Comment by A Reader on Book Review: Creating Your Own Way To Happiness by Robert Bruce and Lee Ann Kirby

Sun, 24 Feb 2008 05:45:36 EST

Having read many books on happiness, I read with great interest your review of Creating Your Own Way to Happiness by Robert Bruce and Lee Ann Kirby. Personally, I generally tend to have more confidence in the recent science-based books on happiness written by authors with academic credentials, however, your review intrigued me, as I have to think that with a combined total of 95 years of marriage between the two authors, it is likely that they have accumulated the wisdom that comes from valuable life experience, and I intend to check out their book. I also noticed that you included several recent books on happiness following your article, which presumably you recommend, including the most recent addition to the growing body of literature on Positive Psychology, the science of human happiness -- Dr. Sonja Lyubomirsky's The How of Happiness. I feel you chose wisely in recommending that wonderful book, which has enjoyed great popularity recently. Of course, with the glut of books coming out on this subject over the past 4 or 5 years, many of them bestsellers, sometimes it is difficult to determine which of them are good solid books, with reliable information and effective strategies, and which are mostly hype. When it comes to Dr. Lyubomirsky's new book, however, The How of Happiness, one can have confidence that the information is reliable and the strategies are sound -- the book is written by one of the leading researchers in the study of human happiness, a world-renowned expert, and the information in the book is based on solid empirical evidence and scientific data. In reviewing all of the books on the subject of happiness over the past decade, I thought I would bring to your attention a book that stands out as the forerunner of all these popular books on human happiness -- In speaking of this book, Dr, Lyubomirsky has said, "If you go to the bookstore, you will find many, many books on happiness. And I'm often asked what is the best book about happiness out there. I truthfully always say it is The Art of Happiness. I believe that." The Art of Happiness: A Handbook of Living, is a collaboration between H.H. the Dalai Lama and Howard C. Cutler, M.D., an American psychiatrist. This book was in the vanguard of popular happiness books, and can be considered the "gold standard," as even today, after all of the more recent bestsellers, it still remains as the most successful book on the subject -- published in 1998, just prior to the explosion of interest in happiness among both the scientific community and the general public (Dr. Martin Seligman coined the term "Positive Psychology in 1998, formally establishing the study of happiness as a new field of scientific inquiry), The Art of Happiness remained on The New York Times bestseller list for 97 weeks, and was a huge international bestseller as well. It presents the Dalai Lama's views on leading a happier life, supplemented with outstanding commentary by Dr. Cutler. While the Dalai Lama's views are of course rooted in Buddhist thought, it is a secular book written for individuals from any tradition or background, and has been enjoyed by Christians, Jews, practitioners of other religions, as well as those who adhere to no religion. Dr. Cutler did a remarkably effective job in framing the Dalai Lama's ideas within a contemporary Western context, finding supporting scientific evidence corroborating the Dalai Lama's suggestions and advice about achieving greater happiness, as well as providing compelling illustrations of how we might go about applying the Dalai Lama's ideas in everyday life. Published just before the sudden interest in happiness research among the scientific community, the book did not have the advantage of many of the new studies on happiness, but the remarkable thing is that in the intervening years since the book was first published, the new scientific studies have seemed to invariably confirm and support the Dalai Lama's views--which are based on the 2500 year old Buddhist tradition. So, while there are many wonderful and helpful books on happiness in recent years, The Art of Happiness still stands alone, with its skillful integration of East and West--beginning with the Dalai Lama's extraordinary wisdom and insight on how to achieve happiness, which is then augmented and given greater dimension for Western readers as a result of Dr. Cutler providing the Western scientific and psychological perspective, which has become so popular among the practitioners of Positive Psychology in recent years. For more information on The Art of Happiness For more information on Dr. Sonja Lyubomirsky.

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Comment by A Reader on Book Review: Creating Your Own Way To Happiness by Robert Bruce and Lee Ann Kirby