Essay On Happiness Project

Simple in concept but comprehensively broad, happiness is often the sole indicator of how people perceive their lives. Therefore, happiness needs to be worked towards; and one way to gain happiness is with a Happiness Project. The Happiness Project was created by Gretchen Rubin, author of The Happiness Project. Rubin realized that although her life was successful and she did not feel unhappy, she constantly felt like she needed something more, and decided to evaluate her life to gain more happiness. For the next year of her life, she spent every month with a new goal, along with smaller resolutions within each month. The goal of her book is not to have the reader read a book about her life, but for the reader to learn and create their own Happiness Project. Hence, this is why I’ve done my own Happiness Project. The theme of my project was to create leisure time for myself. During the school year, it’s easy for students to get caught in a schedule where they repeat the same things everyday. That happened to me this year; I woke up, went to school, went to basketball practice, did homework, and then went to sleep. Before starting the Happiness Project, I realized that although I was not unhappy with this schedule, I could also be happier if I had more time to myself. This is why my goal was to create leisure time; which for me means time outside of school and sports to do things I enjoy, such as being with friends or playing a video game. Although my Happiness Project is based off Rubin’s, mine was only a month, but within that month I had five resolutions. My first resolution, and most important, was to give up procrastination. To keep myself accountable for this resolution, I created the One-and Done Rule, which was a variation of Rubin’s One-Minute Rule. My One-and-Done Rule is if there is an assignment I can finish in one sitting, I won’t split it up between more days. I find myself splitting simple task apart rather than just doing it altogether, which will give me more time overall. I expected this resolution to work towards the overall …show more content…
I often never found time to do these beforehand, and my happiness project was intended to give me time. I expected this to bring me happiness because Rubin said that making an activity rare had the same effect as doing it everyday. When you do an activity you enjoy everyday, it brings happiness just as doing it once a week or month. Finally, my fifth resolution was to spend at least an extra hour with friends and family. It’s hard for me to balance school, sports and friends, so creating time where I have to do the latter seemed to be a good idea. I expected leisure time with friends or family to bring me happiness. Adding all five resolutions together was a plan that I felt would work both sides of my issue. The first side being not having enough time, where the first three resolutions will solve this by forcing me to use my time better. The second side of the issue being using my leisure time better, which the last two resolutions made me spend it with friends and doing activities I enjoyed. For me, these five resolutions were my Happiness Project, feasible goals that I felt would bring me more happiness