Monday, April 30, 2012

More Advice For Grads

Since people seemed to like the advice post (not really my style, was worried it was kinda lame), thought I'd add a few more. Well, I don't know if people liked it, but it got a lot of eyeballs.

Since I'd edited myself down to ten, I figured I'd keep it going. Ten might be a perfect number for a list but it isn't necessarily the perfect number for advice. Here we go:


  1. Be nice to people. Don't burn any bridges. It may feel good in the moment to light a match and set the building on fire when you quit a job, but guess what? You might be interviewing ten years later and be sitting in front of someone who's the best friend of the gal whose cube went up in flames. Keep it to yourself. Walk out the door with dignity. No one cares that you're mad. But they'll remember it and not in the way you want them to.
  2. Don't buy things you can't afford. This includes little things like shoes and dinners out. And big things like houses. Read the fine print. Live within your means. 
  3. Save money (as a corollary to not buying things you can't afford - see #2 above). Every pay check. It may only be $20 every two weeks when you first start working. But eventually it may be $500 or $1000. And then maybe you can buy those things that you want but couldn't afford when you were younger. Or... you can retire without fear! Or ... you can send your kids to college without them having to incur any debt! Or... you can breathe easy simply knowing your kids won't ever have to take care of you. 
  4. Don't live through your children. They are their own people. From the day they feel the rush of cold air on their little tiny bodies. They are ornery or calm or chatty or extroverted. They don't want what you want. They don't always like what you like. Give them time to develop an internal life, to be alone, and explore what they enjoy, what they are good at. 
  5. Dance and sing. A lot. Even if you suck at it. Do it at home alone when you've had a bad day. Or when you've had a good one. Do it with your kids. My kids love to dance with me to Madonna or Bruce Springsteen or Michael Jackson or Train or Lady Gaga. Or any old thing. I don't think I ever danced around the house with my mom. It's a beautiful thing to dance with your kids. Do it. They won't want to do it later. 
Alright. I think that is all the life advice I have. I think I'm writing it because I need to remember to take it myself. I'm going to turn on some music and dance now. 

Sunday, April 29, 2012

Enough already!

I've dated 3 men in the past year, only one for a significant period (5 months). That's really more than I've ever dated in my life. But it's time to take a little break. Which also means doing some assessing. Not just of the last year. But of my relationship life in general.

I realize that I have a tendency towards men who spare no time getting to the business of telling me what's wrong with me, what I should be doing differently. Whether they're nice about it or not is beside the point. Why do I lean towards men who do this? (Or do they all? I honestly don't know!) Is it back to the old (boring) standby - I'm used to being told what's wrong with me by ruthless, unsparing coaches? YAWN!!

As boring, redundant and annoying as this may be, I do think this might be it. I believe I deserve the criticism. Deep down, somewhere in my heart of hearts, I believe they're right to do it. Therefore it doesn't repel me. Though most women I know would high-tail it out the door before the second criticism passed his lips. I endure. Because I believe it's all true to some extent. And therefore deserved albeit annoying.

I tend to look passed faults, at first. If I find them, I push them aside in trying to be open. I so want to be open! I try to look at the whole person, even if one little bit is askew and doesn't fit with my ideal picture. I squint a little, I take it all in, see how it feels. After I've viewed the thing in it's entirety, I can decide if we can be complements to each other. If his outstanding qualities provide inspiration and uplift. If the less than outstanding ones are part of his humanity.

Maybe I should pay a little closer attention to these flaws sometimes known as 'red flags'. Things like no job. Or chronic underemployment. Or going at it in the sack like a horny and unskilled 17 year old. Or impatience. Quickness to anger. Petulance. An utter disconnection from reality. Bad breath. Or an inability to financially plan for one's future.

Still, amidst all of these, the biggest red flag, for me, in the future, will be the compulsion to tell me what I do wrong. That I work too much. That I do too much. That my job is easy so why on earth would I worry about it? That what I really need to do is take a year off (yeah that'll happen) so I can just "be". That I'm not affectionate enough. That I don't initiate sex enough or the right way. That I let my kids drink soda. And watch less than educational television. That my kids are too loud. That I'm too stressed and I pick my fingers too much. That I shouldn't go to therapy because, really, it's not a lifelong solution. What you really need is a women's group? (It's called friends, moron.) That I drink too much coffee and not enough water. And and and... are you done?

I know all of these things about myself. (Well, my job isn't easy but the others...I know!) I'm okay with them. Step off already.

Why do men think they have the right to do this? To pick and pick and pick? It's as if they are editing and re-arranging the pieces of the story before they've even read it all the way through - they don't even know if they like it, if it's any good and they want to change it up. Yes, if you've been with someone a long time and he is doing something inconsiderate, or you disagree about some childrearing issue or other, you have to discuss it, to compromise. But when you're dating, just starting out, don't you just have to take it all in? At first? And then, if you're married, don't you have to accept a person's foibles? Not beat him up too much, for being the guy you picked? I need to take this advice myself. Lord knows, I shot some daggers at the ex for simply being the guy he always had been.

Yet I sat mired in unspoken but keenly felt criticism for many years. I wanted too much. I was too competitive. I spent too much money. Or wanted to (so weird, I'm such a saver). I was fake and nice to people when I wasn't really so nice. I was too loud. Too stressed. Too anxious. Too everything.

And now, this feels uncomfortably normal to me. To be criticized is my set point.

I endured it because I felt I deserved it. I didn't adequately express my complaints because I felt unworthy to even have complaints. He was good. I was bad. If I were better, he wouldn't criticize. Period. The answer here is NOT that I should express more complaints. The answer is I should believe I am worthy of not being picked at. Of being appreciated as a too hard working, raggedy cuticled mom of soda drinking loud-mouthed kids.

Note to the next man who wants to date me: (1) pick up the check our first time out; (2) if we have fun - ask me out again before we say goodnight; (3) even if you're trying to be helpful, hold off on anything remotely critical for at least 6 months. Maybe longer. Maybe just hold off on it altogether. For the foreseeable future anyway. I've got enough self-reproach rattling around in my brain for the both of us. I promise.

Saturday, April 28, 2012

2012 Graduates... beware of commencement speeches

I read this little piece today and decided to come up with my own top ten list of "things they won't tell you in a commencement speech that you really need to know".  Okay class of 2012, here goes:

Me and my parents at my college graduation '92

  1. Don't worry too much about making a choice. Any choice. Who to date, where to work. Failing to make choices is usually worse than making one that isn't perfect. I know some folks who failed to choose anything at all in their twenties - a career, a mate, a passion - and they are stuck in never never land. Sometimes not making a choice means staying in school way longer than necessary. Sometimes it means waiting tables forever despite having a college degree. Sometimes it means staying in a destructive relationship. But if you don't choose something, you don't know if it can work. Choose something, try it. Switch directions if it doesn't pan out. But non-choices lead nowhere. 
  2. Say yes. A lot. Do stuff. Fun stuff. As much as possible. Adhere to your notions of fun, of course. Don't feel you have to adopt someone else's. But see music, go biking or hiking or climbing, make movies, drink with friends, travel. Do stuff. You'll be amazed how little time there is later. 
  3. Sleep around a little bit in your twenties. I mean don't be a complete slut. And certainly be safe. Maybe I should say "date" rather than sleep around. But I'm not big on euphemisms. You gotta see what's out there. Right? I never did this. Perhaps that's why I'm recommending it.
  4. Do things that scare you. At the very least, never let fear be a reason not to do something. Every time I've tackled something that scared the shit out of me, I was rewarded. And felt profound accomplishment and gratification. 
  5. Don't have kids too late. Don't have 'em too early either, for god's sake. But save yourself the panic and the medical expenses that come from waiting too too long. You'll never feel totally ready. It's ok. We know how to do this. It's what we're here for after all. 
  6. Speak another language. If you haven't learned one by the time you finish college, go do it. Don't be a lame-o American like me who works with Euros each of whom speak at least four languages. Don't be the ugly American. It's not fun. 
  7. Marry someone you think is remarkable. Not just nice. You won't regret it. Even if it doesn't work out. 
  8. It's not a race. It feels like it sometimes. And if you're competitive like me, you'll really want to win it. Even though there's no race to be won. But stop running, do what you love. Take your ego out of it all. It's hard. But it's possible. Though you will have to constantly remind yourself of this. Every time you put your ego in the middle of a decision, it will be a poor one. I swear it. 
  9. Get a good therapist. Don't go all the time. If you have to go constantly for years and years, you need a new one. He's not helping. But find one you trust, who helps facilitate a change in behavior or feeling or all of it. And doesn't just sit with you while you navel gaze. And then go in for tune ups when you need them. 
  10. It's gonna be hard. Harder than you think. All of it. Having babies, having toddlers, watching them grow up and leave you every single day. Being married, not being married. Watching friends move away. Not getting the job you wanted. Watching people get sick and not being able to do anything at all to help. But it's also going to be amazing. Remember the ebb and flow. And remember to breathe.


Sunday, April 22, 2012

Girls

I've been eagerly anticipating the new HBO show Girls by Lena Dunham, the 26 year old Wunderkind triple threat - Director, Actor, Writer. With one indie, South By Southwest winning film under her belt - Tiny Furniture - she got the deal of a lifetime. Judd Apatow, the outwardly schlemiel-ly but actually menschy mastermind of hilarious and undeniably entertaining films including 40 Year Old Virgin and Knocked Up, saw Tiny Furniture and sought her out. As the story goes. She was already working on the pilot for Girls and from there it was kismet.

I just watched the first episode a few days ago. I'm getting ready to watch the second tonight. It's been billed as a Sex In the City before they were Carrie, Samantha and those other two. When they were young and making terrible mistakes and not yet enjoying sex. Not yet glamorous rather, fumbling through their twenties, searching for jobs, searching for men and finding themselves in humiliating entanglements.  All of this is pretty true.

It is also a pitch perfect depiction of Millennials - that generation of confident, entitled, I'm here to save the world and become Mark Zuckerberg twenty-somethings that I've come across in the form of interns. And to be clear, not all twenty-somethings fit this description. Just as not all the young people (when I was young) met the definition of Gen-X: disillusioned, somewhat angry (at what?), counter culture grunge-loving, Kurt Cobain aficionados. Some of us did. But many went to work in law firms or consulting firms, went to business school and never went to Raves or got tattoos.

But there's a way that generations get defined by their distinctive-from-generations-past young people and the definition sticks. Of course, no generation is monolithic. But Millennials are known to be entitled and want the corner office the day after they start work in a sort of charmingly naive way. Not everyone can be Mark Zuckerberg, right? But it's sort of cute to think so. Before life sets you straight. (Cynicism = Gen X).

As the story goes, these Millennials need lots of praise because they've always gotten it - this is the generation of 'everyone gets a medal, no one loses!' As their Gen-X bosses who expected little and often opted out because we didn't even want the little we might come across, we find them difficult to manage. We are forced to take classes and read articles and books on how to manage them, in fact. Though I opted-in to corporate America I was squarely, definitively an X-er: cynical, skeptical of wanting what everyone had always wanted, tattoos. And now I find myself to be a curmudgeonly 'kids today' parody of fading generations before me, of the ilk who thought the next generation was going to be the end of us. I'm embarrassing myself.

So these Millennials? That's Girls. And I like it. The show, I mean. They are hurting and talented and can't figure it out. Which is, universally, what it is to be young. They are this crazy combination of over-confident, exceedingly entitled and desperately insecure. In the opening show, Hannah (Lena's character) is cut off by her parents after 2 years of being on the dole, post college. She's flabbergasted. She can't imagine why they'd do this when she's a burgeoning talent, a writer. The voice of her generation, potentially. Or "a voice of a generation" as she puts it. See, there's a hint of self-doubt in there - barely visible, but there.

I love the aspiration. Of the show. Of Hannah. And she's clearly not as sure of herself as she might want to be. She's awkward, sleeps with men who treat her terribly because she must think she doesn't quite deserve more. But what I'm not sure of, is do the creators, does Lena Dunham think this entitlement is an annoying characteristic of her generation or does she think it's justified - simply how they ought to be? It feels like she knows how annoying they can be. And at the same time loves them. She is them. But she isn't. Clearly in real life she is dedicated, hard-working, successful, ballsy, not living off her parents and very privileged. She didn't have to wait long for her big break so does she get that her life isn't what normally happens to people? I'm assuming she does. And that she's grateful.

There's part of me that wants to not like it because of the hype (I'm a Gen-Xer at heart) and the overnight sensation-ism of this not yet thirty year old. Having friends and family that have toiled for years as writers to not meet with nearly the success that she has without even seemingly having to try... well, it's hard not to want to hate it. But I don't.

I'd like it that much more if I knew that this generation sees this quality of entitlement as slightly annoying. A tic to be outgrown rather than a birthright. I'm not sure.


Saturday, April 14, 2012

A remarkable trip

I just got back from Europe. It was a whirlwind tour. Three cities in 5 days. Sounds fun. Mostly it was tiring and a lot of work. Traipsed through Barcelona visiting El Corte Ingles' - the premiere Spanish department store; hiked Munich, again, checking out department stores. And then in Brussels, I visited our corporate offices for a day of meetings. One day I'll visit Europe and see sites...surely there are other things to do besides check out Dockers and Tommy Hilfiger displays. Alas, I'm exceedingly familiar with the retail landscape across the continent.

I was lucky enough to "run into" a friend in Brussels. Not so coincidental, I suppose, though he lives in Australia and I live in San Francisco. He is also a long time Levi's employee and we've worked on many a project together across the seas. He was in Brussels for a different set of meetings; it would have been easy to have been in the same offices for a full day and not run into each other at all. But he heard someone mention my name and he came and sought me out in my windowless conference room. What a nice surprise!

I met him and his crew for dinner and we chatted animatedly while leaning into each other for most of the night, leaving others to speculate about us (he's straight) - I imagine. It's all very innocent. We're two old-timers in the land of newbies, connecting over old stories that no one remembers but us. I'm pretty sure a rumor or two started though.

After dinner we headed to the pub for a pint. He asked about my real life - not work life. He knows about my divorce, my dating travails. He said: don't settle, Jen. You must not settle.

I'll try. I'm trying.

You're a remarkable person. One of the most I've ever known. He said that.

Wow, I thought. "Remarkable" is such a lovely word. He used it to describe me. Me. It almost made me cry. I want someone that thinks I'm remarkable. I thought my ex was. I don't think he ever thought I was. Maybe he did. I'm not sure. But if he did, I certainly never knew it. And perhaps I didn't let him know I thought it either. But you have to think they are remarkable, and experience them as kind, and for both of those things to be reciprocated, for it to work. Both things, both ways are necessary.

I left with utter confidence, feeling as if I truly deserved for someone to think that of me. This felt like a revelation though I think some people always know that and expect it. Wow! I realized, I don't think I ever thought that before. I don't think I thought I deserved that. I thought - though never said aloud or even thought concretely - that what I deserved was for someone to make me work for their love. To prove myself worthy of it. To jump through hoops for a few scraps every now and again. Where does that come from? Such an astonishing realization at this point in one's life. To realize that I've never expected to be loved in that way.

And I also realized I need to find someone that I too think is remarkable. That astounds me with how he thinks, what he does, how he treats me. I deserve that. And I do believe, now that I've realized this - and felt it in my bones - that I will have it.


Saturday, April 7, 2012

Friends

I was just reading a piece in Vanity Fair about the "Friends" phenomenon. While I was never super into the show, it was pretty interesting to read about its humble beginnings. No real stars, seasoned writers who were used to seeing their share of failed pilots. They approached it like any other pilot. Maybe it will make it, maybe not. But they were passionate about the idea from the outset. It wasn't a fabricated concept like "what if an alien lived with this regular family?" or even "what if rich white people adopted two black kids"... it was intended to be about that time in your life when your friends are your family. When you hang out at the cafe, at the bar, telling stories about your day. When you spend holidays together, take vacations together, do pretty much everything together.

Reading about it and seeing it summarized took me back to my early days in San Francisco. I lived with a rotating group of girlfriends. We worked odd jobs, odd hours. We went out together, we ate together (whoever was home at whatever time one of us got home), we cooked together and we dyed our hair (constantly) together. I'd be lucky to spend as much time in a year with a friend now as I spent in just a few days with those ladies.

Later I moved just a few blocks away, and lived with a guy I didn't know all that well - a friend of a friend from Philadelphia. We had a rotating third roommate, and Philly guy's girlfriend basically lived with us as well. Those two introduced me to the man who would be my husband - and then ex husband. The four of us were inseparable. At this point we all had "regular" jobs, but it was never in question that we would eat dinner together every night, drink a few pints, go out on the weekends, staying up until the time I currently wake up on a Sunday morning.

My friends were my family. No doubt about it. If I got bad news at the doctor, I came home and told them. If I wanted to celebrate a promotion, we went out to the local bar, Chances, and drank too many IPAs. If we were bored, we also went to Chances, and maybe drank too many IPAs.

Somewhere around 30ish, the friends receded just a bit. I moved in with my boyfriend (the one that would become the husband), I got married, I had a baby. In a short period of time, seeing friends became a special activity to be planned weeks in advance, rather than a way of life. It didn't make the friends less important, just less constantly present. And the husband became the one to tell good news and bad news to first. Friends also transitioned over the years. I needed some who also had kids, to understand the plight of first time motherhood - the tears, the tiredness, the tantrums (mine, Virgil's, hubbie's). Some friends faded out, some stayed but more in the background. The college ones that I'd first lived with had spread out across the country, nonetheless, we were tied together with hefty everlasting rope. Even though I might only see them once a year. Or less.

And others - work friends, mom friends - became much more visible. I always thought the friends that "mattered" were those early friends. The ones that became friends when friends were your family. And they do. But somehow, along the way, new friends became tethered to me, to my life of today. They knew me, my strengths and weaknesses and turmoils, as an adult. One such friend, Steve, started out as a work acquaintance. Over the years, we worked more and more closely together. One night, in 2007, we found ourselves together in London. We were with a group, but we ditched them, and drank pints and ate steaks and talked books until midnight. We both loved Caroline Knapp's books "Drinking: A love story" and "Appetites". More importantly we both loved books. We knew the difference between "good books" and "bad books" (a few years later we both enjoyed - that's an understatement - "Twilight" and all the rest of 'em) but read both and took them for what they were. I consider that the evening we became friends.

A few years later, we ended up working even more closely together, on a team with its work cut out for it. It was a slog. We seemed to travel endlessly. We hit the hot spots in the U.S. including Little Rock, Dallas and Menomonee Falls. We also traipsed through Barcelona, Paris, London, Brussels, Instanbul and Munich and back again, several times over. Sounds glamorous and it felt that way at first, and then it got exhausting. A city a day for a week, walking endless city miles to visit department stores that all seemed to look the same after a while. That doesn't even sound like it could be part of someone's job but it is, when you market pants. We shared bottles of wine and beers and secrets. I was at the beginning of the end of my marriage and he listened while I talked and he shared his own ups and downs. He and his partner (yes he's gay making our friendship nothing to raise an eyebrow about) faced good times and bad in their 15 year plus relationship (a lifetime for the gays) and weathered every storm, admirably. He never judged or told me what to do. And when I decided what to do, he was there.

It's not a mushy friendship. We don't really hug. There's no heads on shoulders during crying jags. But I wouldn't have made it through without him. He always listened, he always called to check in, he always made me laugh. Working as closely as we did, 8 sometimes 10 hours a day together, it was like one of those friendships from my twenties. Where you literally spend all your time with each other. I spent more time with him than my husband (was that the problem?), my kids, anyone. Such is modern work life. That time spent, along with the experiencing of every emotion under the sun together from joy to despair to sheer exhausted frustration forges a friendship tethered by one of those everlasting ropes. Like Courney Cox and Jennifer Aniston, the alter egos of Monica and Rachel. These two seem to still be BFFs, providing shelter from the storms of divorce and rehab and bad reviews and stolen husbands. Even though they don't do the show "Friends" together anymore. They became friends who became family just like the characters on the show. (I can't believe I'm making this analogy to "Friends" a show I never really cared for... corny...but oh well.)

Such is Steve, for me, even though we weren't in our twenties when we met and we certainly aren't in our twenties now. It doesn't hurt that he thinks I'm funny ("you funny" he says), smart ("I would never want to have to debate you. No way") and generally great company. Back at ya.

All of this is a long windup to say that Steve is moving. To New York. And I hate it. I'll probably see him as much as I do now. If not more. We haven't worked together for a year. So we see each other for dinners about once every six weeks and talk on the phone through daily challenges or bigger life decisions. I go to NY regularly for work, he'll visit here no doubt. But I'm sad anyway. I know how it goes. He'll be tied to me but I'll reach for the phone less ... someone else closer by will fill the daily void (I hope!) ... and while we'll still be thick as thieves, we'll just have a different less constantly present kind of friendship. For now.

So long pal. I'll see you in June when I'm in NY. Don't forget to tug the rope once in a while.

Monday, April 2, 2012

Boger Update

A while ago I wrote about a man named Doug Boger who was the head coach at Flairs Gymnastics in the 1980's. A group of women who were competing back in my era came forward to USA Gymnastics (USAG) to report his abusive behaviors. He reportedly kicked, hit, choked and sexually abused young girls - these women (then girls) and others. The USAG dragged their feet but eventually banned him from the sport - he was coaching at a gym in Colorado up until very recently. It's hit the national news - USA Today and CNN amongst other outlets - have reported on it.


Doug Boger


USAG is still claiming there's not much more they can do other than ban him. I say: not so. How about changing the rules? Much more can be done to prevent future incidents as well as providing clear policies and procedures when abuse is suspected. How about making gym owners accountable for the behaviors of those coaches or other employees on their payroll? What if a club's gym membership was suspended for hiring an abuser or failing to act when reported abuse was happening to the girls training in the gym? What if the girls couldn't compete in USAG competitions if clubs failed to comply? USAG argues this punishes the girls - but doesn't training with a pedophile, risking the athletes' emotional and physical well-being, hurt them more? There are always other gyms to go to that will comply with the policies thus making it possible to compete (and train safely) if a club is banned from membership. Gyms should be required to report suspected abuse. It should not be left to discretion - clearly that isn't working. Gyms should sign up to do this upon becoming member clubs, in the name of athlete protection. This doesn't currently exist.

I'm not a lawyer. I don't know what's truly possible. But certainly, something akin to the above is feasible?

It's not asking for much really. Under various state laws, Pediatricians are required to report suspected abuse to officials lest they risk losing their licenses. If a school principal suspected abuse or was told of abuse by a teacher and did nothing - said "it's rumors" or "there's not enough proof" - there would be outrage (and probably some laws broken, depending on the state). There should by no means be a witch hunt, but there should be a proper investigation. These athletes should be provided the same protections they are provided in other areas of their lives - like in school, or at the doctor.

I know how insular that world can be. I came from it. It made sense to me then. I can tell you stories. Some of which were in my book; some of which were not. The boys coach in our gym was a legendary pedophile. He took advantage of those kids without strong parental presence. He was a world class coach (and a teacher). No one wanted to rock the boat. "It would ruin his life," was a common refrain by some parents. Like he ruined those kids' lives. I feel terribly that I didn't do something - though as a kid myself I followed the lead of the adults. If no one came forward maybe it wasn't that bad? He was eventually fired. But went on to open his own gym nearby and then, later, 'retired' abruptly under hazy circumstances and passed ownership of the gym on to one of his coaches. No one ever came forward to officially accuse him. He probably continued teaching in the school system. But who knows. In another instance, a young girl got up the gumption to tell her parents what was happening in the gym at the hands of one of her coaches. "Surely you've made a mistake," and they waved it off. It was a different time, people often say. Was it that different though?

Mr. Boger went on trial in the 1980's. His legal bills were footed by parents in the gym. He was staunchly defended. No one wanted to believe that their beloved coach - the guy who was gonna bring their daughters medals and Olympic team berths - was an abuser.

Boger with a gymnast in the '80s


We have an unhealthy belief in winners. This is not unique to sport. Winning = good = beyond reproach. He wins (or trains those who do) therefore he can't be that monster. Maybe he bends the rules a bit. But winners get to.  Just like Wall Streeters. They "win" money. They do harm. They go unpunished. Sound familiar?

Maybe it's time to develop a little less faith in winning. Not that we should instinctively distrust those who succeed. But they must not be beyond criticism - or viewed as beyond the law - simply BECAUSE they win.

In many cases, I'd argue, it's their winning that makes them believe they have the power to exist outside the rules. Their egotism may in fact prompt recklessness, illegal acts. In the same way it makes politicians do things like father babies with their "girlfriends" while their wives are dying, or tweet penis pictures, or troll for sex in airport bathrooms. Power corrupts, is the phrase. And while, to the outside world, it may not seem like gymnastics coaches are powerful, I can tell you, from inside, they hold all the cards.




Sunday, April 1, 2012

My Mini Happiness Project

I just finished reading a book called The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin. I generally don't subscribe to these "project-type" books. I'd put Eat, Pray, Love smack dab in the epicenter of this genre which I didn't particularly like. Though I do recognize its value and its raging popularity and I wouldn't dare suggest my opinion is somehow more right than most people's - I'm in the minority here. So perhaps I just didn't get it or relate to it.

There does seem to be a spate of 'project' books of late - I'll do something for a year to better myself and I'll regale you with all the ways I bettered myself and you can too! Generally they seem artificial, contrived to me. And the language a bit cloying and/or too self-helpy for my tastes. This one - The Happiness Project - goes so far as to equip the reader with the tools to start her own happiness project. Which I'm not going to do. Nonetheless I got some worthwhile snippets from the book. And even learned that I already do a lot to promote my own happiness. Ms. Rubin clearly states that everyone's happiness project is going to be different - we all have different things that make us happy. But there are some general principles to abide by... I'm not going to quote her directly. Here's my interpretation of some of the "general principles":


  1. Be yourself. Sounds like grade school pablum. But it's true. Know what you like, don't wish you liked other stuff (unless what you like somehow hurts people). And do more of it. And feel good about it.
  2. Act happy and you'll feel happy. It's true. Act poopy and you'll be a poop. Period.
  3. Working on your own happiness actually helps the world. If you're happy, you'll do more good deeds, be more generous. If you're blue, you'll do nothing. So it isn't selfish (or stupid) to be happy. 
  4. It's easier to be a Debbie Downer than the gal that sees the bright side. It takes work and awareness to be happy. 
  5. Dwelling on everyday problems doesn't help. Let it go. 
  6. Lighten up. Laugh at yourself.
  7. Give of yourself. Or "spend out" as she calls it. Don't give with wanting something in return. Give because it makes people happy. And it makes you happy to make them happy. And on it goes. 
  8. Get lots of rest.
  9. Exercise.
  10. Be nice.
  11. Don't keep score.

Ok she had others. But these ones resonated with me because I've been practicing them unwittingly. I give myself pretty high marks on these. I can do better on "let it go". I get sad sometimes. Not about silly stuff. About real stuff. But stuff I can't do anything about. And the fact is, my life is good. I'm healthy. My kids are healthy and kind and humble. My family is loving and supportive. I've got a great job that I really love that more than affords me the things I want to do. I work with smart, fun people that I enjoy being around even if many of them are moving on to other things. And I have a "hobby" (writing) that I also love. I'm not in a relationship. I don't have an obvious emergency contact. So what! I come to my own rescue all the time. And I've got lots of friends willing to step in in a crunch. Lucky girl is me. 

She points out throughout the book that she didn't write it because she was particularly UN-happy. (I suspect that part of the reason she wrote it is that she noticed a trend in project books and she had an idea for one that she sold... but that's cynical and not particularly nice but I'd do it too if I could think of a good project book!) She simply thought she could be happier. And can't we all.

This is my list of very practical things that I will do in the coming months to be even happier. 

  1. Write a book (working on it).
  2. Actively blog (doing it now).
  3. Be positive, don't criticize (easy at work, harder outside... I can do it).
  4. Spend money on things that make me happy - trips with my kids.
  5. Spend money without worrying or feeling guilty.
  6. Don't react to negativity.
  7. Validate my kids feelings when they're being pains in the butt. It diffuses conflict - related to point 6 above.
  8. Exercise (working on it - keep it up!)
  9. Be me / know my character - do more of what I love, don't feel badly about what I like, want, need (even bad TV on occasion).
  10. If I think someone else requires or deserves some sort of generosity, or kindness (I worry a lot about the people that work for me, for instance - and try to think of ways to make sure they always feel appreciated and heard) - then so do I. I generally think I can do without the things I think others need or deserve. Not so. 
  11. Don't fret (I've been getting pretty good at this but I need to keep at it).
  12. Date if it happens, but don't worry about it too much.
  13. Sometimes...don't make the bed!
So there's my list. It is not an official "project". There are no timelines to be met. No solemn commitments. Just this reminder that I can consult if and when I fall off the happy.