“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
” by Gretchen Rubin – July 2011I borrowed this book from the public library and read most of it in the 3 week loan period. I had to return it at that point as it was on hold and could not be renewed so I skipped the last few chapters.
I enjoyed the way Ms Rubin was able to take what could be a somewhat abstract and subjective topic – happiness – and find a way to quantify it through research.
I felt that some of her projects were unrealistic for someone like me – a mom with 4 children and limited time and money. One of her chapters does discuss whether money can buy happiness though :-) It was sometimes problematic to me because I felt for example that collecting items was a waste of money, time, space, energy, etc. I am really not into things like that that have no eternal value… One of the most practical discoveries I made was that in order to get the happy feelings from a hug, the hug needed to last at least 6 seconds. So my husband and I have put that into practice – surely we can spare 6 seconds a day for each other :-)
I would recommend this book to virtually anyone who is curious about increasing happiness in their lives, however I do think it is skewed towards married couples with children as that is where she’s coming from.
I enjoyed the way Ms Rubin was able to take what could be a somewhat abstract and subjective topic – happiness – and find a way to quantify it through research. I felt that some of her projects were unrealistic for someone like me – a mom with 4 children and limited time and money. One of her chapters does discuss whether money can buy happiness though :-) It was sometimes problematic to me because I felt for example that collecting items was a waste of money, time, space, energy, etc. I am really not into things like that that have no eternal value… One of the most practical discoveries I made was that in order to get the happy feelings from a hug, the hug needed to last at least 6 seconds. So my husband and I have put that into practice – surely we can spare 6 seconds a day for each other :-)
I would recommend this book to virtually anyone who is curious about increasing happiness in their lives, however I do think it is skewed towards married couples with children as that is where she’s coming from.
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