It’s Friday: time to think about YOUR Happiness Project. This week: read Sonja Lyubormirsky’s THE HOW OF HAPPINESS.

I’m working on my Happiness Project, and you should 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.

I just finished reading Lyubomirsky’s book, The How of Happiness,and it’s the PERFECT book if you’re starting a happiness project. It lays out the different strategies to pursue to boost happiness and provides the scientific rationale behind each of them.

Lyubomirsky talks about the “40% solution” to happiness. Research shows that happiness is 50% a product of genetics, 10% a product of circumstances (wealth, health, age, marital status, etc.), and 40% a product of the way we think and how we live our lives.

Forty percent is a lot.

I was very interested to read The How of Happiness; for my work on my own Happiness Project, I pulled together much of the same research and devised, in many cases, similar areas of focus. Though I put my own idiosyncratic spin on it.

Doing it myself was more beneficial, because my Happiness Project is perfectly tailored for me and my way of thinking, and more importantly, the process of devising it forced me to think very deeply about my own particular happiness; however, for people who don’t want to spend QUITE as much time on it, this book gives a terrific grounding and a framework for setting forth.

One way this book is different from many books on happiness – whether by philosophers, scientists, or self-help gurus – is that Lyubomirsky emphasizes that different people need to take different routes to happiness. The “fit,” she stresses, is very important.

Absolutely true. That’s why my First Commandment is “Be Gretchen.” I have to pursue happiness in a way that makes sense for me. As Montaigne wrote, “The least strained and most natural ways of the soul are the most beautiful; the best occupations are the least forced.”

I get very annoyed with people like Thoreau who insist that there’s only one route to happiness (which, coincidentally, conforms perfectly with the way they like to live their lives). Or the happiness researchers who say things like “After a person has $15,000, money makes no difference to happiness.” This simply CANNOT be universally true!

So if you’re eager to start a Happiness Project, but you don’t know where to start, or you want to know the scientific basis for various recommendations, this book will be a big help.

Continuing mystery of happiness research: why no happiness researchers talk about the effect of physical environment (e.g., clutter, beauty). If you look in popular culture, people are clearly very preoccupied with this and its effect on happiness – but as far as I can tell, the scientific happiness experts never consider it.

*
I had a lot of fun with the folks making the documentary Happiness Is. They interviewed me for the movie about "the pursuit of happiness in America." It's about to premiere at the SXSW Fillm Festival, and I hope I'll be able to see it soon here in New York.

*
New to the Happiness Project? Consider subscribing to my RSS feed: Subscribe to this blog's feed. Or sign up to get email updates in the box at the top righthand corner.
If you're starting your own happiness project, please join the Happiness Project Group on Facebook to swap ideas. It's easy; it's free.

Comments

[Mrs. Micah]

I'm already about 1/3 of the way through it. :) Thanks, btw, because I probably wouldn't have picked it up if I hadn't already been reading The Happiness Project. It just seemed like fate when someone returned it while I was on the check-in desk. So I checked it out immediately.

[Paige]

I'll have to check this out. I have noticed that when I get up, decide that this will be a good, happy day and see that I've made progress on accomplishing whatever it is I intend to accomplish, that I am a happier person as a result.

[Sharyn]

I believe that the 40% statistic is why the pursuit of happiness can seem so elusive. You have to work at it, you can't just choose it and get instant results, or buy your way into it. It's your own private and personal journey. You have to figure it out, discover it for yourself. It can certainly take a lot of effort, in our instant gratification society. So many people only try for what's easy, fast or short-term. Never, Never, Never, Never give up - Churchill, of course.
(an aside): I was sorry to read that meditation doesn't seem a good choice for you. I've been amazed by it. But it didn't come easily at all.

[Danny]

On one hand, I am with you on the idea that truths on happiness simply cannot be universal. But I also think a lot of times we struggle with figuring out what makes us happy. Case in point is the paradox of choice. We think choices would make us happy when in fact, given limited or no choice, we do what we can to view the situation as a positive one.

[Gabe]

Coincidentally, I just saw this book for the first time this morning on Amazon's bestseller list, and then again a few hours later in the half-off rack at Borders. Now, with your recommendation, I think I have to buy this book. :)

[Erika]

--Continuing mystery of happiness research: why no happiness researchers talk about the effect of physical environment (e.g., clutter, beauty).--

I think environmental psychology is the field you are looking for. Like much of psychology, it focuses a lot on the negative, but there are some definite gems concerning happiness there. Email me at the address associated with the comment (I assume you can see that Gretchen) if you want me to try to pull together a reading list.

[Melissa]

I have to agree with Danny. I think a lot of people struggle with knowing what really makes them happy- as opposed to what they think is supposed to make them happy.If you are caught in this trap you spend energy trying but the end result is only lack-luster at best. Part of my own Happiness Project is to keep a running list of the things that make me happy. I am hoping that in a few months I will be able to see patterns of what really works for me.

[HP van Duuren]

Sounds interesting, 50% genetics, 40% the way we think, and only 10% the product of circumstances.

At the moment on my site I have a post about a book that pushes the limits of the 'product of circumstances'-idea even further!

In the Book titled: "Happy for No Reason"
the author says that you better not base your Happiness on conditions from the 'Outside', but get it from 'Within'.

That it's not about HOW to become Happy, based on conditions like for example:

'I will be Happy when "X" or "Y"
happens', etc. etc. ....,

Instead that it's all about BE-ing Happy.

BTW something that I also cover in my own little ebook. (that everybody - without a shadow of a doubt - has already read?! :) )

You can even hear the author Marci Shimoff tell about it herself because I have a link to an interview with her, you can find it all at:

http://hpshappy.blogspot.com

All the Best,
HP

P.S. (it goes without saying that you can also have a look a FREE Preview of my own Happy Little ebook.)