The Happiness Project

Dear You,

A few weeks ago I read the first chapter of the book The Happiness Project and fell in love, I bought it for my mom as a mother's day gift and ended up borrowing an ebook copy of my own from the library. I've been pouring over this book for the last week reading and rereading to make sure I got everything, highlighting a million different things, and learning all the different ideas about happiness and life that the brilliant author, Gretchen Rubin, offers throughout the book.

The highlights on the left are about 1/15 of my notes, I had so much fun with this book

It is about the author's journey to find more happiness throughout an already generally happy life. It's intelligently organized into 12 chapters for 12 months each with a certain theme (ex: energy, work, passion) and several specific resolutions to check off each day (remember birthdays, sing in the morning). 

Some of the things I most appreciated about this book were:

1) The Truthfulness - It's always a question for writers and people in general: How much of myself should I reveal? Which parts of my life am I willing to talk about? I can't know how much Rubin actually held back in her book however there were some painful truths throughout the book especially having to admit one's own faults and insecurities (one of the most difficult and disheartening actions in writing). After reading, I noticed I did several similar actions that I've now started noticing and I appreciate that she was willing to expose so much for the book, helping me in the process.

2) The Evidence - I have an entire section in my notes (yes I have about 5 full typed pages of organized notes) devoted to studies that I found interesting throughout the chapters and quotes from notable authors and philosophers with deep, interesting thoughts. This project was very well researched and articulated, providing evidence that the author didn't always necessarily agree with but evidence that was always relevant to the topic. 

3) The Blog Posts - Not every person who reads the book is going to be a successful author, living in the most populated city in the US, or married with two kids. She expressed the possibility of reader's inability to relate early in the book and I think she conquered this obstacle brilliantly by including some interesting comments from her blog titled The Happiness Project by other readers, in different circumstances, with different ideas on how they dealt with life and found happiness. While I found pages upon pages of wisdom from Rubin, I found several nuggets of wisdom that I could relate to or jot down to remember to incorporate into my life later on. 

The amazing author, Gretchen Rubin

I didn't completely agree with every thought Rubin had throughout the book, there were parts of the book that I couldn't relate to or apply to my life in any single way however that's what makes being human so interesting, right? That we're all unique and take away certain thoughts and morals from every person we meet, every show we watch, every song we sing at the top of our lungs. If I ever completely agree with any single person I would feel the need to change just to stay unique. And while I didn't agree with every thought, the ones I didn't agree with made me think twice as hard about what I did believe about the idea and I appreciate the books capacity to challenge my morals and ideals. 

Overall it is now one of my favorite books and has inspired me to start my own happiness project and start reading more literature on happiness I'm thinking of starting with the book "14,000 Things to be Happy About" which I've heard nice things about. Rubin updates her blog often so I highly recommend her book and blog and keep a look out for a post on the start of my own personal Happiness Project :)

Have an Amazing Day!!!

Mia B