Happy Home: How to be Happier at Home, a Conversation With Happiness Project Expert Gretchen Rubin

What is your image of a happy home? Samuel Johnson said, The ultimate result of all ambition is to be happier at home.

If you would welcome added happiness into your home and your life, look no further than Gretchen Rubin's bestselling memoir The Happiness Project, Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle and Generally Have More Fun.

While clerking for Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, Gretchen decided she wanted to be a writer. Gretchen seeks insights on happiness with the same determination that earned her the position of editor-in-chief of Yale Law Journal.

On Gretchen's popular blog, The Happiness Project, she recounts her "daily adventures in pursuit of happiness." She investigates scientific research as well as pop culture, elevating the pursuit of happiness to both a science and an art form.

Recently I had the great pleasure of talking to Gretchen about Happiness in the Home, the title of her next book, due out next August from Crown Publishing. Below I quote and, in some cases, paraphrase Gretchen's wisdom.

How do you define Happiness?

I don't really concern myself about coming up with a final definition of happiness. The looseness of the term is helpful, since different people have different definitions. We get tangled up. I just like to think about being happier.

What are your top 3 guiding principles for happiness?

1. Be yourself, know yourself, be Gretchen. You can only build a happy life on your own nature.
2. Strenghten and build relationships. Ancient philosophers and scientists agree on the importance of building strong relationships with others.
3. Create outer order, which contributes to inner calm. A messy coat closet seems trivial, but getting control of physical space makes people feel calmer. There is a disproportionate effect if I have to spend time thinking about where to put my umbrella.

How have novelty and challenge brought you greater happiness?

I like familiarity and mastery; I like to eat the same food everyday and I don't love to travel. So I did a 180 with the idea that novelty and challenge bring happiness.

I wondered, Will this principle be true for someone like me?

I decided okay I'll try doing a blog for one month. 

Know yourself. Try to pick something that leads to growth, learning, helping someone, changing something for the better.

If you're not happy, you can make something happen. Maybe you're getting a divorce. You might say, I'm getting divorced so I'll take a painting course.

How do you apply the concept of "now?"

"Now" is the idea that now is the time for everything I value; if there isn't time now to decorate for Halloween or go to the park, then it may not happen.

Things never slow down so if it's important, do it now.

We make time for warm greetings and farewells with our immediate family.

The central challenge of The Happiness Project is, How do you make time for what's important to you? I let go of things that ought to be important or that I wish were important. This way, life is perhaps no less crowded but more satisfying.

Can you explain how your one-sentence journal works

For me, it's unrealistic to keep a journal, so every night I write one sentence about something, the first thing that comes into my head, a funny thing that happened, a slice of life.

I can return to it, and it really does bring back the past. It doesn't take much, like looking at a photo.

Sometimes I cheat and write two sentences.

Gretchen had lots more to say. See Part 2 of my conversation about Happiness with Gretchen Rubin: Time Management for a Happy Home.

Meanwhile, you can see how I attempted the one-sentence journal on my blog, Confessions of a Worrywart.

What are your guiding principles for a happy home? We'd love to hear from you in the comments below.

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