Book Review Time!

I am finally attempting to review The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin. Rubin was riding a bus with her daughter on the way to school one morning. She realized she was not as happy as she should be with her life. She was financially comfortable, she had work she enjoyed, and she had a wonderful family. Thus came a question: Why was she not overwhelmingly happy? What was standing in her way? In that moment The Happiness Project was born.

In order to find a place to start, Rubin started reading everything she could about happiness. Once she had learned about the various happiness theories to which people ascribe, she set out to test them for herself. She had no idea how many of them would apply to her personally. Rubin also realized this was a daunting undertaking, so she broke the theories down into smaller more manageable tasks. To provide structure, she created a theme for each month of the year. Her themes include: Vitality, Marriage, Work, Parenthood, Leisure, Friendship, Money, Eternity, Books, Mindfulness and Attitude. Each theme had several specific resolutions. These resolutions included: laugh out loud, keep a food diary, write a novel, keep a gratitude notebook, give something up, make three new friends, take time to be silly, sing in the morning, ask for help, quit nagging and go to bed earlier. Before she embarked on these months she created twelve personal commandments. These commandments ranged from "Be Gretchen" to "Act the way I want to feel" to "Do it now".

Throughout the book Rubin learns what works to help her happiness each month. Some theories work well, others not nearly as much. She also discovers her own personal "Four Splendid Truths" for her happiness. One of her great discoveries was how keeping her resolutions at the forefront of her mind via a chart was incredibly helpful in maintaining focus. All of these discoveries lead up to a central idea about what truly makes up happiness for her.

All in all I learned much about happiness from reading her book. It helped me understand some of my own obstacles to joy. It has reminded me of what is truly important in life. While I am not currently ready to take on a happiness project of my own, it is an idea that appeals to me. The book was well worth the time to read. I truly enjoyed the ideas and the writing. You will have to read for yourself exactly how she fared in her own project. I hope you do, it will be time well spent. It will not only teach you the theories behind happiness, it may also help you find more joy in your own life.