How to Build a Life
A column about pointing yourself toward happiness
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Jan Buchczik Sedentary Pandemic Life Is Bad for Our Happiness
The times when we most want comfort and rest may paradoxically be the times we most need to move, for the sake of our well-being.
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Jan Buchczik Reading Too Much Political News Is Bad for Your Well-Being
Obsessing over politics could hurt your happiness and your relationships.
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Jan Buchczik What to Do When the Future Feels Hopeless
Humans like to feel optimistic about and in control of where their life is headed. The pandemic has made it very hard to feel that way.
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Jan Buchczik The Clocklike Regularity of Major Life Changes
Transitions feel like an abnormal disruption to life, but in fact they are a predictable and integral part of it.
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Jan Buchczik Why It’s So Lonely at the Top
Work friendships are crucial to happiness. What happens when you can’t make them?
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Jan Buchczik How to Navigate a Midlife Change of Faith
When we think of our identities as fixed and unchanging—I am this kind of person; I am not that kind of person—we’re shutting ourselves off from many of life’s possibilities.
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Jan Buchczik ‘Success Addicts’ Choose Being Special Over Being Happy
The pursuit of achievement distracts from the deeply ordinary activities and relationships that make life meaningful.
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Jan Buchczik Love Is Medicine for Fear
Life, especially pandemic life, is full of threats and uncertainty. When we feel afraid, bringing more love into our lives can help.
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Jan Buchczik A College Degree Is No Guarantee of a Good Life
Higher education is often described as an investment. But it’s still unclear if it pays off in happiness.
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JAN BUCHCZIK Sit With Negative Emotions, Don’t Push Them Away
If we want a life full of deep meaning, true love, and emotional strength, it’s going to involve the risk (and often the reality) of discomfort, conflict, and loss.
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JAN BUCHCZIK The Best Way to Handle Your Decline Is to Confront It Head On
Much like contemplating death can neutralize the fear of it, it can help to acclimate yourself to the idea of losing professional skills before it happens.
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JAN BUCHCZIK 4 Rules for Identifying Your Life’s Work
What shape your professional path should take depends on how you define success.
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Jan Buchczik Why So Many People Are Unhappy in Retirement
Too often, we imagine life to be like the hero’s journey, and leave out its crucial last step: letting go.
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Jan Buchczik Two Errors Our Minds Make When Trying to Grasp the Pandemic
Disappointment and uncertainty are inevitable. But we don’t have to turn them into suffering.
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Jan Buchczik The 3 Equations for a Happy Life, Even During a Pandemic
“How to Build a Life” is a new column that aims to give you the tools you need to construct a life that feels whole and meaningful.
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Luci Gutiérrez Your Professional Decline Is Coming (Much) Sooner Than You Think
Here’s how to make the most of it.
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John Locher / AP Fear Can Make You a Better Person
Philosophers and sages have long considered fear a tool for self-improvement—but no, cheap scares don’t count.
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