Completely by chance, as I was wandering a bookstore recently, I found the book “The Happiness Project” by Gretch Rubin I remembered that my friend Chrissy had mentioned this book once, so I picked it up and began looking it over. Wow, this is just what I “needed!” it’s a book about one woman’s journey to find happiness. She decided to take a year to do it.
So that’s what I want, too. I feel like my weight loss that started in September was the beginning of this journey, I just didn’t know what the next steps were. I really wanted to find me, the adult me, the one who is in charge, who has things “planned” instead of feeling like I’m constantly reacting to the whims of others. I want our little family to have a firm foundation, some routines, some traditions, some time for just unplanned / unscripted fun.
While happiness can come out of unscriptedness, I don’t think that living an unplanned life (for me) can result in happiness and fulfillment. It’s too easy to get caught up in everything else, doing things for everyone else, so that at the end of a day or a month of a year, you step back and wonder … where did all that time go?
It’s like the first time Sean and I went to Hawaii. He said he’d never been because there just wasn’t enough money. To which I said – if you plan, and save, and put the money aside, you will have enough. It’s a matter of making things a priority. Happiness is a priority, but I don’t think enough of us make time for it. Happiness doesn’t just happen, you have to make it happen. Sometimes, you might need money for happiness, but there are ways to make money without making big changes to your lifestyle. One way people can make money is by looking into different investment options. For example, there may be people who want to know how to in REIT ETFs investieren (invest in REIT ETFs) but are unsure of where to start. Those people could always research online to see if they could make themselves some extra money. That would increase their happiness.
Now I feel like I have some ideas of what the next, real, tangible steps will be. For right now, I’m going to make “Energy” might focus for this month. Gretchen Rubin broke her year up into 12 areas of focus, so I am going to follow that lead. Energy was also her first area to work on, and I can see that it makes sense for me to start there, too. I’m going to be working on more lists and ideas, too.
What makes you happy? What can you do more of to make you happy this year?
Let’s get happy,
Paula
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| The Happiness Project begins! |