Emily Kaye Lazzaro

I picked up The Happiness Project at the library last week because I saw it on the staff recommendations shelf at the Harvard Coop and then I also saw it for sale at Anthropologie and I was like “somebody up there (God in heaven, obvs) wants me to read this book.”  I got it from the library because we are on a budget and though the pages are disgusting beyond belief (I try imagining who borrowed this book before me, I think it could only have been an elderly woman with no hands who had to read with her feet but she was also very busy so she could only read whilst eating, which would explain all the food stains… however that theory doesn’t help explain the spots that can only be, what, mold?) I am really enjoying it!  And since this blog is nothing if not utterly immature and unprofessional, I’m not going to finish reading the book before I start writing a blog about it.  Who’s got the time?  Not you and not me, that’s for sure.  I mean, I’m going to finish it, just not today.  Anyway, there’s lots of great stuff in there!  Stuff about how venting anger scientifically does nothing to make you or anyone around you feel any better.  Stuff about how helpful it can be to act the way you want to feel – it genuinely often makes you feel that way.  Stuff about making time to do things that make you happy and that the things that make people the most happy are the things they have to work for.  Fun fun fun.  Now.  What’s the point of this, you say?  I don’t really know, except that I want to list some things that make me happy in order to be mindful of them and maybe try to do those things more.  To make them a priority, you know?  And maybe once you guys read my super self-indulgent list of things that make me happy, you can list some of your own stuff in the comments and then we can all be mindful of doing things that make us happy more!  So here’s my list of things that make me happy:

-cooking and baking
-being outside
-dogs
-dressing up fancy and going to fancy places
-exercise (specifically weight lifting and running)
-eating really good food
-reading embarrassing, addictive best sellers
-helping and being useful
-nail art

This list doesn’t include things like my family because, what, I have to list everybody in my family?  It also doesn’t include things like writing, acting, theatre, etc, because, I don’t know, I don’t have to be mindful of that because I do that all day all the time.  Family and career things are a given to me.  But it’s helpful, I think, for me to remember the other things that make me happy so I try to make sure I keep doing them.  And so that I prioritize them instead of prioritizing things like “feeling guilty about calories” or “belittling myself and my career” or “being jealous” and other stuff like that.  FOR EXAMPLE, next time I get bogged down hating myself and thinking I’m doing a bad job at being a theatre artist, instead of that I will try to do some nail art outside in the park while dogs play nearby and a pie cools in the kitchen.  DOESN’T THAT SOUND DELIGHTFUL?!