How to Build a Life
A column about pointing yourself toward happiness
A column about pointing yourself toward happiness
You can find deep, lasting happiness in a good deed that no one knows you did.
You’ll enjoy the season more if you lower your expectations.
We asked. Here’s what you told us.
Putting things off can improve your performance—if you do it right.
Once you’ve met your most basic needs, an obsession with your bank account might be hiding deeper anxieties.
Adjusting your attitude is easier than you think.
Even if you think you have little to celebrate this year, you can—and should—practice gratitude.
Arthur C. Brooks and Lori Gottlieb discuss the importance of fun, the cultural distortion of emotions as “good” or “bad,” and how envy points you in the direction of your deepest desires.
Real happiness starts with telling yourself the truth, even when it hurts.
Our fears about what other people think of us are overblown and rarely worth fretting over.
Arthur C. Brooks and BJ Miller, a palliative-care physician, explore the difference between “necessary” and “unnecessary” suffering, and the paradoxical realities of human joy.
Chasing the sun usually isn’t worth it. Learn to like the climate you’ve got instead.
Arthur Brooks and Jenn Lim, the CEO of Delivering Happiness, analyze the barriers to feeling that your work serves a higher purpose.
Hiding your feelings can be freeing. But eventually you have to take off the mask.
Arthur Brooks and the Harvard psychology professor Dr. Ellen Langer discuss the importance of curiosity and living in the moment—and how an illusion of stability may be holding you back from exactly that.
You can make your quest for meaning manageable by breaking it down into three bite-size dimensions.
Arthur Brooks and Dr. Shefali, a clinical psychologist and mindfulness expert, discuss the definition and dangers of self-objectification—and what it really means to be yourself.
Even if you have no interest in being a pop star or the president, beware the siren song of prestige.
Dr. Vivek Murthy and Arthur Brooks discuss loneliness—what it feels like, how difficult it is to identify, and the remedies to alleviate its impact on our daily lives.
You can forge a happier relationship with your devices by using them more mindfully.