If You’re So Smart, Why Aren’t you Happy? summary

You’re a smart person, right? So why do you always end up falling into the same depressing ruts?

It might have something to do with the seven deadly sins. Now, we’re not talking about biblical sins, but rather the bad habits that get in the way of happiness.

The first sin is the human habit of devaluing happiness.

Despite our desire to be happy, we tend to ignore happiness as a goal and not give it the priority it deserves.

The author, along with fellow professors Sunaina Chugani from City University of New York and Ashesh Mukherjee from McGill University, conducted a study to determine what things people associate with happiness.

Participants were asked to make three wishes for things that they believed would lead to happiness. The researchers found that generally, people wish for things like money, fame and success because they know what they’re getting. Meanwhile, they tended to ignore happiness itself because it seems too abstract a concept to wish for.

But if you think about it, shouldn’t happiness be everyone’s top priority?

Of course different things make different people happy – so before you can prioritize happiness, you need to define it.

Ask yourself what emotion you associate with happiness. This way you can learn to better understand where it comes from. Perhaps you associate happiness with love; if this is the case, your relationship with your partner is probably central to your well-being.

With this in mind, try creating a journal to record all the different things that bring happiness into your daily life. Recall all the memorable moments of happiness and write down what you were doing, who you were with and what led to those positive feelings.

Maybe you were traveling with someone you love, and seeing the world, or maybe you were spending time with your family during the holidays.

Once you have these events written down, you’ll have a clear picture of the kind of things you should be focusing on and making time for in your life, thereby letting in more happiness.