Helllloo, Thursday and Summer of Happiness bookclubbers! We're making our way through the inspiring chapters of Gretchen Rubin's useful guide, The Happiness Project. This week we're smack dab in the middle of F-U-N. Gretchen challenges herself to add more fun into her life through these resolutions:

• Find more fun.
• Take time to be silly.
• Go off the path.
• Start a collection.

First off, can I say that as a new blogger (here we are in month 3 of Pars Caeli) that I was interested to see how much of this chapter Gretchen filled with comments from her blog readers!

Anyway, this chapter poses the broad question: what do you consider fun? I identified with Gretchen's inner struggle of what I'd like to enjoy and what I do enjoy. Here's a useful definition of fun that she uses:

Fun: an activity that's very satisfying, has no economic significance, doesn't create social harm, and doesn't necessarily lead to praise or recognition.

What goes running through your head? Where do you find the fun in your life?

Remember back to your childhood, when you were 10, what did you love to do? I remember being really delighted to be in the double digits when I turned ten. I spent lots of time swimming, playing tennis, hanging out and playing games with my family, reading, drawing...

Forgive me for not being more interesting...I still love doing all of those things. I've added a few more to the list of fun but that first list is a known quantity. I always have fun when engaged in those activities.

I identified with Gretchen's accumulation and time investment in blank books. Couldn't you just visualize her as a red-headed little girl, parked in front of the TV with a snack and all of her goodies, ready to make her next collage? I used to spend extensive time writing poetry and quotations in "fancy writing" (emergent calligraphy), and coloring the backgrounds so that I could hang them up or save them in a special sketchbook. (Gee, I am totally still 10.)

Here's a notion that stuck with me - the three types of fun.

1. Challenging fun: it's the most rewarding but requires the most work to step outside of ourselves.
2. Accommodating fun: having fun with/for the sake of others. It strengthens relationships and builds memories.
3. Relaxing fun: no coordination or heavy investment necessary but the passivity of it all makes us LESS happy than the accommodating and much less happy than challenging fun.

This blog is totally challenging fun for me. Just sayin'.

Alright. so it's time to set a resolution for the week, based on Gretchen's ideas.

Take time to be silly.

Though I love to joke, I'm not the best at silly. Silly can frustrate me or at least make me want to move on to the next task more quickly. But this week I'm starting off on my journey to put more silly back into my life.

How about you, reader friends? Where will you find some fun this week?

Thanks for stopping over! It's always so lovely to have you here.

XOXO, MJ

Don't forget to enter our giveaway (winner announced on Monday)!!

It's Thursday, friends, and that means it's time for some Happiness. Catching you up to speed, we're tagging along to Denise's great summer bookclub of the Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin. If you want to hear my take on adding energy to your life or decreasing negativity in your relationships, follow those cheery pink word links.

First a recap of last week. I followed my own path on the resolution list and made a conscious effort to create less negative experiences. Can I break this down for you, friends? Going into this last week, I really thought, "this will have no effect." But, huh, it did. There were a few moments this past week where I could have pressed an issue (like I typically do) or turned a comment into sarcasm (yup, guilty), and I didn't. I took that one extra inhale and kept it to myself. My hubby and I have had some long work nights this week, and eliminating unnecessary negativity (is any negativity necessary? Talk amongst yourselves) helped both us move through the hills and valleys more easily. And even have a sense of humor about it.

This week: a topic near and dear (and always here), happiness in our work.

Gretchen's five resolutions start this chapter titled: Aim Higher

• Launch a blog
• Enjoy the fun of failure
• Ask for help
• Work smart
• Enjoy now

Let me just go sprinting from the gates here...ENJOY THE FUN of failure? Say what? I knew this was going to be a challenge for me to read. Yes on the perfectionist. Yes on the fear of failure. Yes on the need to please.

Moving on.

First nod of agreement: "Being happy can make a big difference in your work life." I have been both happy and unhappy with my worklife at various stages in my career, and as I look back with my brilliant hindsight, I see how some doors closed and windows opened because of my experience. Have you seen this, too?

Here's another that rang a bell: Challenge and novelty are key elements to happiness. Yes. I get this. In the doldrums of day-to-day, if I can insert a surprising twist or turn the mundane into race for myself, I find energy and capacity just waiting to be tapped.

"One reason that challenge brings happiness is that it allows you to expand your self-definition."

As she wrote about blogging, I found myself wanting to pull out a highlighter, which I never use (and of course this is a library book). I've only been blogging since April, and so that rush, the adrenaline of hitting the publish button is still fresh and this wondering of "where in the world do I think this is headed?", still palpable.

I appreciated her ideas on Working Smarter. I don't work in the same way. I find myself setting small goals (send those three emails, finish that project, make phone call) and then adding a bonus to meet that (connect with coworker, take a walk, put on a new song) to add happiness and my version of effectiveness in my work.

And, lastly, I can never get enough of Enjoy Now sorts of themes. I can never be reminded enough. It's really an outcry, a prayer, to be reminded of all the Good gifts we've been given. I really loved reading her positive letter to the negative book review.

This week I'm going to enjoy now and sit back to drink in her first resolution - launch a blog. I'll be busy doing my work in the coming week and away from Pars Caeli as I invite friends over the housesit and entertain (oh, and will you ever be entertained!). And my intuitions tell me I'm going to be a little homesick, too. So, if you're on the fence, not sure if you should or if it's the right time, let me be the one to encourage you:

Launch a blog.

And here's my golden nugget to motivate us both.

Happy work week, friends. That's what the majority are, right? So we might as well make them happy.

How do you add happiness to your job or your vocation?

XOXO,
MJ