This post was originally published on The BridgeMaker, and written by Michael, part of the team at happier.com.

You have always been told to “count your blessings.” This is a tradition that has been passed down for generations and is a central value in the lives of many people. But does this age-old motto actually make people happier?

New research at some of the top universities in the world has shown that it does! People who practice the act of counting their blessings every night, and many other age-old customs of faith, have now been proven to be correlated with living more happy, productive and fulfilled lives. In fact, there is a new field of research that has exploded over the past 10 years called positive psychology, commonly referred to as the “science” of happiness.

Like “counting your blessings,” many age-old ideals have been put to the test, and researchers have now found proof to back up many of our most ingrained traditions. happier.com is a new website that takes these tested philosophies and puts them into easy-to-follow exercises so that anyone can boost their mood, productivity, and quality of relationships on a daily basis.

For example, happier.com helps its users count their blessings and track their successes with an exercise called “Three Good Things.” You can see demo videos of all of the exercises here, and an explanation of why the “Three Good Things” exercise works here.

More about Positive Psychology:

In the past, psychology has primarily focused on the question “What makes really sad people sad?” Positive Psychology asks the question “What make really happy people happy?” – and they have found some exciting and often counter-intuitive answers!

In the last 10 years, the “science” of happiness has exploded – and expert researchers have pinpointed many of the simple traits that make people more optimistic, productive and fulfilled in their lives.

Many of these complicated findings have been boiled down into easy to use tests and exercises which, when practiced on a regular basis, have been shown to increase a person’s overall optimism and confidence, build stronger relationships, and help people be more productive and fulfilled in both their work and home lives … by an average of 20% in only 8 to 12 weeks! Because it is rooted in science and RESULTS, positive psychology has shown that it can change lives and turn around relationships.

This post was originally published on The BridgeMaker, described as an honestly written lifestyle blog that focuses on the importance of faith, inspiration and stories of personal change. Posts fall into three ares: faith, inspiration, and stories of change.

The BridgeMaker is one of the fastest growing faith-based blogs on the Internet with over half a million readers in the last nine months and a world-wide audience from over 201 countries (source: Google Analytics). It has been featured on Deepak Chopra’s Sirius/XM satellite radio show, Wellness Radio, Self Improvement magazine, Zen Habits.net, LifeHacker.com and Intent.com.

When we launched happier.com, we reached out to Alex Blackwell to talk about how our tools might be relevant to the faith community.  What resulted was this post, guest-authored by Michael, part of the team at happier.com.

happier.com is a personal trainer for your happiness. With more than a dozen tools and tests to help you measure, track and improve your happiness, you can trust the happier.com experts to help you reach your goals. Exclusive videos and a popular blog mean there’s something new to learn every day. Download the free iPhone application or find what you’re looking for with the Positive Psychology Practitioner Directory. happier.com is on Facebook, LinkedIn, and twitter and has meetup groups in Washington, Philadelphia, and Portland, with more planned. Click here for a social media press release from our launch.