The Best Quotes From ‘100 Simple Secrets Of Happy People’

by John Hawkins | April 21, 2011 4:42 am

All of these quotations are from 100 Simple Secrets of Happy People, The: What Scientists Have Learned and How You Can Use It[1]. Enjoy!

“Psychology professors who figure out a better way to think about life spend their careers sharing it with other professors.” — XV

“For some people there are no victories, just alternate forms of losing.” — Xvi

Happy people do not experience one success after another and unhappy people, one failure after another. Instead, surveys show that happy and unhappy people tend to have had very similar life experiences. The difference is that the average unhappy person spends more than twice as much time thinking about unpleasant events in their lives, while happy people tend to seek and rely upon information that brightens their personal outlook. (Lyubomirsky 1994) — P.4

Close relationships, more than personal satisfaction or one’s view of the world as a whole, are the most meaningful factors in happiness. If you feel close to other people, you are four times as likely to feel good about yourself than if you do not feel close to anyone. (Magen, Birenbaum, and Pery 1996) — P.12

Too often we watch TV because that’s what we usually do rather than because there is something we actually want to see. Ask yourself when you are watching TV, “Is this something I want to see? Would I ask this program be made if it didn’t already exist?” — P.13

Better sleepers are 6 percent more satisfied with their lives than average sleepers, and 25 percent more satisfied than poor sleepers. (Abdel Khalek, Al-Meshaan, and Al-Shatti 1995) — P.20

Any situation can be viewed as an act of selfishness, if that’s how you want to view it. Taking this perspective makes us cold, critical, and cynical. — P.28

In research on highly educated professionals, almost half the subjects could not become satisfied even as they accomplished their apparent goals because they did not recognize their accomplishments and instead created an irrational negative image of themselves. (Thurman 1981) — P.41

Research on the effect of religion on life satisfaction found that regardless of what religion people affiliated themselves with, those who had strongly held spiritual beliefs were typically satisfied with life, while those who had no spiritual beliefs typically were unsatisfied. (Gerwood, LeBlanc, and Piazza 1998) — P.43

Imagine for a moment that today was your last day on Earth. Now, make a list for yourself of all the things that you feel you have accomplished, all the things you are proud of, and all the things that make happy. — P.50

There is no objective way to tell you if you have had a good life, a good day, or a good hour. Your life is a success based only on your judgment. — P.62

Individuals who tend to be socially open rate their overall life satisfaction 24 percent higher than individuals who do not. (Finch, Barrera, Okun, Bryant, Pool, and Snow-Turek 1997) — P.69

A philosopher once noted that people long for immortality but run out of things to do on a rainy afternoon. — P.70

In studies of college students, those with more demanding schedules were 15 percent more satisfied with life. Despite the more demanding schedules, the individuals studied did not experience any more stress than those with less to do. (Bailey and Miller 1998) — P.71

Not surprisingly, surveys find that happy people tend to have more positive experiences than unhappy people. What is striking is that, objectively, their lives aren’t really much different. Studies find that happy people experience much the same range of events as unhappy people. The real difference is in what they define as positive and negative. Happy people are those who use a lower threshold in order to lable an event positive. (Parducci 1995) — P.73

Those who regularly ruminate over negative subjects and unhappiness are 70 percent less likely to feel content than those who do not. (Scott and McIntosh 1999) — P.76

Happiness does not depend on how many bad things happen to an individual. What is more important is whether an individual tends to make negative conclusions about him – or herself when negative events occur. Individuals who think of themselves as the cause of negative events are 43 percent less likely to be satisfied than individuals who do not. (Panos 1997) — P.86

Being happy and being moral buttress each other. People who feel they lack morals report they are half as likely to feel happy compared to those who feel they are moral. (Garrett 1996) — P.92

An interesting thing happened on Tuesday mornings in the fall of 1998. A study found that workers in the Northeast were 3 percent more productive than they had been on Tuesdays the autumn before. What changes? Monday night football came on an hour earlier in 1998, and more men got a decent night’s sleep as a result. — P.95

In research on hundreds of college students, individuals were found to be happiest when they felt they were moving closer to achieving their goals. Students who could not see progress were three times less likely to feel satisfied thad students who could. (McGregor and Little 1998) — P.98

A positive effect on mood was found for 92 percent of individuals when they listened to the music of their choice. Excitement and happiness were typical reactions to the music. (Hakanen 1995) — P.129

The problems you spend your time and energy on should be both important and improvable. Otherwise, you are better off moving on to things you can change. — P.138

Today many of us yearn for more contact with our family, while two hundred years ago people had so much contact with their families that they became sick of one another. — P.144-145

We spend so much time chasing dollars, worrying about dollars and counting dollars. It may surprise you to learn that satisfaction with life is no more likely among the rich. — P.168