The Happiness Project

The Secret Is Not To Care.

I’m working on my Happiness Project, and you could have one, too! Everyone’s project will look different, but it’s the rare person who can’t benefit. Join in -- no need to catch up, just jump in right now. Each Friday’s post will help you think about your own happiness project.

A friend told me this story, and I’ve never forgotten it, though the following anecdote about G. Gordon Liddy may not, in fact, be true; I’ve never verified it. According to my friend, Liddy once held his hand over a candle flame until his flesh burned. Someone asked, “What’s your secret?” and he replied, “The secret is not to care.”

I think about this phrase constantly: “The secret is not to care.” Because if I don’t want to let certain things make me unhappy, the secret is not to care. (Not to mention not caring about the weird grammar of the phrase.)

Recently a friend explained that although she doesn’t enjoy getting manicures, she has to get them, because her hands must look nice for work (she has a fancy job). The last time I had a manicure was two years ago when my sister got married, and I know that even if I had my friend’s job, I wouldn’t get manicures. I just don’t care, and because I don’t care, I don’t believe that other people care much either.

Another friend is honestly worried because his children don’t have very adventurous tastes in foods. Again, I just don’t care about that, so that worry doesn’t make a difference to me. Of course, I care about things that other people don’t care about.

I think this “secret” is important, because while we can’t exercise complete control over the things we care about, we can take notice, remember that some of our concerns are idiosyncratic, and try to master them where appropriate. Mindfulness! Yikes, mindfulness turns out to be important everywhere I look. (Wondering how mindful you are? I’m not very. Here's a quiz.)

Often I invoke this phrase, “The secret is not to care,” in a context where I find myself worrying about what other people will think. When I feel myself fussing about something, I ask myself, “Do I really care? Or is the secret not to care?”

I felt myself caring about the fact that my four-year-old often goes to school wearing hideous outfits. She loves to pick out her own clothes and tends to choose eye-popping combinations. I found myself wanting to explain to everyone, “She chose that herself! I didn’t match that shirt with those pants!” Then I realized – the secret is not to care. Why shouldn’t she pick out her own clothes to please herself? Why should I care? I don’t care. And I let it go.

This observation by Samuel Johnson keeps springing to my mind: “Since every man is obliged to promote happiness and virtue, he should be careful not to mislead unwary minds, by appearing to set too high a value upon things by which no real excellence is conferred.”

Accordingly, I’m not “setting too high a value” upon coordinated outfits on a pre-schooler, “by which no real excellence is conferred.” The secret is not to care.

Have you found yourself caring about things you don’t really care about? How do you address it?

* I see on Gimundo that the New Economics Foundation ranked Costa Rica as the world's happiest country. Interesting.

* Interested in starting your own happiness project? If you’d like to take a look at my personal Resolutions Chart, for inspiration, just email me at grubin, then the “at” sign, then gretchenrubin dot com. (Sorry about writing it in that roundabout way; I’m trying to thwart spammers.) Just write “Resolutions Chart” in the subject line.

Join or Start a Group -- a Happiness-Project Group.

One of the happiness-project resolutions that I’ve found to be most effective – and also the most fun – is to Join or start a group. Since I started my happiness project, I’ve joined or started seven groups, each of which has added dramatically to my happiness.

Some people are interested in starting or joining a group for people doing happiness projects – to my astonishment, more than 2,000 people have sent for the starter-kit for people launching such a group. (Click here if you'd like to sign up for a kit yourself.)

I’m wildly interested in what these groups are doing, so am thrilled whenever I hear news. There are groups forming in cities like Dallas/Fort Worth, Boston, Gainesville -- even Singapore!

Nicole’s group, in Enid, Oklahoma, has more than forty members (incredible). Nicole suggested that everyone begin by deciding on three or four resolutions, and she offered several great suggestions about making an effective resolution (start small; keep it concrete; hold yourself accountable by keeping a chart, whether online at the Happiness Project Toolbox or on paper), and she offered her own resolutions as an example:

1. Meditate for at least 10 minutes each day
2. Exercise at least twice per week
3. Choose my arguments more wisely
4. Take more notes so I do not forget things so easily

Nicole made another excellent point to the Enid group, which I echo in different words in my Secrets of Adulthood. She reminded everyone, “Remember, you’ll only get out of this what you’re willing to put in!” Very true. (My version is “No deposit, no return.”)

Michael’s group in L.A. has an unexpected geographic challenge: thirty-two people are interested in joining the group, and they’re spread all across the vast L.A. area. To keep the drive easier for people, Michael has suggested that they break into two groups, to keep meeting as convenient as possible. Very smart! Convenience matters a lot! However, having a committed leader matters a lot, too, so I hope someone steps forward to lead the new, second group if it forms.

Dani is launching a group in the Washington, D.C. area. If you’re interested in joining, email her at positivepresent@gmail.com. Her excellent blog is Positively Present.

Group leaders, please do join the Facebook Discussion Page for group leaders. From time to time, I’d like able to contact you directly – for instance, I’m sending you all a little surprise in the mail this week – and if you’re on that Page, I’ll be able to find you.

What about the tri-state area? (NY, CT, NJ) I live in New York City and would love to see a happiness-project group form in my own backyard. If you’ve started one, let me know! Maybe I can come to the kick-off meeting.

*
I was interested to see this Marriage Calculator at Divorce360. My result? "People with similar backgrounds who are already divorced: 14%. People with similar backgrounds who will be divorced over the next five years: 3%." Apparently that puts me at average risk for divorce.

Nine Tips for Giving Memorable Praise--and Why To Bother.

I just finished a very engaging book, Richard Stengel’s You're Too Kind: A Brief History of Flattery. I wish I’d had this book as a resource when I was writing my first book, Power Money Fame Sex. It’s a treasure trove of anecdotes and observations about flattery – a topic which comes up with some frequency when you’re writing about money, power, fame, and sex.

The book is history and social criticism, but at the end, Stengel includes a list called “How to flatter without getting caught.”

To put flattery in a happier context, I adapted his list to focus on giving good praise rather than flattery. Now, what’s the difference between flattery and praise? Flattery is strategic; it’s praise given for a self-serving reason. But many of the same rules apply:

1. Be specific. Vague praise doesn’t make much of an impression.

2. Find a way to praise sincerely. It’s a rare situation where you can’t identify something that you honestly find praiseworthy.

3. Never offer praise and ask for a favor in the same conversation. It makes the praise seem like a set-up.

4. Don’t over-praise. Keep it credible and realistic.

5. Look for something less obvious to praise – a more obscure accomplishment or quality that a person hasn’t heard praised many times before.

6. Don’t hesitate to praise people who get a lot of praise already. I’ve noticed this myself; even people who get constant praise – or perhaps especially people who get constant praise – crave praise. Is this because praiseworthy people are often insecure? Or does getting praise lead to a need for more praise? I’m not sure, but it seems often to be the case.

7. Praise people behind their backs. The praised person usually hears about the praise, and behind-the-back praise seems more sincere than face-to-face praise.

8. Beware when a person asks for your honest opinion. This is often a clue that they're seeking reassurance, not candor.

9. Don’t damn with faint praise. “You were so lousy when you started, you’ve really come a long way” or “You did a much better job than I expected” is not praise that will warm people’s hearts.

Because the way we feel is very much influenced by the way we act, by acting in a way that shows appreciation, discernment, and thoughtfulness, we make ourselves feel more appreciative, discerning, and thoughtful. And that boosts happiness.

Have you thought of any other good ways for giving people praise? As my mother once wisely pointed out to me, "Most people probably don't get the appreciation they deserve." Very true, and therefore...

...if you're grappling with the opposite problem -- of not getting enough praise yourself -- check out these Five tips for dealing with feeling unappreciated. I'm a praise junkie, myself, so have tried all these strategies. With mixed success.

* Non sequitur: Today is July 8, 2009. At six seconds after 4:05 a.m. this morning, the time was 04:05:06 07-08-09. Shoot, I slept right through it.

* Lots of great discussion on the Facebook Page. Check it out!

Happiness: Deadlines, Running, H&M, and Novel-Writing.

From time to time, I post short interviews with interesting people about their insights on happiness. During my research, I’ve noticed that I often learn more from one person’s highly idiosyncratic experiences than I do from sources that detail universal principles or cite up-to-date studies.

I recently read a terrific new novel by Sally Koslow, The Late, Lamented Molly Marx. It has a very interesting premise, which I don’t want to give away, but I will say that it explores an important aspect of happiness.

I raced through the book because I was enjoying it so much (it’s packed with sharp social observation, plus it paints a wonderful picture of New York City), so only after I’d finished it did I realize that the book is a great examination of drift.

In the novel, Molly has a life with her husband and young daughter, and she's also having an affair. She loves and hates her life with her husband; same with the affair. She can’t decide whether to divorce her husband and marry her lover, or to end the affair, and she begins to drift in this state. Both fates have their appeal, and their cost.

Molly’s situation is resolved in a surprising way, which I won’t reveal, but it got me thinking about drift. I was interested to see what Sally Koslow would have to say about happiness.

Gretchen: What’s a simple activity that consistently makes you happier?
Sally: Besides reading novels, which I love so much I decided to try and write one? Dancing, at which I most certainly do not excel, makes me giddy-happy if I’m hearing the right music, even if I’m alone in my kitchen alternating the same two moves my kids mock. So does escaping into a movie trussed-up with corsets and English accents or a well-written contemporary rom-com. Every time I watch Diane Keaton grin to herself while she’s pounding away on her computer in Something's Gotta Give, a movie I can probably lip synch, I want to do the same.

Some activities make me happy once they’re over. I can’t say I adore running, but several times a week I take myself to the park for a long jog and invariably, when the rubber hits the road, my brain manufactures dialogue, plot points and metaphors, and as e.e. cummings wrote, the world is mud-luscious and puddle-wonderful.

Is there anything you find yourself doing repeatedly that gets in the way of your happiness?
Procrastination screws with my happiness, even though I know I get a contact high from accomplishment. For me, productivity demands infrastructure. I’d never have been able to complete three novels in the last five years if I hadn’t joined a writing workshop. It gives me feedback, but most important, the group harnesses me to deadlines, without which I’d still be muttering, “Maybe I’ll write a novel!” Being a magazine editor taught me that everyone, for almost everything, requires deadlines. I’m kind of an evangelist about this. Now if only someone would give me a deadline for organizing my photographs.

Is there a happiness mantra or motto that you’ve find very helpful? Or a particular book that has stayed with you?
Thornton Wilder’s Our Town is my all-time favorite play, and it inspired my current book, The Late, Lamented Molly Marx

Is there anything that you see people around you doing that detracts a lot from their happiness?
Envy is the buzz-kill of happiness. This is a theme I’m exploring in my next novel, where four women’s friendships wig out when they start tripping over their envy. (The original title was The Schadenfreude Club -- we just changed it to With Friends like These, since not everyone knows the snarky German word, schadenfreude, which means taking pleasure in someone else’s misery.)

I know I’ve wasted too much time on envying people with more money or success. I wish I could say I’ve learned to short-circuit envy, but the best I do is try to minimize contact with happiness-suckers in favor of being with people I appreciate and who appreciate me. I got happier, for example, when my son switched from private to public school, where the parents took fewer vacations to Tuscany. I try to remind myself that while other women may look like they have it all, they may secretly covet X. For all I know, maybe every woman I envy secretly wants to be a novelist.

Have you always felt about the same level of happiness, or have you been through a period when you felt exceptionally happy or unhappy – if so, why? If you were unhappy, how did you become happier?
I was a cliché high school and college kid who no doubt looked happy enough, but wrote yearning poetry and was often the girl at the party ready to cry. I was shy, and didn’t instinctively understand how to make friends. My early role model was Lois Lane, and it helped to cast myself as a reporter for school newspapers, where I was forced to ask people questions. This practice helped, but took me only so far—when I, a North Dakota hayseed, moved to Manhattan to work on Mademoiselle magazine, the culture shock rendered me practically mute. I forced myself to observe women who had a knack for making friends, and tried to model their behavior, down to noticing that it’s ordinary good manners to be friendly

During the last eight years, because of dumb luck I’ve lost two editor-in-chief jobs. This crashed my happiness, since I adored my work and believed I was put on earth to edit magazines. To keep my sanity, I started dabbling with writing fiction, which turned into novels—one lost job was running McCall’s, which got turned over to Rosie O’Donnell to start an eponymous magazine. That “you can’t make this stuff up” experience inspired my first novel, Little Pink Slips. I never expected novel-writing to become my new life’s work, and it has made me as happy as I’ve ever been.

Have you ever been surprised that something you expected would make you very happy and didn’t?
One of my jobs came with—woo-hoo!--a clothing allowance. Although I’d been devoted to cheap-chic, when I got this perk I threw myself at the mercy of a personal shopper at Bergdorf’s, and let her talk me into suits which made me looked like a lady senator, not Sally. I’ll never say money can’t buy a certain peace of mind, but this experience taught me that scoring bargains at H&M makes me happier than posh shopping, which leaves me feeling not pampered, but phony and rip-offed, a sure recipe for unhappiness.

* I'm a big fan of Alexandra Levit's blog Water Cooler Wisdom, which is a terrific resource for "up-to-the-minute career advice from one who has survived the trenches," so I was very pleased to see that she posted about the Happiness Project Toolbox.

* I send out short, free monthly newsletters that highlight the best of the previous month’s posts to about 24,000 subscribers. If you’d like to sign up, click here or email me at grubin, then the “at” sign, then gretchenrubin dot com. (sorry about that weird format – trying to to thwart spammers.) Just write “newsletter” in the subject line.

A Problem in Happiness: Drift.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the problem of drift in happiness. Drift is the decision you make by not deciding, or by making a decision that unleashes consequences for which you don’t take responsibility. (“Drift” isn’t an actual psychological term, like situation evocation or emotional contagion; it’s just a word that I use).

I fear drift. Drift feels small, but once unleashed, drift is a powerful, often almost unstoppable, force.

An engaged friend couldn’t have made it more plain that she didn’t want to get married. I asked her, “Imagine that something happened, and you couldn’t get married next month. Your fiancé absolutely had to move to China for a year, alone, or you had to have a big operation. How would you feel?” “Relieved,” she said. And yet she went through with the wedding, and got divorced a year later.

I drifted into law school. I didn’t know what else I wanted to do, it seemed like a legitimate, useful way to spend a few years, it would keep my options open…I didn’t really think much about the decision. As it turns out, I’m very glad I went to law school – drift sometimes does lead to a happy result, which contributes to its dangerous appeal – but I didn’t approach law school mindfully. And many, many people who go to law school are not happy they went.

Just taking one drifting step can you set you in a course that’s very hard to stop. In my case, I drifted into taking the LSAT (the law-school application test). “Why not, might as well, could come in handy, maybe I’ll be glad I did,” etc. This is a good example of the fact that drifting doesn’t always mean taking the easier course; it was a lot of trouble to prepare and take the LSAT, but it was still drift.

Some situations look like drift but aren’t. You may be following a pathless path -- and that's fine, if that's what you intend to do. Or you may have to choose between multiple courses, with their pros and cons, and you can’t decide which you want, and while you’re deciding, life continues rolling along. This isn’t drift, because you’re actively weighing your options. Sometimes, it’s helpful to postpone making a decision, either because you get more information or because your own preferences reveal themselves. However, if this goes on too long – and it’s hard to know what’s too long – it can become drift.

The tricky thing about drift is that people rarely want to admit to themselves that they’re drifting. So what’s a good way to catch yourself in drift? I tried to make a list of warning signs for myself:

-- Thinking “This situation can’t go on,” but then it does go on.
-- Complaining a lot about a situation without working to find ways to make it better.
-- Hoping that some catastrophe or upheaval will arise to blow up a situation, e.g., fantasizing that you’ll break your leg or be transferred to another city.
-- Feeling that other people or processes are moving events forward, and you’re being passively carried along.
-- Getting the urge to do or have something because the people around you are doing it or want it. One of my Secrets of Adulthood is "Just because something is fun for someone else doesn’t mean it’s fun for you – and vice versa."

Have you ever caught yourself in drift? What are some other warning signs?

* I always find a lot of great material to read at Beyond Blue, a blog about "a spiritual journey to mental health," and I was interested in a recent post, Depression happens to successful people.

* Interested in starting your own happiness project? If you’d like to take a look at my personal Resolutions Chart, for inspiration, just email me at grubin, then the “at” sign, then gretchenrubin dot com. (Sorry about writing it in that roundabout way; I’m trying to thwart spammers.) Just write “Resolutions Chart” in the subject line.

Forgive an Accident. Which Is Harder Than It Sounds.

I’m working on my Happiness Project, and you could have one, too! Everyone’s project will look different, but it’s the rare person who can’t benefit. Join in -- no need to catch up, just jump in right now. Each Friday’s post will help you think about your own happiness project.

One of my happiness-project resolutions is to “Forgive an accident.” Now, you might think, why should I try to forgive an accident? After all, if something is an accident, there’s nothing to forgive. Accidents happen, we all know that.

Yes, I know that. Accidents happen. But I still find it hard not to be annoyed – and to act annoyed – in the face of certain accidents. Reminding myself of my resolution helps me to respond in the right way.

Here are just two examples:

1. When we were flying to Kansas City to spend Christmas with my parents, my daughter lost her “functional appliance.” If you’re not current with the latest parlance of orthodontia, this is like a fancy retainer. My daughter is supposed to wear it at all times, except when she’s eating. We were on the plane, she took it out to eat, and the next time she looked for it, it was gone. We all looked, couldn’t find it. We think it must’ve been thrown away when the stewardess took her food tray.

I was annoyed: she wouldn’t be able to wear this thing again until we were back in New York and had managed to replace it; getting a new one would be expensive; it would be inconvenient.

2. Recently, my husband left his wallet in a cab. The second he reached the sidewalk, he realized he didn’t have his wallet, and he raced down the street to stop the cab, but it was gone. He waited anxiously for two days before he had to admit to himself that it really wasn’t coming back. Before that, however, we had to cancel our credit cards.

I was annoyed: we’d put a lot of recurrent and online charges on one of the lost cards, so that number had to replaced many times, by me.

In each situation, I could feel the accident-causer bracing against my possible annoyance, and it was very, very hard to resist the temptation to say things like, “You should’ve been more careful!” “Now we’re going to have all this hassle to fix this!” “How could you have not noticed that you didn’t know where it was?” etc. But I realized – what was the point? My daughter felt terrible, my husband felt terrible. In general, they’re both very responsible (my daughter had never lost her F.A. before, and my husband had never lost a wallet before). They obviously hadn’t done these things on purpose. Why make a bad situation worse?

In each case, once the moment passed, I was very glad that I reacted mildly. (I even came up with a good idea about credit cards: now we have a card that never leaves the house that we use for online charges.) When you’re feeling bad about something you’ve done, it’s awful when someone adds to that feeling – you feel defensive, resentful, and misunderstood. I didn't want to cause that.

Also, one of my Personal Commandments is to Act the way I want to feel; although we think we act because of the way we feel, in fact, we often feel because of the way we act. By acting calm and forgiving, I help myself to feel calm and forgiving, instead of annoyed.

The resolution would be more accurately phrased as “Let go of an accident” or “Forget an accident” but somehow I need the little extra kick supplied by the word “forgive.”

How about you? Have you ever felt tempted to react harshly to something someone did, even though it was an accident?

* I loved this little video on Gimundo -- especially because I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how to use photographs to keep happiness-project resolutions like “Take time for projects” and “Be a treasure house of happy memories." The Black Lake Island project and Taking tourist photos of my own romance, for example, both use photographs.

* I send out short monthly newsletters that highlight the best of the previous month’s posts to about 24,000 subscribers. If you’d like to sign up, click here or email me at grubin, then the “at” sign, then gretchenrubin dot com. (sorry about that weird format – trying to to thwart spammers.) Just write “newsletter” in the subject line. It’s free.

True Rule: Rock the Boat.

I've started a feature -- the True Rules series. These are concrete lessons that come out of people's specific experiences. Whether you agree with these rules or not, they’re fun to consider.

I was very excited to have lunch with the brilliant Debbie Stier in her office at HarperStudio, which is part of my publishing house, HarperCollins. A few weeks ago, I’d been in a meeting she led, and I'd immediately realized that she was a treasure trove of information about how to use online tools – and specifically, how to use them as a writer.

I came away from the meeting with a long list of things to read and experiment with. One of Debbie’s suggestions was to “Use more video!” so I asked her if she’d give me a True Rule for my video series. Here’s her True Rule:

In case you can’t watch the video, Debbie says: “My True Rule is that you should rock the boat. Don’t let fear stop you, don’t let what other people might think stop you, just push it as far as you can go – rock the boat, take risks, and experiment.”

* Two friends of mine started a fantastic new blog, Drinking Diaries, "where women spill their drinking stories." I was pleased when they asked me to do a guest post -- I wrote about Why I stopped drinking alcohol (more or less).

* Check out my companion site, the Happiness Project Toolbox. Great tools to build your happiness -- and the chance to see what OTHER people are doing!

Fourteen Tips for Running a Good Meeting.

Every Wednesday is Tip Day.
This Wednesday: 14 tips for running a good meeting.

Nothing can drain the happiness from you faster than a long, unproductive meeting. You’re bored; you’re not getting anything done; emails are piling up while you sit, trapped.

On the other hand, a productive meeting is exhilarating. A long time ago, when I was working in Washington, D.C., I remember a friend who worked at the Department of Justice saying, “Jamie Gorelick runs a meeting so well, it brings tears to my eyes.”

Meetings come in all shapes and sizes, so not all of these strategies will be useful, but here are some things I try to remember when I’m in or running a meeting:

1. Very obvious: Start on time, and end on time. Once people see that meetings are starting late, the bad habit builds, because people see there’s no point in showing up promptly. Here's one solution for late starts: a friend worked at a law firm that started fining partners $100 if they were late to a meeting, which turned out to be very effective. If the meeting has to run long, say, “We’re not through with the seven points, so can everyone stay fifteen extra minutes to wrap up?” That way, people know that the end is in sight.

2. At the same time, remember that it’s helpful to spend a little time in chit-chat. For a long time, I didn’t believe this to be true, and I tried to be hyper-efficient, but now I realize that it’s important – and productive – for people to have a chance to relate on a personal level. People need to build friendships, they need a chance to show their personalities, they need to establish rapport. Meetings are very important for this process.

3. If some people hesitate to jump in, find a way to draw them out. Ability to grab the floor doesn’t necessarily correlate with capacity to contribute.

4. One of the most insightful things my father ever told me was, “If you’re willing to take the blame, people will give you the responsibility.” Meetings often involve blame-giving and blame-taking, and although it’s not pleasant to accept blame, it’s a necessary aspect of getting responsibility (if deserved, of course). Proving my father’s point, one of my best meeting experiences ever was a time when I took the blame – rightly – for something done by a team of people working with me. Doing this ended up dramatically increasing my organizational credibility on all sides.

5. Share the credit. Along with blame, a meeting is also a great place to give people credit for their ideas and accomplishments. Be quick to point out great work or to call for a round of applause for a colleague. For some reason, people often act as though credit is a zero-sum goody, and if they share credit, they’ll get less themselves. From what I’ve seen, sharing credit not only doesn’t diminish the number of gold stars you get, but adds to them – because people so admire the ability to give credit. (Gold star junkie that I am, I pay close attention in this area.)

6. Making people feel stupid isn’t productive, and it isn’t kind. A friend has a good suggestion: “Be cheerfully, impersonally decisive.”

7. Have an agenda and stick to it. If possible, circulate the agenda in advance, along with anything else that needs to be read to prepare for the meeting. Make sure people know if they should bring anything. Along the same lines…

8. Never go to a meeting if you don’t know why you’re supposed to be there! This seems obvious, but it’s a situation that arises surprisingly frequently.

9. Standing meetings should be kept as short as possible and very structured. Have rules for canceling the meeting when appropriate – if such-and-such doesn’t happen; if only a certain number of people can attend, etc.

10. Don't say things that will undermine or antagonize other people. Turns out they do in fact notice this, and they don't appreciate it. If you wonder if you're an offender, check yourself against this list.

11. Be very specific about what the “action items” are (to use the business-school term). Who is agreeing to do what, by when? Make sure someone is keeping track of what is supposed to happen as a consequence of the meeting, and at the meeting’s end, review these items so it’s crystal clear to everyone. Follow up by email.

12. If a meeting is long, schedule breaks when people can check their email and phones. Otherwise, they get very distracted by feeling they’ve been out of touch for too long (for some people, this takes about ten minutes), and they start sneakily emailing under the table. As if no one will notice. Which they do.

13. Meetings should stay tightly focused. If people want a chance to discuss side issues, theoretical problems, or philosophical questions that aren’t relevant to the purpose of the meeting, they should set up a separate meeting.

14. Here’s a radical solution: no chairs. In Bob Sutton’s terrific book, The No A**** Rule, (printed that way not out of prudery but to avoid spamblockers), he points to a study that showed that people in meetings where everyone stood took 34% less time to make an assigned decision, with decisions that were just as good as those made by groups who were sitting down.

What am I missing? What are some other strategies for improving meetings?

* BoingBoing is a "directory of wonderful things," and it truly is. You never know what you'll find, but there's always a lot of interesting stuff there.

* For more discussions about happiness, join the Facebook Page.

Happiness: Paddling a Canoe, Not Biting the Hook.

From time to time, I post short interviews with interesting people about their insights on happiness. During my research, I’ve noticed that I often learn more from one person’s highly idiosyncratic experiences than I do from sources that detail universal principles or cite up-to-date studies.

One of the most consistently fascinating and provocative writers – online and in print – is Seth Godin. I love his blog, Seth Godin’s Blog, and I’ve read several of his many books. Seth’s field is marketing, but marketing understood very broadly – he often discusses subjects like authenticity, communication, community, entrepreneurship, fulfillment, the future of media, and happiness.

He’s written many interesting books – my personal favorites are Tribes and Permission Marketing.

Because I’m such a fan of his thinking, I was very intrigued to hear what Seth Godin had to say on the subject of happiness.

Gretchen: What’s a simple activity that consistently makes you happier?
Seth: I honestly believe that external events are a poor predictor (or causer) of happiness. There are certainly things I can do to prompt some short-term happiness, but in general, it's a decision more than an act. For example, every time (every time!) that I go to visit Acumen Fund and my friend Jacqueline Novogratz, I leave happier than I came in.

What’s something you know now about happiness that you didn’t know when you were 18 years old?
Don't try so hard.

Is there anything you find yourself doing repeatedly that gets in the way of your happiness?
I used to be able to make myself unhappy by reading anonymous criticism of my work online. No middle ground to the attacks, no way to respond, no happiness. So I stopped.

Is there a happiness mantra or motto that you’ve find very helpful? (e.g., I remind myself to “Be Gretchen.”) Or a particular book that has stayed with you?
I think Pema Chodron's suggestion, "Don't bite the hook," is a really easy way to avoid the dead ends that can so easily get me caught up. One of the easiest mantras I have is flashing back to paddling a wooden and canvas canoe, solo, across Teepee Lake in Algonquin Park. The sun is setting, the water is calm and there's a loon on one side of my boat and a beaver on the other. That works every time.

As for books, the work of Zig Ziglar, Pema Chodron and Ben Zander never fail to work.

If you’re feeling blue, how do you give yourself a happiness boost?
I write. I ride my bicycle or strap on my cross-country skis. Forward motion, no wallowing.

Is there anything that you see people around you doing or saying that adds a lot to their happiness, or detracts a lot from their happiness?
I think it's possible to eat your way unhappy. I also believe that whining and complaining never (not once) increases someone's happiness level. On the other hand, sending someone a thank-you note or a small present benefits you far more than it does the recipient.

Have you always felt about the same level of happiness, or have you been through a period when you felt exceptionally happy or unhappy – if so, why? If you were unhappy, how did you become happier?
I spent some unhappy years in my early 20s, and again when my mom died. On the other hand, I've been insanely, positively happy almost every single day for the last thirty years, mostly because I just decided I liked things better that way.

Do you work on being happier? If so, how?
"Working" is not as good a word as "choosing.” I don't think happiness is a project as much as it is a habit. [I would suggest: For many people, it takes a project to build a habit!]

Have you ever been surprised that something you expected would make you very happy, didn’t – or vice versa?
Finishing projects almost never makes me happy. It creates a void. I don't much like milestones either. Any event where you're supposed to be a happy is a challenge!

* I send out short monthly newsletters that highlight the best of the previous month’s posts to about 23,000 subscribers. If you’d like to sign up, click here or email me at grubin, then the “at” sign, then gretchenrubin dot com. (sorry about that weird format – trying to to thwart spammers.) Just write “newsletter” in the subject line. It’s free.

Jung, Buffy, Twilight, Virginia Woolf -- and Happiness.

I love Carl Jung (the bits of his work that I understand, which isn’t much), and one of my favorite Jung quotations is, “The creative mind plays with the objects it loves.”

This video clip is a perfect example – found on my friend Lev Grossman’s excellent blog, Nerd World. I love the fact that Jonathan McIntosh had the creative energy and interest to create this mash-up of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Twilight:

I connected with this remix on several levels:
-- Take time for projects – clearly Jonathan McIntosh is following that very important resolution.

-- though I’m not a historic Buffy fan, my TV-writer sister has worked a lot with Joss Whedon, so I always take an interest in his work.

-- I love Twilight, books and movie alike. How much, you ask? I’ve read Midnight Sun. And The Host.

-- There was a split-second clip from Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, which I recognized, of course. Huge raving Harry Potter fan. I’ve got a ticket to the very first showing, at midnight in a few weeks, of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

-- Even my former lawyerly self got engaged in considering the assertion at the end that “This transformative work constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright law.” Why didn’t a case like this come up when I was hanging around courthouses?

Perhaps I should make a new resolution, to “Play with the objects I love.” I’m already doing this with my passion for J.M. Barrie’s The Boy Castaways of Black Lake Island. A friend and I are doing an homage to Barrie’s brilliant skeletal picture book – ours is called “Four to Llewelyn’s Edge.” This has turned out to be an enormous undertaking, and so much fun.

Along those lines, I wonder if I could use popular new tools (YouTube, as in the example above, or Twitter, or Facebook, as well as my blog) to shine a spotlight on my more obscure and more demanding passions. I want to highlight the things I love, and to try to entice others to follow me – just as this video made me want to watch old episodes of Buffy The Vampire Slayer.

One idea: I’m considering sending out daily Tweets that are quotations from one of my favorite books, Virginia Woolf’s The Waves (bizarre: this book doesn't seem to be for sale on Amazon). I would love doing this. I wonder if the book would be interesting to anyone else in that form – if the beautiful writing would be engaging out of context like that – or if it would be too reductive. Perhaps, as in the video mash-up above, new pleasures could be revealed in a work that is usually read in a different way.

Hmmmmmmm.

* Very apt for this subject -- Bricolage Life. Looking at this blog made me want to sit down and MAKE something.

* Follow me on Twitter. I may or may not be sending out Woolf quotations in the near future.