Hi everyone, this week’s post is dedicated to an author/speaker. She is known for her amazing books on happiness, habits, and most recently, the five senses. If you think you’ve guessed who she is, then click the button below to find out what I think about her…
Well, the author I want to talk about is Gretchen Rubin. Best-selling author of several amazing books, Gretchen Rubin is one of today’s most influential and thought-provoking observers of happiness and human nature.
Her first book, The Happiness Project (which I read out of order as I read her book on habits Better than Before first) has sold millions world-wide in many languages. This one I think I have reviewed before but just in case you’ve missed it or forgotten, check it out here. This book really impacted me and gave me an opportunity to delve into my own happiness and research more into what it meant to be happy. Following her advice from both The Happiness Project and Happier at Home, I began incorporating things that made me happy in my own life, and my home. Every single page in this read felt as if Gretchen was talking to you over a cup of coffee, it’s that easy to read!! Her monthly resolutions are practical and the principles she outlines are so life-affirming. Interspersed with all of these are lovely anecdotes about her family which make it all the more real. It was those stories that made me want to read more of her works and she didn’t disappoint with the ‘sequel’ of sorts!!
In Happier at home (Crown Archetype; 2012), Gretchen goes deeper on factors that matter for home, such as possessions, marriage, time, and parenthood. She had come to write this after a wave of homesickness hit her while she unloaded the dishwasher. “Of all the elements of a happy life,” she thought, “my home is the most important”. In a flash, she had decided to undertake a new happiness project, and this time, to focus on home. She wanted to appreciate how much happiness there was already. So, starting in September (the new January), Gretchen Rubin dedicated a school year – September through May – to making her home a place of greater simplicity, comfort, and love. With the signature blend of memoir, science, philosophy, and experimentation, Gretchen’s passion for her subject jumps off the page, and readers – by taking in just a few chapters of this book – will be inspired to find more happiness in their lives. I found this even more helpful in honing my own happiness project, especially for my home life. I suppose this blog was a result of both these books combined and the impact they had on my own habits and routines. What I liked the best were the Splendid Truths and Secrets of Adulthood she shares and how they can help plan out your own happiness project. These two were the ones that I felt most inspired by even though she’s got so many more published now!!
After I had completed these amazing books, I started following Gretchen on Facebook and found out that she had a podcast, Happier with Gretchen Rubin, and would occasionally tune in. Her witty banter, and funny anecdotes with her sister Elizabeth, are enough to fill up anyone’s heart with warmth. I know, I’m fangirling a bit aren’t I!! I hope this post inspires you all to go check out her amazing books too!!
Stay safe and keep reading
Miss Mahee
Miss Mahee's Library of Reads 