A growing body of research has identified one reliable path to greater personal happiness: engaging in a rewarding activity — particularly one that involves doing something nice for someone else. Acts of kindness not only benefit the recipient but also “create a pleasurable ‘helper’s high’ that benefits the giver,” says Stanford Graduate School of Business professor Jennifer Aaker, who has studied the phenomenon with University of Houston’s Melanie Rudd and Michael I. Norton of the Harvard Business School.

Acts of kindness make you happy as the giver. 

thanks for posting this, tina.  i wrote an article from this study!  i love that not only does making others happy make us happy, but that we are happier when we can SEE the results of our kindness, as in a smile from a stranger.  :)

more giving, more happy-making, more smiling all around!

Yes, and that's an important distinction: to be able to see the results of kindness.

That gives the feedback that the kindness is appreciated.