The Happiness Project: Do good, feel good.

The Happiness Project

I’m working on a book, THE HAPPINESS PROJECT, a memoir of the year I spent test-driving the wisdom of the ages, the current scientific studies, and the lessons from popular culture about how to be happy--from Aristotle to Martin Seligman to Thoreau to Oprah. On this daily blog, I recount my adventures as I grapple with the challenge of being happier. THE HAPPINESS PROJECT will hit the shelves in December 2009 (Harper).

What Started Me Thinking

"Whoever is happy will make others happy, too." Mark Twain.
“There is no duty we so much underrate as the duty of being happy.” Robert Louis Stevenson
"Martha, Martha, thou art careful and troubled about many things: But one thing is needful: and Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her." Luke 10:41-42
“Imaginary evil is romantic and varied; real evil is gloomy, monotonous, barren, boring. Imaginary good is boring; real good is always new, marvelous, intoxicating.” Simone Weil
“What a wonderful life I’ve had! I only wish I’d realized it sooner.” Colette
“It is easy to be heavy: hard to be light.” G. K. Chesterton
“A man’s first care should be to avoid the reproaches of his own heart.” Joseph Addison
“Best is good. Better is best.” Lisa Grunwald
“Order is Heaven’s first law.” Alexander Pope

Happiness Theories I Reject

Flaubert: "To be stupid, and selfish, and to have good health are the three requirements for happiness; though if stupidity is lacking, the others are useless."
Vauvenargues: “There are men who are happy without knowing it.”
Eric Hoffer: “The search for happiness is one of the chief sources of unhappiness.”
Sartre: "Hell is other people."
Willa Cather: “One cannot divine nor forecast the conditions that will make happiness; one only stumbles upon them…”
Alexander Smith: “We are never happy; we can only remember that we were so once.”
John Stuart Mill: “Ask yourself whether you are happy, and you cease to be so.”

When it comes to happiness, it’s very important to remember to ACT AS YOU WANT TO FEEL. People believe they act because of the way they feel, but in fact, we very often feel because of the way we act.

So to change your emotions, change your actions. If you want to feel like a caring person, act in a caring way. If you want to have more loving feelings toward someone, perform loving actions for that person's benefit. Doing good makes you feel good.

It really works.

The Big Man and I went away for the weekend, and to his great annoyance, he couldn’t find his iPod when we got home. He thought it wasn’t even worth the trouble to call the hotel and gym we used. Eager to earn a check in the “think of small treats and courtesies” box on my happiness-project self-scoring chart, I went ahead and called.

I had no real hope that the iPod would be found, but awarded myself a gold star just for calling (and I’ll do anything for a gold star).

Surprise—Brian from the gym called. Someone had turned in the iPod, and Brian was mailing it back right away.

The only thing interesting about the story is the question: who felt happier? He who got his beloved iPod back, or she who made the call that located it?

Answer: Of the two of us, I felt happier. It thrilled me to imagine how pleased he would be. Do good, feel good.

Comments

He took an iPod along on when going on a weekend with you? Why? Surely the uninterrupted pleasure of your company should be more than enough.

Posted by: Bill Parkes | May 22, 2006 at 11:56 AM

This is so true, very good advice

Posted by: Larry | May 25, 2006 at 05:20 AM

Gretchen,
Another question about who felt happier about the iPod being found anreturned...

What about Brian? How good did he feel about being able to send it back, knowing that it would soon be caressed by the loving and secure thumb of it's owner?

Posted by: Mason Turner | July 10, 2009 at 07:41 PM

Verify your Comment

Previewing your Comment

Posted by: |

This is only a preview. Your comment has not yet been posted.

Your comment could not be posted. Error type:

Your comment has been posted. Post another comment

The letters and numbers you entered did not match the image. Please try again.

As a final step before posting your comment, enter the letters and numbers you see in the image below. This prevents automated programs from posting comments.

Having trouble reading this image? View an alternate.