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Lunch » Tags » Books » Reviews » The Happiness Project: Or, Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun » User review

Taking concrete steps to make yourself happier with life...

  • Aug 7, 2010
Rating:
+4

So is it possible to actually create a project and plan to increase the overall happiness in your life?  Gretchen Rubin set out to do just that in her book The Happiness Project: Or, Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun.  It wasn't that she was horribly dissatisfied with life.  It's just that she felt that there could be so much more if she really thought about it and started making changes.  The project became a blog, and the blog turned into this book.  While your project would not be the same as hers, she does present the basic project components, and makes some good points on how anyone can get back to the basics of what makes them happy.

Contents:
January - Boost Energy (Vitality); February - Remember Love (Marriage); March - Aim Higher (Work); April - Lighten Up (Parenthood); May - Be Serious About Play (Leisure); June - Make Time for Friends (Friendship); July - Buy Some Happiness (Money); August - Contemplate the Heavens (Eternity); September - Pursue a Passion (Books); October - Pay Attention (Mindfulness); November - Keep a Contented Heart (Attitude); December - Book Camp Perfect (Happiness); Afterword; Acknowledgments; Your Happiness Project; Suggestions for Further Reading

During the project, Rubin had to think hard about what she wanted, what really made her happy, and how she could take all her study and research and condense it down into nuggets of truth for her.  For January, "boost energy" became the actionable items of go to sleep earlier, exercise better, toss/restore/organize, tackle a nagging task, and act more energetic.  September's pursuit of a passion turned into writing a novel, making time, forgetting about results, and mastering a new technology.  It all sounds simple in theory, but she often struggled behind *why* certain things worked and didn't work in her life.  For me, I quickly faced the realization that I really don't *know* what I want in many cases.  Too much "letting life happen" and pleasing others leaves me with a lack of understanding about what makes *me* tick.  As such, I found this book rather convicting and uncomfortable in places.

Since I tend to be a bit more "to the point" in my reading preferences, I found a few places where I wanted to trim up the narrative a bit.  It was also a bit hard to get excited about a project month for a topic that just didn't fall onto my radar screen (or at least not in the way it did for Ruben).  Still, The Happiness Project is well worth the time spent reading.  Because of what I learned, I have some major thinking to do and actions to take.

Disclosure:
Obtained From: Author
Payment: Free

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August 10, 2010
Sounds like a worthwhile and interesting read. I can see how some of these projects might not jive with all people, but it would still be fascinating to get some ideas and thoughts on how/where to start "improving" your life. Thanks for the review!
 
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More The Happiness Project: Or, Why... reviews
review by . July 09, 2010
This book was incredibly easy to read and very entertaining.  The author has a way with words that makes you feel she is having a conversation with just you.      I really enjoyed reading about her Happiness Project and came across a lot of ideas I feel I can implement in my own life. On a random note, I found the word "idiosyncratic" to be overused throughout, which became a little annoying. I really liked how honest she was about herself in terms of how judgmental …
review by . December 31, 2009
This deceptively simple little book has taught me more about happiness than any of the self-help books/courses/information I have come across, combined.    Gretchen Rubin spent a year investigating happiness- researching happiness (scientific, philosophical, behavorial, emotional, and otherwise) and then applying the different concepts and ideas she picked up to her own day-to-day life. "The Happiness Project" is the result of that investigation.     Rubin …
review by . December 20, 2009
posted in Cafe Libri: Reviewing Books & More
I have no idea how to properly convey how I feel about this book. I felt so much for it and because of it and it's kind of crazy. I saw so much of myself in the author and some of the examples she explained, half the time I was sitting there dumbstruck. She breaks down her resolutions in such a way it's very easy to follow along and she is so specific in how they work out you really can't ask for much more.    Rubin writes in a way that it was very easy for me to relate to and …
see all The Happiness Project: Or, Why... reviews (4)
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Thomas Duff, aka "Duffbert", is a long-time member of the Lotus community. He's primarily focused on the development side of the Notes/Domino environment, currently working for a large insurance … more
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About this book

Wiki

Starred Review. Rubin is not an unhappy woman: she has a loving husband, two great kids and a writing career in New York City. Still, she could-and, arguably, should-be happier. Thus, her methodical (and bizarre) happiness project: spend one year achieving careful, measurable goals in different areas of life (marriage, work, parenting, self-fulfillment) and build on them cumulatively, using concrete steps (such as, in January, going to bed earlier, exercising better, getting organized, and "acting more energetic"). By December, she's striving bemusedly to keep increasing happiness in every aspect of her life. The outcome is good, not perfect (in accordance with one of her "Secrets of Adulthood": "Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good"), but Rubin's funny, perceptive account is both inspirational and forgiving, and sprinkled with just enough wise tips, concrete advice and timely research (including all those other recent books on happiness) to qualify as self-help. Defying self-help expectations, however, Rubin writes with keen senses of self and narrative, balancing the personal and the universal with a light touch. Rubin's project makes curiously compulsive reading, which is enough to make any reader happy.
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Details

ISBN-10: 0061583251
ISBN-13: 978-0061583254
Author: Gretchen Rubin
Genre: Health, Mind & Body, Nonfiction
Publisher: Harper
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