Gretchen Rubin had an epiphany one rainy afternoon in the unlikeliest of places: a city bus. "The days are long, but the years are short," she realized. "Time is passing, and I'm not focusing enough on the things that really matter." In that moment, she decided to dedicate a year to her happiness project.In this lively and compelling account of that year, Rubin carves out her place alongside the authors of bestselling memoirs such as Julie and Julia, The Year of Living Biblically, and Eat, Pray, Love. With humor and insight, she chronicles her adventures during the twelve months she spent test-driving the wisdom of the ages, current scientific research, and lessons from popular culture about how to be happier.Rubin didn't have the option to uproot herself, nor did she really want to; instead she focused on improving her life as it was. Each month she tackled a new set …
Gretchen Rubin had an epiphany one rainy afternoon in the unlikeliest of places: a city bus. "The days are long, but the years are short," she realized. "Time is passing, and I'm not focusing enough on the things that really matter." In that moment, she decided to dedicate a year to her happiness project.In this lively and compelling account of that year, Rubin carves out her place alongside the authors of bestselling memoirs such as Julie and Julia, The Year of Living Biblically, and Eat, Pray, Love. With humor and insight, she chronicles her adventures during the twelve months she spent test-driving the wisdom of the ages, current scientific research, and lessons from popular culture about how to be happier.Rubin didn't have the option to uproot herself, nor did she really want to; instead she focused on improving her life as it was. Each month she tackled a new set of resolutions: give proofs of love, ask for help, find more fun, keep a gratitude notebook, forget about results. She immersed herself in principles set forth by all manner of experts, from Epicurus to Thoreau to Oprah to Martin Seligman to the Dalai Lama to see what worked for her—and what didn't.Her conclusions are sometimes surprising—she finds that money can buy happiness, when spent wisely; that novelty and challenge are powerful sources of happiness; that "treating" yourself can make you feel worse; that venting bad feelings doesn't relieve them; that the very smallest of changes can make the biggest difference—and they range from the practical to the profound.Written with charm and wit, The Happiness Project is illuminating yet entertaining, thought-provoking yet compulsively readable. Gretchen Rubin's passion for her subject jumps off the page, and reading just a few chapters of this book will inspire you to start your own happiness project.
Rubin's idea of happiness correlates closely to mine: completing todo lists, knocking out 1-minute chores, and paying attention both to small maintenance items around the home and emotionally in relationships.
It's an incrementalist's approach to maintaining and growing happiness that emerges over time. To us, happiness is a tidy house and thriving relations. This is a good 3.5 stars book -- usable ideas, relateable moments, but not ground-breaking or Nobel-worthy. (sorry!)
I'm not an overly emotional or hyperbolic person...but (you knew that was coming) this book is life changing. It validated ideas I already had, provided me with more useful information than any book I've read in the last 10 years, entertained me and ultimately inspired me in all sorts of ways to be a better husband, a better son, to sleep more, to challenge myself intellectually in ways that a re real and lasting. You'll want to read it again and again. I'll loan you one of my many copies.
Read this on my boss's recommendation. The book was a mix of some helpful thoughts and a lot of dull anecdotal filler. It read like a lot of other stunt memoirs, feeling mostly like a collection of printed out blog posts. This feeling was even more pronounced as most chapters include comments from an actual blog the author kept while writing this book. The stories illustrate the overall point - that you're responsible for your happiness, and that focusing on your happiness can make you a more positive influence on people you come in contact with - well, but so much of it is either uninteresting anecdote or hokey corny platitudes (Calling the four main points "Splendid Truths" with an obviously exaggerated narrative of how she came to the revelation of these truths is particular eye-roller) watering down the useful observations. It's a fairly easy read and there are enough …
Read this on my boss's recommendation. The book was a mix of some helpful thoughts and a lot of dull anecdotal filler. It read like a lot of other stunt memoirs, feeling mostly like a collection of printed out blog posts. This feeling was even more pronounced as most chapters include comments from an actual blog the author kept while writing this book. The stories illustrate the overall point - that you're responsible for your happiness, and that focusing on your happiness can make you a more positive influence on people you come in contact with - well, but so much of it is either uninteresting anecdote or hokey corny platitudes (Calling the four main points "Splendid Truths" with an obviously exaggerated narrative of how she came to the revelation of these truths is particular eye-roller) watering down the useful observations. It's a fairly easy read and there are enough good thoughts in it that it would be worth checking out, but there's little here that isn't covered in other such inspirational writing and there are other blogs or stunt memoirs that focus on much more interesting people/events.
I'm really surprised by the range of reactions to the book - apparently a lot of people really found it almost offensive, while others seemed to find it inspiring..
Personally, I've got a bit of a fascination with how our brains work and I've read a lot of psychology-focused books on what makes people effective, happy, etc. and I've found (almost) all of them interesting. What I liked about this book is that the author put a plan together and went about a personal experiment. Sure it was contrived. So what?
And yes, she's got a 'good' life compared to many - that doesn't mean that she's happy or as happy as she could be. It also doesn't mean that she has nothing useful to say - privilege doesn't discount her ability to provide some useful insight and possibly spark some self-inspection and self-improvement.
I actually really liked some of …
I'm really surprised by the range of reactions to the book - apparently a lot of people really found it almost offensive, while others seemed to find it inspiring..
Personally, I've got a bit of a fascination with how our brains work and I've read a lot of psychology-focused books on what makes people effective, happy, etc. and I've found (almost) all of them interesting. What I liked about this book is that the author put a plan together and went about a personal experiment. Sure it was contrived. So what?
And yes, she's got a 'good' life compared to many - that doesn't mean that she's happy or as happy as she could be. It also doesn't mean that she has nothing useful to say - privilege doesn't discount her ability to provide some useful insight and possibly spark some self-inspection and self-improvement.
I actually really liked some of the things that she did to practically apply a lot of the research she reviewed. It helps me to focus on what I can do to translate some of the information that I've gathered from my own reading into my own daily life.
This is a book I have been reading for a book club. To be honest: it's not a book I would have chosen myself. Not anymore. I was kind of done with self-help books years ago. And on top of that I kind of had my very own happiness project behind me in the years in China. Even without realizing it (maybe that's the way to go?). I learned the hard way. And am pretty happy now. But... more
ps I couldn't really decide how to rate this book... somewhere in between 3.5 and 4 I guess.
