news at CBS News. It was at the height of the recession, and on top of the usual negative stories, my newscasts became full of especially heart wrenching stories of people losing their homes, jobs, and retirement savings. Starting the morning off like that could leave even the most optimistic person feeling helpless and hopeless. The lightning bolt came when we changed how we talked about the negative.

Social comparison that leads to unhappiness is the downside of social media.