Happier at Home

Uhhh. I'm not sure how this got on my list or what I thought it would be. I just finished “There's No Such Thing About Bad Weather”, which is insights into the difference between Swedish and North American parenting. I thought this book would be something more like that, an examination of happiness told through the lens of the author's experience. Maybe that's what it was supposed to be but, man, after listening to this on 1.5 speed for 45 min I couldn't take it anymore. This book seems like it was a pamphlet that was expanded to a book. I can't handle the overly flowery descriptions of what your kids are doing every minute of the day which serve as padding.

After 45 minutes I'm not even sure what this book is supposed to be about, something about a “happiness project” but beyond that from what I can tell just reading the extremely long title of this book gives you enough information to infer the rest of the book. The other thing that put me off was the comparison early on made to Eat Pray Love, if that's what your striving for then I'm already out.

I ended up with a library book I wanted to finish and spin around. And at about 250 pages it was a quick read: Happier at Home, by Gretchen Rubin.

Sadly, I found it lacking. It's not written for me. It's about precisely what it sounds like: how to be happier in your home. Useful for those of us in places melting down with infections right now.

But I don't like the tone. She's a rich white woman who went to Yale and lives in New York with two kids and a husband. She gets to write books all day after having a successful law career at the top levels of the Supreme Court.

She basically puts all her eggs in family, kids, having the “right amount” of no doubt expensive possessions and making time for things like acupuncture.

I'm a gay man in Indiana who can't have kids, makes nowhere near that kind of money, has no family, and hates spending money.

Like I said, this book just wasn't written for me.

I found this book by looking for a list of books about long-term relationships and making them work. This was a very good read, not so much for relationships exactly but a way to frame your own thinking and life to get the most happiness out of it. She repeats throughout the book that you cannot control other people but you can control yourself. Making yourself happy makes the people around you happy.

Would highly recommend.

I love Gretchen Rubin's books. She recently redid the audio book and read the book herself which made it so much for enjoyable. This book makes me strive to make small changes to bring greater joy. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it.

I first read this book in November 2012, and here I am over three years later rereading it. This is the kind of book that makes more sense to read when you feel more settled. So many of Gretchen's thought processes and plans for each month resonated with me, and I'm excited to work on upping the game with my own happiness at home.

I really like Gretchen Rubin and her quest for self perfection. I vacillate between being inspired by her detailed, mindful thoughts of how to make tiny behavior changes to make life better (an approach that suits me as well) and being totally stressed by all the things she discovers she should be doing (and apparently successfully adopts as new habits!) that I am not doing. I really identified her quest to engage with her personal space (like home decoration stuff) rather than to follow her instinct of just not bothering. But then I get stressed out thinking about how I can improve my own space/life. Self help lit is like this as a rule I think, kind of enlightening but kind of stressful. So maybe I'll just shift back to mystery and fantasy.

The library's kindle version of this book was corrupted and was ruining my kindle reading experience (super slow) so I actually gave up about 40% through the book. But I think I got enough from it.

I love the way Rubin writes about her experiences with happiness and encourages others to find their own happys. I came away from reading this book with a lot to think about, despite having a completely different life than hers. Or possibly BECAUSE I have a completely different life... I was never tempted to take her happiness resolutions and shoehorn them into my life, but rather to think about what worked in MY life.

[Some days my reviews are more influenced by other Goodreads reviews than the actual book I read...]

Your happiness starts at home. All the great philosophers tell us this. As does happiness guru Gretchen Rubin in her new book, Happier at Home.

Rubin narrows her focus on happiness here in this, her second book on happiness, but she also delves more deeply. Another delightful book, part self-help, part memoir.

Happily, I recommend it.