“Happiness is like a cat, If you try to coax it or call it, it will avoid you; it will never come. But if you pay no attention to it and go about your business, you'll find it rubbing against your legs and jumping into your lap.”

—William Bennett

The first two books come from the Great American Read list of 100 novels: The Giver, by Lois Lowry and The Stand, by Stephen King. I’m not sure I’m up for this chunk of a book, but maybe. Or maybe I’ll woman up and choose War and Peace?  

I’m very intrigued by Circe, by Madeline Miller. 

Blandings Castle, by P.G. Wodehouse. Sometimes I just need a little Wodehouse. (I was disappointed to see none of his novels made the list for the Great American Read.) 

Starting to prepare for Paris in the fall with these possibilities: 

The Light of Paris, by Eleanor Brown. This one is waiting for me at the library as I type. Thanks to Danielle for the recommendation.

The Little Pleasures of Paris, by Leslie Jonath.

True Pleasures: A Memoir of Women in Paris, by Lucinda Holdforth.

Paris in Stride: An Insider’s Walking Guide, by Jessie Kanelos Weiner. I’m already reading this charming little book.

Speaking of Paris, I should be practicing my drawing and painting prior to the trip. Am I? No, I am not. Maybe one of these books will jump start my practice:

Keys to Drawing, by Bert Dodson.

The New Creative Artist, by Nita Leland

How about a peek into someone else’s life? I have the Journal of Eugene Delacroix on my shelves, as well as Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady, by Edith Holden.

Surviving Your Dog’s Adolescence, by Carol Benjamin. Because Luna.

Upstream, by Mary Oliver. I love her poetry, and look forward to reading this collection of essays.

The Secret History of Wonder Woman, by Jill Leport. Because now I have a thing for Wonder Woman.   

Queen of Bebop: The Musical Lives of Sarah Vaughan, by Elaine M. Hayes One of my favorite jazz singers

The Beach Street Knitting Society and Yarn Club. by Gil McNeil. Because it’s been on my TBR list for years!

A collection of short stories: either by Eudora Welty (I have a collection on my TBR stack at home), Neil Gaiman’s Smoke and Mirrors, Edith Pearlman’s Honeydew, or Ellen Gilchrist’s Acts of God.

These are the books I feel like reading now—and that list is likely to change over the summer as new books catch my eye. Will I find a new favorite author or will one of these books rate as a “best read” for 2018? I can’t wait to find out.

“Close friends contribute to our personal growth. They also contribute to our personal pleasure, making the music sound sweeter, the wine taste richer, the laughter ring louder
because they are there.”

Those of you who know me know I hate summer in Florida. It’s too hot and humid to enjoy being outside, and those conditions drain my energy and kill any desire I might have to get things done. Unfortunately, the need to get things done doesn’t go away with the advent of summer conditions. Every year, I tell myself I’m not going to complain (much) about the weather, and I am going to plan fun things to look forward to during the hottest, stickiest months. (You can read about previous summer fun lists here and here. Last year I was deep in the redesign of Catching Happiness and didn’t make a list—instead, I asked friends to share their favorite summer pleasures.)

This year, I’d planned to make a summer fun list again, but I’ve been struggling to come up with anything that sounded like fun.

Yes, I can make a struggle out of having fun.

Then I realized that part of the problem was that I was making a list of things to do. If you were already fighting an energy drain, would you want to pile more things to do upon yourself, even for the sake of “fun”? Probably not.

What will make me happy this summer? To have more time to relax and do nothing (or very little). What that translates to for me is: time to read a book on the couch in the afternoon, time to play with Luna in the pool, time to sit in my rocking chair and daydream, even time to putter around my house tidying up the inevitable messes that materialize here and there. (It makes me happy to have a pretty and tidy home.)

In 2018, I’ve been busier with freelance work than I’ve been in a long time (for which I’m very, very grateful), as well as training and supervising Luna, which means I’m stuffing other necessary and pleasurable activities into a smaller box of time. It feels like every moment of my day is full, and there’s a waiting list for my time and attention. So this summer, I want to rush less and savor more, to float rather than dog paddle. 

I’m looking for an easy, relaxed feeling this summer (flow!), not to cram it full of more things to DO. I’m still experimenting with not over-planning my schedule after my mini-breakdown in March. 

Does this make me a slacker? No, it does not. My summer fun list doesn’t have to look like anyone else’s in order for it to be right for me. And neither does yours. I don’t want to run around a lot, but maybe you do. Maybe you’ve been cooped up all winter and you’re ready for adventures! Maybe you still have kids at home who’ll drive you insane if you don’t get them out of the house to do something. I remember those years.

Sure, a movie or a museum visit with a friend will be most welcome, and I’ll likely create a summer reading list since I haven’t done one for a couple of years…and that couch is beckoning. Beyond that, I don’t think I want to commit to doing anything else!

For me this summer, that feels right.

“Why is play so elusive for some grown-ups? Because we are so strongly attracted and attached to a profoundly goal-oriented, work-ethic-driven society. Like other forms of nonwork, play connotes wastefulness, a stoppage in the way of what needs to get done. Yet often what really needs to get done has more to do with our hearts and spirits and less to do with a deadline or longstanding project. Play beckons to us, urging us to live in the present moment, a moment that becomes more luminous when we disallow interruptions like work and worry.”

—Leslie Levine, Ice Cream for Breakfast

How will you play today? 

This is Memorial Day weekend in the U.S.—time to remember the fallen, and mark the unofficial beginning of summer. We’re hosting out-of-town family, and the forecast is for rain, rain, rain. Hopefully the weather will cooperate enough for us to spend time on our lanai. Luna is looking forward to meeting some new people and demonstrating her (questionable) swimming skills.

If your Memorial Day weekend proves rainy, or leaves you with a little extra time on your hands, here are a few links you might love:

I hate to tell you this, but the first half of 2018 is almost over. Yeah, I know, where did it go?! It’s a good time to evaluate how 2018 is shaping up, so check out these “10 Questions for Mid-year Reflection.”

“Four Things Procrastinators Need to Learn” was outstanding. I am a big-time procrastinator (and yes, I have several items on a to-do list that are more than a year old, much to my chagrin). 

Subscribe to free e-magazine Happiful here, or if you prefer, buy print versions here. Happiful aims to provide “informative inspiring and topical stories about mental health and wellbeing. 

You don’t have to consider yourself in midlife to learn from the suggestions in “8 Ways you Can Survive—and Thrive in—Midlife”. Number five helped me understand why setting goals is such a major production in my life.

I so much identified with “What If All I Want is a Mediocre Life?” For example, in one passage, the author writes: “What if I am not cut out for the frantic pace of this society and cannot even begin to keep up? And see so many others with what appears to be boundless energy and stamina but know that I need tons of solitude and calm, an abundance of rest, and swaths of unscheduled time in order to be healthy. Body, spirit, soul healthy. Am I enough?” A question I often wrestle with. 

And speaking of wrestling with feeling not good enough, in “Feeling Overwhelmed? Remember RAIN,” you’ll learn four steps to stop being less hard on yourself.

This baby elephant doesn’t want to stop playing in the mud:

There will be no post Monday due to the holiday weekend, but the Happy Little Thoughts newsletter will go out as scheduled on Sunday. (If you’re not already receiving the newsletter, click here.)

Since reading is one of my favorite simple pleasures, I’m looking forward to watching The Great American Read, an eight-part PBS series which premieres tomorrow, May 22. The documentary will explore and celebrate the power of reading in American culture “through the prism of America’s 100 best-loved novels”. The books were chosen in a national survey, and you can find a list of them here. You can join the Great American Read Book Club here. 

Viewers will have the chance to vote for their favorites online and on social media starting when the first episode airs. The finale will take place in October, when the winner will be revealed. See your local PBS station for details.

As I write this, I’ve read 36 of the 100 on the list, and I’m in the middle of a 37^th (Great Expectations). Several on this list I’ve tried to read and couldn’t get through (I’m looking at you The Catcher in the Rye). I plan to read at least a few more of them, including The Giver, War and Peace, and Stephen King’s The Stand. And there are some on this list that I won’t even attempt to read because they’re just not my cup of tea, life’s too short, and my TBR list is already (wayyyy) too long. That’s the beauty of the modern age of books: there’s a meaningful book out there for everyone. And often they’re freely (literally) available.

Some of my favorites from the list include Anne of Green Gables, The Alchemist (I wrote briefly about both Anne and The Alchemist here), Pride and Prejudice, The Help, and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. Two of my favorite authors who were not on the list: Barbara Kingsolver and P.G. Wodehouse.

(In 2003, the BBC undertook a similar search for the best-loved book in the United Kingdom. The winner of The Big Read was J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings.)

Let’s talk about books! Which of the 100 have you read? Which are your favorites and which ones didn’t you like? Why? Was your favorite on the list?

“Attention is like energy in that without it no work can be done, and in doing work is dissipated. We create ourselves by how we use this energy. Memories, thoughts and feelings are all shaped by how use it. And it is an energy under control, to do with as we please; hence attention is our most important tool in the task of improving the quality of experience.”

—Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience

On the bulletin board next to my desk hangs a sign with the following words:

I’m mean to myself sometimes, and I’m betting you are, too. For instance:

For our own happiness’ sake, I think we should be nicer to ourselves all the time, even when we feel we least deserve it.

A few ways to be nice to yourself include:

Treating your body lovingly. Feed it well, move it, let it rest. And talk to it nicely. Go slow enough, or take enough breaks during the day, that you can hear what it has to say.

Having more fun! Schedule at least one thing just for fun every day. Working out doesn’t count, unless you do it for fun. Maybe it’s a half hour of reading at lunchtime, a glass of wine with your partner before dinner, or playing a game with a friend online. Whatever simple pleasures make your heart happy.

When you are kinder to yourself, you’ll probably find it easier to cut everyone else some slack as well. We’re all imperfect, we all lose concentration now and then, we—gasp—make mistakes! It’s much easier to be patient and forgiving with others when that’s “where you live,” so to speak.

Being nicer to ourselves is not only a way to feel happier, it is also one way to add to the sum total of kindness and gentleness in the world—something the world desperately needs.

How are you mean to yourself? What can you do today to be nice to yourself?

“To be interested in the changing seasons is…a happier state of mind than to be hopelessly in love with spring.”

—George Santayana, “Justification of Art”

I’ve had an influx of beautiful books lately, so I thought I’d share this simple pleasure with you.

I was shopping at Target a couple of weeks ago when this book caught my eye:

First the pretty cover and then the enticing title: A Book That Takes Its Time: An Unhurried Adventure in Creative Mindfulness. I picked it up to flip through and found that each page was unique. Thoughtfully written pieces were interspersed with happy illustrations and interactive goodies, such as tear out “Notecards for your beautiful moments jar.” The clincher that made me drop it into my basket—it is “a flow book.” (Flow is a magazine I’ve heard of but not yet seen in person. Since flow is my word of the year, my reticular activating system is constantly bringing it to my attention!)

I’m taking my time going through this book, savoring the simple pleasures within. On the back cover, it’s described as “A mindfulness retreat between two covers….” It has sections on kindness (to yourself and others), creativity, learning and more, as well as writing prompts, mini-journals, postcards, and decorative papers. I can see it sitting on a coffee table, available to browse through at whim. This was an impulse buy, but well worth the price.

The other beautiful books came to me by way of a contest! Rizzoli Books sponsored a giveaway on Instagram recently, and I won! The books arrived Friday. They’re all beautiful, and I know I’ll spend many happy hours browsing through them. 

 Two were of particular interest to me: Gardens of Style, by Janelle McCulloch, and Paris in Stride, by Jessie Kanelos Weiner and Sarah Moroz. Janelle writes and photographs the most beautiful books, and I’ve read her blog A Library of Design for several years. I claim her as a blogging acquaintance and hope to meet her someday as she sometimes visits Florida. 

Paris in Stride comes at just the right time, as I will be joining Laure Ferlita on her sketching tour in Paris in October! Paris in Stride is subtitled “an insider’s walking guide,” and is arranged by arrondissements, so I think it’s going to be helpful in planning our visit. Plus it’s charmingly illustrated in watercolor! (The books also came with a watercolor of the Eiffel Tour as seen below left.)